Tag Archives: Movie Villainy

Special Easter Edition Movie Villain: Jesus Christ!

08 Sunday Apr 2012

Posted by in Movie Villainy, Movies, Religion

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Can you see it my Brothers?

Can you see the truth of what I am saying?

Because not everyone can see this. Some consider the topic just too boring to bother with. They’d rather watch a slasher flick. Others are too busy with their prayers. Jesus is too beautiful to them, too noble, too good, too strong, too gentle, too much of a blank check upon the bank account of all things warm and wonderful.

They cannot see it. But Jesus can be downright terrifying.

The Prince of Peace makes an awesome movie villain.

Just ask the merchants in the temple! Yes, that would be the one Jesus trashed, because apparently commerce is supposed to be a bad thing. Just a temper tantrum, you say? Well tell that to someone whose entire livelihood has just been trashed by a madman. A madman who threatens to destroy the very temple of God Himself.

Do not think, he didn’t warn us my friends. Jesus told everyone about his nefarious plans. He told us that he came bringing a sword. He told us that he came to destroy our families. He told us that we would have to forsake everything we know and love to join his kingdom.

And I ask you, what sort of dark kingdom begins with the abandonment of one’s own family?

Let us not even mention the practice of necromancy! Well, okay, yes, let’s go there. Do not imagine that little girl was the only time this fisher of men came to practice the dark arts. On this matter (and many others), the dear Lord is definitely a repeat offender. Seriously, when in the Hell does someone raise the dead and NOT end up as the principle villain of the story? Oh I’m not talking about accidentally awakening a Mummy. That gets you an hour of running and a hero status when you finally beat the bad guy back into the ground. No, I am talking about the deliberate act of pulling a dead man out of the grave and setting him back to walking about the earth. And Jesus did it at least twice!

There is a reason the name of Frankenstein fills us with terror, but Jesus gets a free pass on this one, does he?

And then of course of course there is his skillful use and disposal of Judas. Even as the man betrays Jesus with a kiss, Jesus himself has willed the whole thing to happen, …from the moment of creation, so some folks say. And thus does Judas play into the great cosmic scheme, a lamb for the sins of man. But who is the real sacrifice here? And how wicked is the villain that has chosen a single man for the greatest crime of all history? How wicked is the puppet-master who could bring his chosen victim to accept eternal damnation …with a kiss?

How did he do it? Well great movie villains work in mysterious ways.

Not even the Cylons of the new Battlestar Gallactica series could manipulate humans with such ease and skill. Neither Darth Vader, nor Sauron, nor Scorpius from Farscape have ever had such an elusive evil plan! Professor Moriarty could only dream of such eloquence. Christopher Walken was never so creepy in all his career! And the Devil in all his movie incarnations has never, NEVER, been so menacing.

The question you have to ask is just why everyone found this fellow so frightening to begin with? Why is that this Jesus must die?

Must die!

Must die!

Must die!

The Romans, The Pharisees, even apparently the average man on the street came to call for the blood of the lamb.

So we are told anyway!

But were they really so short-sighted, so bloodthirsty as to want the death of a miracle worker and healer? Or did they know something the rest of us seem to have forgotten? Did they see into the depths of the darkness? Did they know just how terrible this villain really was?

It’s a damn good question, I tell you.

Note: The original version of this post included a lot of links to various movies. I really was talking about Jesus as a movie character and using the videos to illustrate the point. Anyway, dead links happen. So, I took most of them down. Left up Judas, cause, yeah.

 

 

Great Movie Villains, Volume V: God Damn Us Every One!

19 Monday Dec 2011

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Yeah, that’s right folks! I’m talking about Tiny Tim here. Don’t even pretend you don’t know what I am talking about! Or did you think maybe it was those damned spooks that brought about the downfall of a Ebenezer Scrooge?

No, I am telling you Scrooge wasn’t afraid of no ghost! Nor even three of them. He may have hesitated a bit with the first one, but I am telling you that stalwart icon of good business sense rose to the occasion. He faced those ghosts down like a true champion. Were it for their vainglorious efforts, I feel quite certain that Scrooge would have gone to his grave a good thrifty capitalist, just as he was at the beginning of this terrible tragedy.

And it is a tragedy, make no mistake about it. A Christmas Carol is a dark and terrible story about the downfall of fine American. Don’t even try to tell me that Scrooge was British! Just listen to the man! Asked to give to the poor, how does Scrooge reply?

“Are there no prisons? Are there no poor houses?”

American, Hell! If only Scrooge were still around, the Republican party would know just who to run against Obama. I’m telling you, Scrooge was a good American even if he was British. What this country would not give to have someone of his moral fortitude around today! But no, sadly the old man is dead. And not just dead. His spirit was broken long before he entered the grave. All on account of that sad-adorable little boy, Tiny Tim!

It’s enough to make you want to puke.

Scrooge was a man of principle. He was a man of industry. A man who understood what happens when you subsidize sloth by saving a life instead of letting the market work its magic. Scrooge was all these things, and above all he was a man of wit and reason. He handled life’s problems rationally, and all he asked of others was that they do the same.

And then along comes this poor boy with a treatable illness and just like liberals everywhere the damned ghosts go to work on your heart-strings. Oh look, Ebenezer, look at the poor sick child! Can’t you pay Cratchit a little more? Can’t you save little Tim, Ebenezer? You have so much money, surely you can save him! Oh look Ebenezer, if you don’t help him, poor little helpless Tim is gonna die.

And the little runt plays his heart perfectly, acting so sweet and innocent. The ghosts don’t show Scrooge a moment of Tim slacking off instead of doing his homework. Hell, they don’t even focus on the fact that he doesn’t have a job as every good working class kid his age should have had by that age. And they sure as Hell don’t show him sneaking an extra helping of mashed potatoes or pulling on his sister’s pig-tails. No, they only show him Tim at his most pure, most adorable, most pathetic.

Sad to say the old man cracked.

I know, we are supposed to say that his heart melted, that he found his inner goodness, or some such rotten sentiments. We are supposed to believe that this is a story of redemption, that Scrooge was a better man on account of the story of Tiny Tim. We are supposed to believe that Tiny Tim was the instrument by which Scrooge became a better person.

More than that, we are supposed to be inspired by this story. We are supposed to learn to care. It is supposed to warm our hearts and help all of us to become better people.

Bah Humbug!

In Honor of Nigel Tufnel Day, this Movie Villain Takes it to 11!

11 Friday Nov 2011

Posted by in Movie Villainy, Movies, Music

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Most movie villains would be content to achieve a ten out of ten on a villain rating. Not this one. No, Nigel Tufnel isn’t satisfied with that kind of mediocre performance.  His villainy is always one louder.

Oh sure, just another misunderstood heavy metal musician you say? We’ve all heard the wild rumors that rock&roll is subversive? They’re just rumors, aren’t they?

Well no, dammit they’re not. When rock&roll is done right it is subversive.

And no-one is more subversive than Nigel Tufnel.  With songs like Big Bottom and Sex Farm Woman, he destroyed the sexual mores of middle class culture. With Hell Hole, he exposed the veneer of “success,” and with Stonehenge, Nigel reminded us all that Pagan worship is damned cool.

Not content to corrupt the souls of the young, Nigel inflicted his musical perversity on the fans of classical music, or at least he will as soon as he completes his long awaited trilogy and “Lick My Love Pump” knocks Beethoven, Bach, and Mozart right off the charts and into the corner pub where lesser musicians belong.

This man isn’t misunderstood at all. He is rock&roll badness at its worst. He wants your money, your daughter, and your freakin’ Oreos. And he doesn’t want the damned creamy filling!

Nigel doesn’t just create the music. This make-up wearing, Gumby-Lovin tight-panted freak with a guitar and a violin is the music your parents don’t want you to hear.

He is the music they don’t want you to touch.

…to look at.

…or even to think about.

You’re thinking about Nigel now aren’t you?

Well don’t!

Great Movie Villains, Vol. III: Nevermind the Nazgûl, Fear the Fellowship!

03 Thursday Nov 2011

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Which members of the Fellowship of the Ring are villainous? Almost all of them, if you ask me.

Just not Boromir though. He’s the one guy you can almost trust. Given a chance for power, he took it. Sounds like a straight-up kinda guy. He’s okay by me.

But those damned Halflings! They are just all bad.

We’ll save Frodo for later, but it’s short work to see that a couple of no-good thieves like Pippin and Merry are full-on bad guys, even if they are short and cheerful. Between starting fires, and raising false alarms, Pippin is a damned mess. I can almost understand his desire to steal the biggest marble in the known universe. That’s understandable. But with a petty offense like that, you gotta come clean when the jig is up. I mean, seriously, it’s Sauron’s marble. Pippin didn’t win it in a fair match. The least he can do is have a polite conversation with the man he’s cheated out of the coolest boulder on the playground. But no! Apparently, that was too much to ask. He has to cry to Gandolf and start a war over it, just so he can keep his prize. It wasn’t even a cleary, fer cryin’ out loud!

And then there is Merry stabbing the king of Angmar in the back during what would have been a perfectly honorable duel with an upstart Princess who has done nothing but disrespect her father, her brother, and every authority figure who tried to help her out in the course of the story. She was about to get taught a damned good lesson when that little runt goes and gets all 9th-level Rogue on her enemy.  Absolutely disgraceful!

Don’t even get me started on that “faithful” toadie, Samwise Gamgee! Can there be any doubt that he is responsible for the terrible depression that befell poor Golem? I mean that guy is in the middle of a deep blue funk that lasts for well over a hundred years and this furry-footed bully goes around calling him names and picking on him constantly.

Plus, poor golem had lost his precious ring. Who the Hell can blame him for wanting it back? It was a damned good ring! And look who stole it? Hobbits. Hobbits, like the very two halfwits golem is now supposed to be helping, one of whom is flaunting his precious under the poor wretche’s very nose. This whole story-line is messed-up in a big morbid way, and there poor golem is on the edge of sanity. Leave it to the fricking henchman to push him off.

Then there is the Gimli and Legolas, with their friendly little competition over how many orcs they can kill. War is one thing folks, you gotta do what you gotta do, but this shit is way over the line! When did killing become fun, I ask you people? Just when did it become a contest? Apparently, when the killers became an elf and a dwarf. Oh look at the cute little creatures killing the ugly people! Let’s bet on who can kill the most!

And then of course there is Aragorn. I could go on and on about this geriatric black sheep of the royal family, but let’s just look at one thing here. Have you ever noticed Aragorn’s sword in the minutes before the final battle at the gates of Mordor? It’s got blood on it. Yeah that’s right, BEFORE the fight he has blood on his sword. Know why? Cause he killed a messenger from Sauron in a deleted scene.

That’s right!

No sooner had said messenger returned a lost mithril shirt that stupid Frodo lost somewhere in Mordor when Aragorn goes and repays this act of great kindness by killing the guy (in cold blood, and during a parlay, no less). Small wonder the director chose to cover that  up. …but he couldn’t hide the blood.

No he couldn’t

Next time someone tries to tell you Aragorn is a hero, just keep asking him; “what about the blood?”

So, now we are down to the last two bad guys. Which is the worse? I know what you’re thinking; it’s Frodo right? After all, he is the one that destroys the most valuable piece of jewelry in all of Middle Earth, causing a great cataclysm which leads to the genocidal destruction of many of the world’s great kindreds. (Seriously do you not see all the orcs and goblins and trolls falling into a great pit at the end of this terrible tragedy? Are we supposed to cheer that shit on?) Yes, Frodo did that. All that destruction is Frodo’s claim to infamy, and it’s a damned good one.  But it still doesn’t win him the prize for the most-hated villain at the Fellowship ball.

Before moving on though, I wonder if we need to say a thing or two about the little guy’s sappy buzz-kill attitude through just about the complete series? What do you do when you have the power to rule the entire world at your finger tips? Sulk and cry about it for three fricking over-long movies. Three of them, I tell you! That alone should get him an award for something.

Still!

Frodo is not the principal villain of this story. It’s Gandolf. What you have to ask yourself is why this big-ass powerful wizard uses his magic so sparingly. I know, I know, he’s only supposed to help and council people, not solve their problems for them. Right? He’s been sent by the powers that be to guide mankind in its struggles. Doing more than that would spoil the moral of the story for them and us. Yadayadayada! We’ve heard this yarn before.

That’s the excuse of every manipulative god-like being in all of history, real or imagined. Just what the Hell are people supposed to get out of all this anyway? Wisdom? A sense of accomplishment?

Tell that to the dead!

Gandolf could have ended the entire war with a bit of basic parlor-magic. He could have returned the ring to its rightful owner and all would have been right with the world of middle earth. Failing that, he could have gone wompy-stompy with his great powers and beat the crap out of his enemies in the first half of the first movie. Still the bad guys win that way, but at least it’s over with quickly. And that my friends is what makes Gandolf the ultimate villain. He doesn’t just want to kill Sauron, whose only crime was in gifting jewelry to the great leaders of the world. No, Gandolf wants to make sure a lot of people die unnecessarily along the way. If you ask me this villainous puppet-master is the worst of the bunch.

…which is saying a lot, because he has a real den of iniquity there in the Fellowship of the Ring. What’s the difference between the dirty dozen and these guys?

Three people!

Great Movie Villains, Volume II: Princess Fricking Buttercup!

19 Wednesday Oct 2011

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True love, my ass!

What is it that her principal love interest keeps saying to lovely  Buttercup at the beginning of the movie? “As you wish.” Whatever Buttercup  tells him to do, Westley answers with “as you wish.” Seriously, if hearing that doesn’t make you shudder, then this witch’s powers have already reached through your flatscreen TV monitor and bitch-slapped the good sense out of your soul. That isn’t love; it’s co-dependency. Learn the difference people!

My God, what that poor soul, Westley, must have been through to have been reduced to such a wretched state by the start of our little fairy tale. And this is but the first caress, a mere taste of the suffering Buttercup is capable of inflicting on people. Long before Lt. Columbo begins to relate this tragic narrative to the helpless little boy he is about to horrify, the dreaded Butterup has already reduced our would-be hero to a mere shadow of a man.

But of course Westley’s suffering is only just beginning, because it is “true love” that keeps him alive when he is captured by pirates. Are we really supposed to believe that this witchcraft is benign? Small wonder that when our kitty-whipped hero re-emerges he is clothed in black just like any other form of living dead would be. One can only guess at the horrors his own victims have suffered, all at the hands of a man empowered by little other than his morbid devotion to a woman far away!

It does not end there, no. First the lovely miss Buttercup seduces a boat-load of innocent men and leads each of them one by one to their ruin. First Inigo, then Fezzik, and finally Vizzini, each in turn meets our mere shadow-of-a-man on their own terms, and each faulters in a test of his own greatest strength.  Are we really supposed to believe that the spineless little co-dependent has developed so many talents in his short years as an undead pirate? No, my friends, it was the malevolent power of the lovely Buttercup that weakened these once proud men and brought them all to ruin.

I know it’s a fairy tale; strange things are supposed to happen. My point is that fairies can be fricking scary. If Buttercup does not scare you yet, then you have got balls of steel my good reader.

Or do you?

Let us not even consider the many examples of Buttercup’s other monstrous powers; her moral destruction of a Prince and likely his entire kingdom, the reduction of a high priest in all his dignity to a mere Pythonesque caricature, the pointless slaughter of unusual and probably endangered swamp creatures, and the morbid double reanimation of twice-dead Westley by a pair of witches who conveniently enter the story just in time to keep the finally-vanquished abomination going.

Seriously, they say that it takes 4 witches to make a coven. We know who the first 3 are, but Princess Bride never reveals the fourth. I have my suspicions.

But that is of course the real power of Buttercup, Mistress of Ultimate Evil. She reaches right through the story and corrupts to heart of a young and defenseless boy. Does he not ask his uncle to read the part with all the kissing? And what self-respecting young boy would ever do that? None, I tell you. And in that moment, this movie reveals the real target of Buttercup’s mischief. It was the boy she was after all along. It was his heart she sought to corrupt, his will she sought to weaken. And she succeeded, did she not?

Buttercup’s powers are not merely restricted to characters in her own story. No, she has the capacity to reach right through the narrative frame and corrupt the hearts of those for whom she is supposed to be a mere character in a story.

And THAT my friends is precisely why you must fear this woman. Can you name any apparent chick-flick about which grown men have ever sung so many praises? How many self-respecting testosterone-poisoned grunt-brains have taken time away from a good wrestling match to tell you they actually like THAT movie, as if to suggest that this is the exception to their normal preferences. No, they haven’t succumbed to the power of the girlie-romance; it’s just that this movie is so damned good and so unusual that they cannot help but like it. The story of the Princess Bride is not really just another girlie-flick; it’s a romance movie that even men can love. That is what so many men want you to believe.

Take care, my friends! For, that is also what SHE wants you to believe.

Great Movie Villains, Volume I: Surrender Dorothy!

16 Sunday Oct 2011

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I was reading a forum discussion about great movie villains, and it suddenly occurred to me that people always seem to get this wrong. So, I wanted to say something about the REAL villains of the movies. None of this namby-pamby, “Oh Sauron is such a meanie, don’t take his rings” gift-horse-in-the-mouth kinda whinging. I mean, what’s a few orcs and black riders!?! That ain’t villainy. I want to get serious here and find the REAL thing. Truly evil movie characters that deserve their spot in the villainy hall of fame.

Let’s start with Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz. Now you’d think she was just another homeless teenager wandering the streets, you know. “Oh look, she’s so cute, and she sings too, maybe we should feed her,” that’s what most people seem to think. But I am not buying the “accidental” status of that first killing. No way man! Especially not when she takes the poor woman’s shoes. It’s a straight up smash and grab operation, no question about it. She pops the poor woman with a house and takes her stuff. I ask you, how is that NOT villainy?

And it’s awful damn convenient that Dorothy can’t take the shoes back off. Yeah right! I’m guessing whoever she has lined up to fence the rubies will do just fine when the time comes. Then she steals a scarecrow and a robot. Are we supposed to think the original owners had no use for them? As if that wasn’t enough, she goes and takes a lion out of the wild. I know it sounds PC to say this, but I’m telling you some creatures just aren’t meant to be used as pets.

Don’t even get me started about her thing with the Poppies. This isn’t the eighties anymore, you know people. Drugs are NOT cool!

And of course we’re supposed to be proud of her when we see little miss pigtails ruin the whole Wizard’s gig, but I’ve got no sympathy for hecklers who absolutely refuse to sit back and enjoy the show. The old guy was rather gracious about it, but that doesn’t change the fact that sweet little Dorothy proved herself to be one of the greatest spoilsports of all time in that scene. What’s next? Does she go to the mall and tell all the children Santa is really Uncle Bob?

I mean honestly, if you can’t enjoy the show, then please don’t ruin it for others. Sheesh!

And then there is the not-so-small matter of our little darling’s second victim. Accident my rootie tootie! Dorothy knew exactly what she was doing. And that’s two witches within the space of one show. I mean what does this woman have against Wiccans anyway!?! They’re a peaceful lot, never harmed anybody, but no, this sweet face is just an anti-Pagan killing machine. And we’re supposed to be happy she made it home? Happy she finally left, you mean. Now at last the people of Oz can begin to put their lives back together, whatever she left of them.

I’m telling you, for my book, this no-good little hussy has got to be one of the top movie villains of all time.

…and her little dog too!