Square-jawed star of Paths of Glory and Lust For Life leaves legacy ‘that will endure for generations’, says son Michael Douglas

Kirk Douglas, the self-styled “ragman’s son” who became the last great star of Hollywood’s golden age, has died at the age of 103.

His son Michael announced the news in a statement posted on Instagram on Wednesday evening.

“To the world, he was a legend, an actor from the golden age of movies who lived well into his golden years, a humanitarian whose commitment to justice and the causes he believed in set a standard for all of us to aspire to,” the statement said.

“But to me and my brothers Joel and Peter he was simply Dad, to Catherine, a wonderful father-in-law, to his grandchildren and great grandchild their lovingShatner called Douglas “an incredible icon” of the film industry.

Douglas made his screen debut in the 1946 film The Strange Love of Martha Ivers before giving what would prove his breakthrough performance, playing opposite Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer in the classic film-noir Out of the Past. With his square jaw, cleft chin and ice-chip eyes, he went on to hone a ruthless, alpha-male image on such films as Champion, Ace in the Hole, I Walk Alone and The Bad and the Beautiful.

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Yet Douglas was also shrewd enough to avoid the pitfalls of typecasting. In 1956 he attracted rave reviews for his impersonation of anguished Vincent Van Gogh in Vicente Minnelli’s Lust For Life. John Wayne, for his part, was