My good friend Heather has done a great job putting together the ultimate list of 100 most compelling characters in the history of film. She did an amazing job and I wanted to share it with you. Be sure to click the links because she does a great job explaining her picks! At the bottom, you can see my top 25 list as well. – Jeff
100) Shrek
99) The Crow
98) The Drunken Master
97) Wall-E
96) John Malkovich
95) Morpheus
94) Penny Lane
93) Billy Madison
92) Wolverine
91) Blade
90) Brodie Bruce
89) Doc Holiday
88) Dr. Evil
87) Mary Poppins
86) Han Solo
85) Anne Of Green Gables
84) Mr. Pink
83) Annie Hall
82) Achilles
81) Forrest Gump
60) Captain Quint
59) Wilma “Deanie” Lommis
58) Vito Corleone
57) Red
56) Inigo Montoya
55) Axel Foley
54) Jason Bourne
53) Catwoman
52) The Wicked Witch Of The West
51) Frank TJ Mackey
50) Blanche DuBois
49) Katsumoto
48) Sofia
47) The Joker (Jack Nicholson)
46) Travis Bickle
45) Gordon Gekko
44) Martin Riggs
43) Derek Vinyard
42) Catherine Tramell
41) Maximus
40) Drop Dead Fred
39) Jeffrey Goines
38) The “Dude” or Jeff Lebowski
37) Sara Goldfarb
36) Michael Corleone
35) Beetlejuice
34) Captain Kirk
33) Col. Nathan Jessup
32) Rose Sayer
31) Butch Cassidy
30) Edward Scissorhands
29) The Joker (Heath Ledger)
28) Riddick
27) James Bond
26) Captain Jack Sparrow
25) Chili Palmer
24) Yoda
23) Hannibal “The Cannibal” Lector
22) Raoul Duke/Hunter S. Thompson
21) Lestat de Lioncourt
20) Ferris Bueller
19) Dory
18) Scarlett O’Hara
17) Jareth: The Goblin King
16) Sarah Connor
15) Alex DeLarge
14) Norman Bates
13) Lestor Burnham
12) Stanley Kowalsk
11) Annie Wilkes
10) Gollum/Smeagal
9) Dr. Ian Malcolm
8 ) Tommy DeVito
7) Darth Vader
6) Jules Winnfield
5) Dr. Gonzo/ Oscar Z. Acosta
4) Patrick Bateman
3) Indiana Jones
2) Ellen Ripley
1) Tyler Durden
Here is my top 30 characters in film (I’d love to read yours in the comments).
30) Special Agent Fox Mulder – The X-Files
29) Paul Giamatti – John Adams
28) Michael Clayton – Michael Clayton
27) Dorothy Gale – The Wizard of Oz
26) Andre Linoge – Storm of the Century
25) Woody – Toy Story
24) The Monster – Cloverfield
23) Forrest Gump - Forrest Gump
22) Clark Kent – Superman
21) Gordie Lachance – Stand By Me
20) Mary Poppins – Mary Poppins
19) Indiana Jones – Indiana Jones
18) Capt. John H. Miller – Saving Private Ryan
17) Dr. Emmett Brown – Back to the Future
16) Ron Burgundy – Anchorman
15) Llewelyn Moss – No Country for Old Men
14) Glenn Holland – Mr. Hollands Opus
13) Josh Baskin – Big
12) William Wallace – Braveheart
11) Dr. Malcolm Crowe – the Sixth Sense
10) Marge Gunderson – Fargo
9) Leonard – Memento
8 ) John Keating – Dead Poets Socity
7) Dr. Ian Malcolm – Jurassic Park
6) Andy Dufresne- The Shawshank Redemption
5) Lestor Burnham – American Beauty
4) Jules Winnfield – Pulp Fiction
3) Death - Meet Joe Black
2) Michael Corleone – Godfather II
1) Ellis Boyd Redding – The Shawshank Redemption
Here are some honorable mentions, that were really good, but couldn’t crack the top 30.
Ever since I updated 10.5.6 on my new iMac, I could not get Handbrake to successfully rip DVDs for me. I have found a solution that will work until Handbrake fixes the issues.
We have a ten way tie for the worst movies of 2008:
1) What Happens in Vegas
Ordered by a judge to serve six months of “hard Marrage” – what could possibly go wrong with this premise… everything.
1) Twlight
The “in” vampire fad, needs to please go away. Or as South Park puts it, anyone who thinks they’re a vampire is retarded.
1) The Day the Earth Stood Still
I rank this up there with some of the most disappoint events in my life. I really had high hopes for his movie. And while it’s suckiness may not be worthy of the top ten worst list, I’m still mad at its over all suckiness, so here it is.
1) Meet the Spartans
Rule of thumb. Parody movies are not funny.
1) W.
Not only did the filmmakers screw up almost every fact in the movie, the acting sucked.
1) Religuluous
Bill Maher is a moron. He goes out and talks to crazy religious people in order to poke fun at the beliefs held by 90+% of the people on the planet.
There is a reason you are in the minority Bill. Deal with it.
1) The Alphabet Killer
This could have been a great movie. Eliza Dushku is a great actress and does a wonderful job with this lousy script. This film is based on a real life unsolved murder mystery. The facts of the case make the story really interesting, but the film makers couldn’t decide if they were making a horror movie, a ghost story, or a crime drama. The blend of the three don’t work.
1) The Love Guru
This movie was such a mess. Mike Myers needs a new agent.
1) Passengers
I saw the “surprise ending” a mile away. Epic Fail.
1) While She Was Out
The movie tries to hard, and like Passengers, the big twist at the end is so unbelievable, it makes the whole movie fail. And what the hell, I will spoil it so stop reading if you want to see this garbage of a movie.
They really want us to believe this housewife, devoted mom of two would kill her husband? Every after all the crap she had to deal with that night? Her going home and packing the kids suite case and then leaving the house is how the film SHOULD have ended and would have been a much more reasonable reaction.
Instead, she comes home kisses her children and tells them she loves them. Then goes down stairs and shoots her husband in the face. Then the film dramatically cuts to black and roles the credits. What the hell would come next?
She is obviously going to go to prison and lose her children. I refuse to believe she would survive all the events of that night to throw it all way in the end.
The critics were not kind to The Happening. And for it’s flaws, I still think the movie works and deserves a spot at number 10 on my list.
9) X-Files: I want to believe
Agents Mulder and Scully are back! The movie feels a lot like the first few seasons of the X-Files, when the show was in its prime. No aliens, no problem – hopefully this won’t be the last X-File movie!
8) Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who
“On the fifteenth of May, in the jungle of Nool, In the heat of the day, in the cool of the pool.” This movie is fun from start to finish, with excellent animation to magnificent voice talent of Carry and Carell.
7) Zack and Miri Make a Porno
Zack and Miri make a porno, but also make a pretty darn funny movie.
6) The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
The second movie in the Chronicles of Narnia series was so good, I re-watched it as soon as I finished viewing it the first time! C.S. Lewis would be proud of how much the filmmakers have stay true to his books.
5) Forgetting Sarah Marshall
This could easily be one of the funniest movies I have ever seen.
4) Wall-E
Have you seen Wall-E?
No?
Why not?
Go… rent… or better yet… buy this movie… now.
3) Cloverfield
I have not been more excited about seeing a movie since I saw the Green Mile (and I’m a big Stephen King fan). Cloverfield marketing campaign was as brilliant as the film. Slammed by critics as a Blair Witch knockoff, but actually it lives up to Blair Witch’s greatness (and surpasses it).
We have this monster attacking New York (when will NYC catch a break), and the story does not focus on explaining the creature, rather we get to be a passenger on how this small group of people react and try to survive.
I look forward to Cloverfield 2.
2) The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
I have not been more excited about seeing a movie since I saw the Cloverfield! I first saw the preview for this movie in April of 2008 and was hooked! I patiently waited the rest of the year and it was not in vain.
Brad Pitt should win an Oscar for his performance as Benjamin Button. The movie is based on a silly short story from the first half of the century about a baby who is born an old man.
The movie takes the subject much more serious. A baby is born with a fictional disease that makes him suffer from all of the elements of old age. The movie is not typical as it does not have a neat and pretty ending. The movie will make you think and hopefully make you appreciate the relationships we have with the ones that we love.
1) The Dark Knight
It is not an exaggeration to say, the Dark Knight may be one of the best films in the crime genre ever made. Christopher Nolan gave us everything we loved about Batman Begins and then topped it with the Dark Knight.
The song has been in my head the past week. Rich Mullins is one of my favorite singers, he passed away tragically in a car accident in 1997. The musical intro to this song is simply marvelous.
Well the moon moved past Nebraska
And spilled laughter on them cold Dakota Hills
And angels danced on Jacob’s stairs
Yeah they danced on Jacob’s stairs
There is this silence in the Badlands
And over Kansas the whole universe was stilled
By the whisper of a prayer
The whisper of a prayer
And the single hawk bursts into flight
And in the east the whole horizon is in flames
I feel thunder in the sky
I see the sky about to rain
And I hear the prairies calling out Your name
I can feel the earth tremble
Beneath the rumbling of the buffalo hooves
And the fury in the pheasant’s wings
And there’s fury in a pheasant’s wings
It tells me the Lord is in His temple
And there is still a faith that can make the mountains move
And a love that can make the heavens ring
And I’ve seen love make heaven ring
Where the sacred rivers meet
Beneath the shadow of the Keeper of the plains
I feel thunder in the sky
I see the sky about to rain
And I hear the prairies calling out Your name
From the place where morning gathers
You can look sometimes forever ’til you see
What time may never know
What time may never know
How the Lord takes by its corners this old world
And shakes us forward and shakes us free
To run wild with the hope
To run wild with the hope
The hope that this thirst will not last long
That it will soon drown in the song not sung in vain
And I feel thunder in the sky
I see the sky about to rain
And I hear the prairies calling out Your name
And I know this thirst will not last long
That it will soon drown in the song not sung in vain
I feel thunder in the sky
I see the sky about to rain
And with the prairies I am calling out Your name”
There was a great article written in the Wall Street Journal by Andrew Klavan. For anyone who has seen the Dark Knight, the comparisons between Batman and President Bush become clear from his article.
There seems to me no question that the Batman film “The Dark Knight,” currently breaking every box office record in history, is at some level a paean of praise to the fortitude and moral courage that has been shown by George W. Bush in this time of terror and war. Like W, Batman is vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand. Like W, Batman sometimes has to push the boundaries of civil rights to deal with an emergency, certain that he will re-establish those boundaries when the emergency is past.
And like W, Batman understands that there is no moral equivalence between a free society — in which people sometimes make the wrong choices — and a criminal sect bent on destruction. The former must be cherished even in its moments of folly; the latter must be hounded to the gates of Hell.
“The Dark Knight,” then, is a conservative movie about the war on terror. And like another such film, last year’s “300,” “The Dark Knight” is making a fortune depicting the values and necessities that the Bush administration cannot seem to articulate for beans.
The Dark Knight is one of the best movies I have ever seen. My review will be coming soon. In the meantime, check out the Heather’s Movie Mobsters review:
“If you are a Batman junkie, this movie is for you. If you are an action hero or superhero junkie this movie is for you. If you are a chick flick junkie this movie is for you. Don’t bother to wait for it to hit DVD’s, go to your theatre this second, stand in line for an hour, buy a ticket and prepare to be blown away. Three years seemed a long wait after Batman Begins, but now I can’t seem to muster the patience to wait five months till I can own it on DVD.”
Here is some music from Adam Carolla’s movie “The Hammer.” I don’t believe there is any official soundtrack, so here are just six songs from the film. Download and enjoy. If it asks you for a password, it’s: hammer.
One of my favorite movies from 2007 was Sweeney Todd. The music from the movie was so wonderful, I had to share it with you. You can listen to every song for free online!
Just as Barry B. Benson is about to be crushed, his life is spared. Vanessa stops Ken from smashing the little bee with his pair of winter boots. Vanessa makes a simple argument:
“Why does his life have any less value then yours? … All life has value. You don’t know what he’s capable of feeling.”
This is precisely the message of the pro-life movement. When we look at the ultrasound of a few month old baby, Vanessa’s question fits perfectly. Why does this life have less value? Nothing else is important. Nothing else matters in grand scheme of things. This is a baby and his life does indeed have worth.
