By DENNIS ANDERSON .c The Associated Press TEHACHAPI, Calif. (March 1) - It's been more than 40 years since Jack Palance filled the big screen as the Angel of Death, the hired gun who smirks, then kills in the movie ''Shane.'' It's been a fast six years since the 77-year-old star used a one- handed push-up at the Academy Awards to advertise he was an actor looking for work. But these days, the actor who added a sinister elegance to villainy and contributed to the Golden Age of television with his ''live'' star turn in ''Requiem for a Heavyweight,'' compares his life and career to that of a tree. Palance considers himself an oak, like the ones that spread their acorns across the rolling hills of his 1,300-acre cattle ranch in the cradle of the fog-shrouded Tehachapi Mountains, 100 miles due north of Hollywood. Trees often get a better deal in life than people, Palance figures, and he has expressed those sentiments in a book-length poem called ''The Forest of Love,'' which details a man's frank yearnings for love and intimacy with women through the autumn of his years. Palance gives poetry readings at college campuses and bookstores throughout the country. And, if his public is somewhat surprised at such sensitivity from one of filmdom's fiercest bad guys, fans were equally blown away when he pulled his on-camera stunt after winning his best supporting actor Oscar for playing the curmudgeonly Curly in ''City Slickers.'' Even on the night of victory, he displayed some of the anxieties and doubts that are part of any actor's life. But he's sure no one will duplicate that push-up. ''They'd say it's already been done,'' he reflects. Palance, 77, has been busy since the 1991 Oscar ceremonies, making more movies and commercials. But as he sits in his comfortable ranch home, surrounded by Western art and cowboy bronze works, he discusses how his professional view has mellowed. ''I don't really care if I'm in another film,'' he says. ''Films are beautiful ... but they should be done with the generations of now. ''It's curious - the young can be made up to play the old, but the old cannot be made up to play the young.'' And he doesn't spend time dwelling on the movies in which he's been. ''It's just something that was. A walk in the forest is more important than thinking about myself as an actor,'' he says. He continues to work - his latest project a remake of ''Heidi.'' Palance as Heidi's grandfather? That's a career turn for a guy who played Attila the Hun in ''Sign of the Pagan'' and Fidel Castro in ''Che,'' and who won an Emmy early in his career for his role as the bloodied but unbowed boxer in Rod Serling's ''Requiem for a Heavyweight.'' But when he was at Stanford University's drama school after World War II, he always got the lighter roles, and expected to keep playing it light right up until his film debut in 1950 as a gangster carrying bubonic plague in ''Panic in the Streets.'' Columnist Hedda Hopper once wrote of Palance, ''Here's a man who could play Frankenstein without makeup.'' Such words can hurt. Palance, who worked in the coal mines of Pennsylvania and won prize-money boxing, isn't shy about being known as a tough guy. But he is a tender, even vulnerable, tough guy. Hopper, who rarely took anything back, recanted the hard edge of her words, writing in 1954, ''I had no idea then that Jack was shy, sensitive and very intelligent.'' Palance says he wouldn't mind trading places with the trees of his poetic forest. ''Some of the trees on this property are over 500 years old,'' he says, looking out the window of his rambling ranch home. ''When you think about the longevity of a tree, compared to a human, it makes you wonder - it makes you think, maybe you should have been a tree.'' Palance's career span is remarkable. He's worked with some of the great talents of film such as Elia Kazan and George Stevens. And he's shared the screen with stars such as Alan Ladd, Burt Lancaster and Lee Marvin. Some films have been memorable, such as the mercenary in ''Shane,'' the impassioned Mexican rebel chieftain in ''The Professionals'' and the aging cowhand of ''Monty Walsh.'' For television, he had starring roles in ''Dracula'' and ''Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde'' - menacing characters who always oozed pathos from those deep-set eyes. Yet, with more than 130 films, Palance's musings about his dramatic contributions are modest, pained and even uncomfortable. ''If an actor is lucky, he will get a number of good roles,'' Palance says, staring at the large, knobby hands that once picked coal slate from the mines of Lattimer, Pa. ''The actor is giving the message somebody else has given. The actor is given more credit than they give to anybody else, but the message can be brought by another actor. Given a good role, most actors will do it well.'' Palance's greatest esteem for actors is reserved for those of an earlier Hollywood - James Cagney, Wallace Beery and Victor McLaglen. He once refused an offer to remake Sean O'Casey's ''The Informer'' because he didn't think he could exceed McLaglen's performance. Palance reveres Charles Laughton, relishing his role as Captain Bligh in ''Mutiny on the Bounty.'' Among younger actors, he thinks highly of Tom Hanks. ''I don't see very many new films, but when I saw 'Forrest Gump' I was so impressed that it made me wary of myself for not going out to films very often. People who love films want to see everything,'' he says. He smiles, lights a cigar and blows a puff of smoke. Then, he ushers a visitor out to see some of the trees on his ranch. AP-NY-02-27-97 1208EST Copyright 1997 The Associated Press.