Bad guys (and gals) are a dime a dozen in movies, especially when one factors villains from the comic book genre, torture porn flick freaks and Michael Myers from the Halloween series and remakes.
Hell, there must be nearly a dozen or so versions of Myers alone these days.
But a great movie bad-guy -- or bad-gal -- is a treasure to watch; in fact, it's often the villain's work that makes the flick so enjoyable.
Excluding those characters with super-powers, supernatural mojo and those from flicks that could be described as snuff films, this is:
My Top 5: Movie Bad Guys & Gals
Blake, Glengarry Glen Ross (Alec Baldwin): You think I'm fuckin' with you? I am not fuckin' with you. Blake came from downtown on a mission of mercy to grab the attention of the salesmen, and to make sure they knew that coffee was only for closers. See the scene here.
John Doe, Se7en (Kevin Spacey): When Brad Pitt emptied his gun into the body if serial killer John Doe, I cheered. Spacey's calm embrace of evil made Doe one helluva scary bad guy. See the scene here.
Alex Forrest, Fatal Attraction (Glenn Close): She wasn't going to let Dan get away with it. And for the first time I can remember, a cheating husband was the good guy in the movie. See the trailer here.
Hannibal Lecter, Silence Of The Lambs (Anthony Hopkins): Lecter's taste for human flesh wasn't the worst part of this character, in my opinion. What made Lecter such a monster was his ability to see deep into the core of a person, then use that information to manipulate them. See the scene here.
Anton Chigurh, No Country For Old Men (Javier Bardem): Perhaps the most bad-ass of all the bad-guys, Bardem's Chigurh was both compelling and frightening. His coin flip scene is one of the most tense film scenes I've seen in years. See the abbreviated coin flip scene here.
4 comments:
Perfect list! The only other baddie I can think of off the top of my head is the guy Aaron Eckhart plays in "The Company of Men."
Great list. I was wondering if you would have The Joker in here. Even though you said it wouldn't have comic book villians, that movie is just so REAL!
I always liked Alan Rickman as a baddie. You can have him in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves or Die Hard.
I also thought that Norman Bates was a pretty nasty character.
I like Francis Begbie from Trainspotting -a bastard among bastards, really.
Was Boba Fett a villain or just a pimp tryin to stay alive?
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