MissGoddess
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Posts posted by MissGoddess
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*MissG, I didn't know you had a sweet spot for the rough ones.*
why do I hear laughter from the peanut gallery?
yes, ummm, i guess i do. just call me cleo.
Edited by: MissGoddess on Jul 27, 2011 10:48 PM
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roy "mad dog" earl! he's my sweetheart. :x :x :x
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Oh Chris y ou have several that I did think of putting on my list---like "Cody Jarrett", he was one of the first I thought of. "Tommy Udo" is a great selection, I can't believe I forgot him, too.
I did want to include Richard Boone's villains as well, especially "Frank Usher".
I would also like to mention Humphrey Bogart in *The Petrified Forest*.
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THank you, Chris...might we have some favorite baddies from you, sir?
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ok.
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*And those two characters are complete opposites. One is very "loud" while the other is "quiet." Then you have an intellectual villain such as "Harry Lime."*
I never thought about it before, but they are different.
*Darth Vader!*
SPOILER
But he turns out to have been a man.
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*You like the swashy villain, eh? Very classic.*
You could argue they make those movies worth watching, since the whole plot leads to the hero's showdown with his nemesis. George Sanders is another good one in any number of movies, including *Death of a Scoundrel*.
*"Hank Quinlan" is quite a force.*
Orson's always fun to watch. He's terrific in *The Stranger*, too.
*Monsters make for interesting "villains." Many times they are merely misunderstood or outside the "rule" of Society for one reason or another.*
Sometimes, yes. My list would have been too long with them included. I just can't see them as the same category. Godzilla vs Liberty Valance?
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Why so shocked about Max? I've always been proper scared of him.
That's a nice list, lots of "lethal ladies" on it, which I'm sure CinemAva will appreciate, and many others I should have thought of, like Hank Quinlan. I should have even included Orson Welles from *The Third Man* and Basil Rathbone in *Captain Blood* and *The Adventures of Robin Hood*. He made a dashing foe for Errol Flynn.
Now I deliberately refrained from putting any monsters on my list, like the "mummy" or else I would have put *Dracula* (Bela) and *The Wolf Man* (Lon, jr.).
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WARNING! SPOILERS FOR THE MOVIES LISTED BELOW!
Okay, here's my list with some explanations, for what that's worth.1. Max Cady (Robert Mitchum) *Cape Fear*
Max is probably the scariest villain for me personally, because he enjoys sadistic games with the women he brutalizes. So, as a girl, I'm going to be extra nervous about him. Aside from that, the power of Mitchum's physicality coupled with that startlingly brilliant mind makes him so formidable, that Gregory Peck really seems no match. In real life, I wonder if a man like Peck could really take a man like Cady. The agony of suspense that Cady enjoys creating...boy does he enjoy it!...makes him just about the worst of the worst. I can't say I like watching this movie late at night, alone.
2. Vince Stone (Lee Marvin) *The Big Heat*
Like his "Liberty Valance", Marvin's villain is unhinged and barely controlled by the man who hires him. He's so good at adding a certain "punkish" quality of a thug with delusions of grandeur. He really believes he's going to be the top man one day. He doesn't even understand a man like Dave Bannion, or anyone normal and decent. He's that far gone.
3. Cab Man Gray (Boris Karloff) *The Body Snatcher*
I love witty, intelligent villains and seeing such a one in the guise of perhaps the lowliest creature in town is a real turn of events. The way he digs it into "Toddy" (Henry Daniell) makes for some of the most delicious exchanges in movies. He almost seduces you into believing he's not so bad, he's so humorous and so kind to the little crippled girl. But then he commits the most ghastly crimes, and you almost hate yourself for liking the brute. And what he did to the cat!
4. Mrs. Iselin (Angela Lansbury) *The Manchurian Candidate*
I'm not usually as interested in political "bosses", but the perversion and twistedness portrayed by Angela Lansbury of all people is hard to ignore. She's one scary broad. I think all the Italian mob bosses put together aren't quite her equal. At least you seldom heard they sacrificed their own sons like she did.
5. Raven (Alan Ladd) *This Gun for Hire*
Perhaps the one "sympathetic" villain. I mean, a hired gun who's basically dead inside comes to life and redeems himself out of love. I can see the little boy he described, the horror that made him the way he was. And again, a kitty is involved...
6. Wilson (Jack Palance) *Shane*
"He was fast. Fast on the draw." I think Palance made as fine an archtypical western villain as ever there was. He's a real machine built to kill, no excesses, no frills.
7. Pa Clanton (Walter Brennan) *My Darling Clementine*
I find Brennan's villainy more startling than Henry Fonda's turn. This is sweet old "Stumpy"??? And in 1946!! Brennan was always believable, no matter what. He is so cold he seems carved out of that harsh landscape in Monument Valley, his eyes as baleful as the sky.
8. Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin) *The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance*
Marvin made one gesture and Ford zeroed in on it in a close angle shot that's unusual in his film. It was to show us the whip handle Liberty carried, identifying him as the highwayman who beat up Rance. But the way he held the whip, I can't describe it except to say it looked simian. Like an ape would. To me, that was key to his whole character. He's truly something wild and primitive. And he is a foe that really is a match for John Wayne, and there simply are not many actors/villains that were. No, not even Dern, who had to do it...well, you know how he did it. Not Liberty, he wasn't afraid.
9. Frank (Henry Fonda) *Once Upon a Time in the West*
He's like an even icier version of Wilson from Shane. Both have that stillness that suggests moral emptiness, lack of any heart or anything human. A killing machine. I always thought Fonda had a kind of inner reserve and this movie simply strips everything else away but that, and his stillness.
10. Rhoda Penmark (Patty MacCormack) *The Bad Seed*
Who thought a wee little kid could cause so much trouble? Just ask Leroy! I don't have to explain to some here why I enjoy watching her so much and wondering over how she fools people, and how easily people ARE fooled because they want to be. The backstory Paul Fix revealed about Nancy Kelly's mother sends a chilling note, making me wonder if some children can really be born thoroughly bad.
11. Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya) *From Russia With Love*
Oh, she's just so repulsive and horrid! Sometimes littler can be meaner, and Lotte Lenya's drab, scrawny frame managed to contain more venom than a pitful of rattlers. I can't stand her and the way she looks at Daniela Bianchi, yikes!
12. Evelyn Harper (Hope Emerson) *Caged*
Re-watching this lately just gave me the shivers at Harper's sadism. What she did to poor Betty Garde makes her inhuman, but her political manipulations suggest she is so much more than just a 'club' to do others' dirty work. She's dangerously indemic to the system, you can't be rid of her type without ripping out the whole fabric of political corruption. This makes her more evil than just some brute who gets off on creating pain.
13. Goldfinger (Gert Fröbe) *Goldfinger*
Maybe the best 007 villain, I don't know, there were lots of good ones. He seemed smart enough to have a shot at ruling the world, and ruthless enough to be a worthy adversary for Bond. "No, Mr. Bond! I expect you to die!"
14. Darth Vader (James Earl Jones/David Prowse) *Star Wars*, etc.
Okay, so he's the other villain I have a sneaking sympathy for. He's just so dashing, and that voice. I guess it's the cape, too.
15. Verne Coolan (Louis Calhern) *Devil's Doorway*
JackFavell has described his dreadfulness better than I can. Again, he's dangerous because he knows how to use all kinds of people and even the law of the land to get what he wants. That he wants to exterminate all the Native Americans adds madness to his sins. What he lacks is the guts to really stick his own neck out, and I guess this makes him even more hateful.
16. Sheriff Dad Longworth (Karl Malden) *One-Eyed Jacks*
Something tells me the west had its share of "Dads" but Malden's ability to seem as though he was fully convinced he should never even be reminded of his past treachery makes him come to life on the screen opposite formidable company (Brando and Johnson). I would have added Ben's "Bob Amory" except my list was getting too long.
17. Nick Ferraro (Raymond Burr) *His Kind of Woman*
I remember being scared to death by those scenes on the boat with Burr trying to get Mitchum. They're pretty stark and there is just something sick and depraved suggested in Burr's eyes as he watches the doctor try to stick Mitch with the needle.
18. John Baron (Frank Sinatra) *Suddenly*
I need to see this one again, I just remember that Frank's eyes looked so chilling and crazed and that he wouldn't have hesitated to kill the boy was frightening.
19. Capt. Munsey (Hume Cronyn) *Brute Force*
Another movie I recently re-watched, and admired Cronyn's ability to make the most of the u ltimate sadist/weasel. You would not think anyone would cast such a small, nerdy looking guy in the role of a strong-arm prison guard, or that any such actor could make it convincing but Cronyn does. He's a dangerous little climber. The ultimate example of the runt who always got abused and now is bent on making others pay for it while he craves power to augment that hunger for revenge.
20. Long Hair (Bruce Dern) *The Cowboys*
What he did to John Wayne! Need I say more.
21. The Warden (David Landau) *I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang*
Maybe the first of a long movie tradition of sadistic prison wardens, you can trace the line from him to Strother Martin in *Cool Hand Luke*. I've only seen the movie twice, but each time it was almost unbearable, largely due to this Warden. The idea of that poor man having to return to his clutches was harrowing.
22. Selina (Jayne Meadows) *Enchantment*
I had to include her at the last minute, because I remember how much I loathed her. She's probably the most ordinary and prevelant type you'll find in reality: selfish and spoiled to the extent she'd destroy the happiness and ruin the lives of her whole family. A real beast of a girl.
23. Mr. Brocklehurst (Henry Daniell) *Jane Eyre*
There's something so loathesome about a man who in order to feel strong has to tyrranize little girls, to the point of murder. And to cover it over with moral and religious justification, is despicable.
24. Lydia (Hillary Brooke) *The Woman in Green*
One of the most entertaining and charming female villains, and one of the earliest I've seen. Sherlock Holmes didn't interact with too many women, Hillary Brooke's scenes with Rathbone make one wish he had.
25. Philip Vandamm (James Mason) *North by Northwest*
It seemed somehow wrong not to include him, though I can't say he's my favorite Hitchcock villain (that would be Mme. Konstantin in Notorious). However, I can't argue that he's probably the smoothest and most memorable.
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Isn't our reaction what makes good villains? Your pity for "Raven" from "This Gun..." is interesting. (Now I'll have to watch it again.)
You're right, Chris, because it was as if my reactions to the villains on my list were more varied than toward my favorite heroes and heroines.
Did you like *This Gun For Hire* already, or was it a miss? I like it more and more each time I see it. I used to think it was the weakest of the Ladd/Lake pairings, now I'm not so sure but it's the best or nearly so. I thought Ladd brought a touching dimension to the role, just something he has that seems hurt or vulnerable.
Disgust comes to mind for Bruce Dern in "The Cowboys." The man is completely devoid of any normal traits. Maybe he is what Valance would have been if they had made the movie ten years later.
Poor guy, I hate to say it but just Dern's looks give me that reaction. He is made for playing a certain slimy type of villain. Lee Van Cleefe seems like an aristocrat next to him.
Okay, not you got me thinking what is the real difference between the evil of Dern and Marvin in their characters? They both beat up on the defenseless and weak. They seem to take great pleasure in it. Marvin has a bit of flair when Dern is just a plain brute.
That's probably it. I enjoy Lee's villains so much because he plays them with a gusto and abandon that is positively electrifying. He's like a wild animal. Dern's villains, that I've seen, are that sort of country boy scum that suggests a real coward underneath.
I'd like to hear more specifics, if you are inclined, on what "appeals" to about some of your villains.
okay.
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I hope you find it, Jackie, that sounds like a much more interesting list than mine. When a villain can make you feel compassion, that's always a surprise and I frankly love the complexity.
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*And Lee Marvin is the only repeat. There are different types of villains going on too. "Max Cady" and "Liberty Valance" are both pure evil but their approach is so different. Both scary.*
hi, movieman
I was thinking over my list how different my reactions are to many of my choices. for instance, i feel disgust toward some, i am entertained by the "relish" or wit of others, and in at least one instance, "Raven" in *This Gun For Hire*, I feel pity.
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*Favorite Villains/Villainesses*:
1. Max Cady (Robert Mitchum) *Cape Fear*
2. Vince Stone (Lee Marvin) *The Big Heat*
3. Cab Man Gray (Boris Karloff) *The Body Snatcher*
4. Mrs. Iselin (Angela Lansbury) *The Manchurian Candidate*
5. Raven (Alan Ladd) *This Gun for Hire*
6. Wilson (Jack Palance) *Shane*
7. Pa Clanton (Walter Brennan) *My Darling Clementine*
8. Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin) *The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance*
9. Frank (Henry Fonda) *Once Upon a Time in the West*
10. Rhoda Penmark (Patty MacCormack) *The Bad Seed*
11. Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya) *From Russia With Love*
12. Evelyn Harper (Hope Emerson) *Caged*
13. Goldfinger (Gert Fröbe) *Goldfinger*
14. Darth Vader (James Earl Jones/David Prowse) *Star Wars*, etc.
15. Verne Coolan (Louis Calhern) *Devil's Doorway*
16. Sheriff Dad Longworth (Karl Malden) *One-Eyed Jacks*
17. Nick Ferraro (Raymond Burr) *His Kind of Woman*
18. John Baron (Frank Sinatra) *Suddenly*
19. Capt. Munsey (Hume Cronyn) *Brute Force*
20. Long Hair (Bruce Dern) *The Cowboys*
21. The Warden (David Landau) *I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang*
22. Selina (Jayne Meadows) *Enchantment*
23. Mr. Brocklehurst (Henry Daniell) *Jane Eyre*
24. Lydia (Hillary Brooke) *The Woman in Green*
25. Philip Vandamm (James Mason) *North by Northwest*
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I thought it sent a really strong message, too. I wasn't prepared for that from a Hitch film. It should be seen by more people. I wonder that TCM doesn't air it more often.
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Yes, you're right about that, of course. But nothing in the movie showed much of a real relationship between Paula and Larry. They were "comfortable" with each other. She was into her work. I remember when Larry visited Paula in her office he mentioned he'd never even been there. The movie just didn't show me much of them...as a couple...of their "love." But it's still a noble gesture. I think I focused just a touch more on why Diane purposefully even went after Paula's man in the first place.
It's true, their relationship was very nebulous and undefined. Risky business. What I like about Greer's performance is that despite her shenanigans, I never lost my sympathy for her. I guess I know what it's like to be the pariah and not to be able to trust anyone too easily. I even admire her willingness to do anything to get the guy's attention. If she'd had more pride, she'd have no man, ha.
*The idea of the government, or the church trying to have over control my life scares me more.*
Oh well if you put it that way, I quite agree. It makes me glad I'm strictly neutral in all politics and belong to no church. I know what it's like to be threatened by both.
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*Rich and Strange* is one of my favorites of the early ones.
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*Ro*, since you're a Maureen O'Hara fan, I suggest *Sentimental Journey*. It's a very affecting little drama and Payne is excellent.
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THe only other two that I've seen on your list we haven't talked about are *Man of the World* and *Doubting Thomas*. I know why you wouldn't like the latter, but I don't really remember much about the Powell/Lombard movie. It was kind of serious, wasn't it? This was before Carole really found her persona.
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I'm pretty sure Charlotte drove the same sedan when she took Jerry's daughter camping. I guess it was the de rigeur vehicle for upscale country types.
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*And then there's the vehicle. And, ironically, a similar vehicle is found in Kansas City Confidential.*
Oh yes, Preston Foster drove it, right? The wood paneling. There was one also in *Now, Voyager*, if you remember.
*Bowling after hours. Amazing.*
It sounds like fun to me. But like in the movie, not like they are now.
SPOILED AT THE ROAD HOUSE
*I'd say it's because he's spoiled. Still, it does stink when you bring a gal to town and you defend her and speak highly of her to your "partner," who doesn't really like her yet eventually wins her away from you.*
He had his grievance, to be sure. The movie kind of took the easy way out, make the guy out to be a bad guy.
Edited by: MissGoddess on Jul 26, 2011 10:47 PM
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*You were right. It's definitely a strange film. A bowling alley/night club... in the woods? Very odd.*
Ha! I actually like the set up, it's one of my attractions to the movie. That ghastly decor, which is so charming because it's of the period. I imagine pictures of cowboys on the dinner plates.
I figured you'd like Celeste Holm's character. Dear O.Z. Whitehead manned the bar.
*I had the same feeling. I enjoyed the burn of Lily (Ida Lupino) and Pete (Cornel Wilde) in the first half of the film. And even though I enjoy seeing Richard Widmark unhinged in the second half, the film becomes too predictable. I didn't like the finish.*
ROAD HOUSE SPOILED
The dialogue exchanges between Lily and Pete pretty much make the whole movie for me, along with the setting. Sometimes I watch the DVD just to laugh at Lily's outrageous wisecracks. She's so funny when Widmark wakes her up too early with breakfast in bed. He's actually rather sweet and I felt sorry for him. It was hard to read whether he went crazy because he's crazy, or because he was spoiled, or because he was just jealous.
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I figured you wouldn't be crazy about *Road House*. I like it for the first half, the ending is not great or doesn't seem to quite live up to the build-up.
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*I can't wholly take credit for those knocks. I have to say JackaaaAaaay painted such a diss-cription of him over at the Oasis that was so funny and devastating that it colored my opinion. Now I do understand that every man can't be Tyrone Power, < ( Sigh! ) > nor should they be. Those stunning good looks are oftimes distracting for the story at hand. Here here to the average "regular guy." (Pssst! Just wish it were someone besides O'Keefe though darned if I can come up with a good casting suggestion).*
I like O'Keefe in *Raw Deal*. I don't know if it's him or the role, though. I wouldn't doubt that I'd have enjoyed Dana Andrews even more in such a part.
THE COMPANY SHE KEEPS IS SPOILED BEYOND BELIEF.
*Can't say I've seen that alot in films. Women might make sacrifices, but they're not willingly giving up their man. I think "Paula" was very very well-adjusted. She realized that the man she loved cared for is no longer in love with her. Why would she hold onto him. (I think of Joan Crawford in "Possessed"). She really wanted to give Diane a good shot at life, she had so little from the get-go; perhaps Paula saw that she could afford to give up Dennis to someone who has so little.*
Well, from what I've seen of female behavior, a guy who's "just not into you anymore" isn't always any kind of reason to let go. We're usually more caught up in our own emotions, not his.
If, on the other hand as you suggest her own love for him was cooling, then the gesture takes on a different, and in my mind, lesser meaning. I thought the scene powerful only if she loved him so much that she wanted him to be happy, not just Diane. I can't imagine a woman in love thinking more about the other woman's happiness than her man's.
Did you have any thoughts on Theresa Harris' moment in the film?
Unfortunately, the incarceration scene is where I got distracted. I came back to the movie as Diane was brought forward in the line-up. I remember Theresa Harris, she's always good. And I did think of her in *Out of the Past*.
I also liked the subtlety the film expressed in showing how parolees' different approaches to life after prison. I chuckled when I saw Character Actress Extraordinaire Kathleen Freeman show up with two kids in tow to see her parole officer on a day she didn't have to come.
That was funny!
*I'm going to try and check out "Shockproof" before the week's end. It's torture to skim posts with a discussion of a film I haven't seen yet. I watched about twenty minutes of the film, and I was shocked by Cornel Wilde's brutishness. Did you see how nurturing Lizabeth was to Greer's character. And then in "Shockproof" Cornel Wilde is beating his patriarchal chest and saying he's the teacher and she's the student.*
Ha! Well, see how you like the way it turns out.
*What a difference a woman's touch makes to a parolee.*
In the movies, anyway. The idea of a woman having that much control over my life makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. No thanks, I'll take Wilde any day!
Edited by: MissGoddess on Jul 26, 2011 12:54 PM
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nite nite, ro. don't let the rhinos bite.
RAMBLES Part II
in Films and Filmmakers
Posted
mAva, have you seen this on *Cleo Moore*? It has a short biography which was really interesting...I had no idea she died so tragically young.