AFI Top 50 Villains

I guess I don't disagree with any on this list.  It seems to me Darth Vader should be higher, but I can't dispute the first two choices.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8JjH724-ho

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?

Thrills (#63); Stars - Bette Davis (#2), Joan Crawford (#10); Villains - Baby Jane Hudson (#44)

I love you, sister dear.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=648-2RE4XAk

Little Caesar

Stars - Edward G. Robinson (#24); Quotes - "Mother of mercy, is this the end of Rico?" (#73); Villains - Caesar Enrico Bandello (#38); Top Ten - Gangster (#9)

I have now seen more than my share of gangster movies, and I am thoroughly convinced they're all the same.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vq3uK3i4_gA

Blue Velvet

Thrills (#96); Stars - Laura Dern (Current - Not Rated); Villains - Frank Booth (#36); Top Ten - Mystery (#8)

I debated watching this one, decided to go ahead, then shut it off after about half an hour. 

It starts off innocent enough.  All-American boy MacLachlan teams up with small town girl Dern to investigate some mysterious goings-on.  Then it gets creepy and yucky.  I think Lynch purposely started things all sweet and innocent to make the contrast between that and the twisted underworld the teenagers discover that much greater.

Yeah, um, not what I want to be watching.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSeceN11Dm4

Mommie Dearest

Quotes - "No wire hangers, ever!"  (#72); Villains - Joan Crawford (#41)

Some thoughts -
1) Why would someone stay with an abuser?  I understand why a child would - they don't know what else to do.  But as Christina grew up, why would she ever be happy to see her mother?
2) Why didn't the housekeeper ever intervene?  That makes her just as bad as Joan Crawford.
3) Okay, so it ended (SPOILER) with the children getting nothing in Joan Crawford's will.  Christina's brother says, "It figures she'd get the last word."  Christina thought for a moment, then said, "Does she?  Does she really get the last word?"  Which leaves the viewer to wonder if this was all a made-up vendetta to get back at their mother for not leaving them any money.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1YgmytVKg8

The War of the Worlds

Villains - Martians (#27)

This is the movie we have to thank for Signs and Alien.  Maybe Jimmy Fallon should write a thank you note and say how much we appreciate that it didn't set the bar too high.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1c2jp8WyXms

Taxi Driver

Top 100 (#47/52); Thrills (#22); Quotes - "You talking to me?" (#10); Villains - Travis Bickle (#30)

It wasn't what I expected, but I'm not sure what I was really expecting.  I wasn't expecting it to be artsy-fartsy.  And I was thinking it was more violent than it was.  And I thought Jodie Foster's role would be bigger.  I don't know.  But I didn't really like it - and I hadn't figured that I would.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4p_rX74TgI

The Night of the Hunter

Thrills (#34); Stars - Lillian Gish (#17), Robert Mitchum (#23); Villains - Reverend Harry Powell (#29)

Robert Mitchum is so scary!  He's a master of the calm, calculating, almost bemused look. 

Here he plays a "preacher" - a con man - who discovers that two children know the whereabouts of the money from a bank heist.  And he's out to get that money whatever the cost.  Throughout the movie he sings "Leaning on the Everlasting Arms" in a haunting, predatory style.

But then, finally, he's encountered by the amazing Lillian Gish.  Kick butt, Miss Gish!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNmtkxw4b58&feature=related

Cape Fear

Thrills (#61); Stars - Gregory Peck (#12), Robert Mitchum (#23); Villains - Max Cady (#28)

Holy scary bad guys!  Ex-con Mitchum has it in for Peck, who testified against him years earlier.  And so, in devilish bad guy style, he goes after Peck's wife and daughter. 

I thought Mitchum was scary in Night of the Hunter.  Max Cady far out-scaries that bad guy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73lZPln-A2I

The Manchurian Candidate

Top 100 (#67); Thrills (#17); Villains - Mrs. John Iselin (#21)

This was much easier to follow than the recent remake - or maybe it seemed easier because I had seen the remake.  At any rate, it was good.

Angela Lansbury was terrific in her role, which actually seems wrong.  It's just not right for Mrs. Potts to be a villain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RAUm6l_t6k

The Public Enemy

Stars - James Cagney (#8); Villains - Tom Powers (#42); Top Ten - Gangster (#8)

Any job worth doing is worth doing well.  Apparently James Cagney's grandma told him that, because he started out as a bit player in this movie.  He did his job so well that he impressed the director and was given the lead role.  And that's why you should listen to your grandmother.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1FgpBxXho4

Goldfinger

Thrills (#71); Quotes - "A martini.  Shaken, not stirred" (#90); Songs - Goldfinger (#53); Villains - Auric Goldfinger (#49)

Dr. No didn't have all the Bond gadgets, but this movie did.  Very cool.  And of course, there's Sean Connery.  Also very cool.  But (SPOILER) what's with 007 always getting caught?  He wasn't the hero of this movie.  A girl was.  Not so cool.

Oh, and guess what?  In the newest Bond movie, Daniel Craig will ask for a Heineken, not a martini, shaken, not stirred.  There are just some things product placement should NEVER mess with.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7OPuc4KZZY

Wall Street

Quotes - "Greed...is good" (#57); Villains - Gordon Gekko (#24)

A good movie, but sad. Sad that people think money is all there is. It's sad when Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) tells his blue collar dad, "I just want you to be proud of me." How sad that he thinks money is the key to his dad's pride, and how sad that what he's really saying is that he's embarrassed that his dad doesn't even make $50,ooo.

The other thing that's sad is that this movie is another reminder of how Charlie Sheen wasted so much potential (well, except that he doesn't know how to cry).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lG8n1fjGz3Q

Die Hard

Thrills (#39); Villains - Hans Gruber (#46)

It's ridiculous and far-fetched. But I love Bruce Willis. And I love the friendship that develops between him and Reginald Vel Johnson. And I love that my husband says that if I'm ever held hostage by terrorists in a skyscraper, he'd go all John McClane and rescue me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBCZuZJvkzk

Bonnie and Clyde

Top 100 (#27/42); Thrills (#13); Quotes - "We rob banks" (#41); Villains - Clyde Barrow & Bonnie Parker (#32); Passions (#65); Top Ten - Gangster (#5)

After I saw this movie, I bloodied my sister's nose. And that is my primary recollection of Bonnie and Clyde.

I don't quite know how gangstering comes across as an admirable crime, but in the movies it usually is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=copiznIfV3E

Sweet Smell of Success

Stars - Burt Lancaster (#19); Villains - J. J. Hunsecker (#35)

I really don't know what's worse - snobby elitists or the simpering sops who kiss up to them. Burt Lancaster plays the former and Tony Curtis the latter in this movie about a newspaper columnist who can make or break a person's career and/or reputation just by writing about him.

Lancaster was utterly unappealing, which was the point. But I think I was supposed to feel sorry for Curtis, and I didn't. I was just annoyed that he gave Lancaster that much power over him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtE8r-VTsPY

Chinatown

Top 100 (#19/21); Thrills (#16); Score (#9); Quotes - "Forget it, Jake, it's Chinatown" (#74); Villains - Noah Cross (#16); Top Ten - Mystery (#2)

Overall, it was okay. Jack Nicholson plays a detective who starts out investigating one thing, but finds it's just the tip of the iceberg in a different case. So that part was interesting enough. I don't like Faye Dunaway though. And Chinatown wasn't really a part of this story. It referred to something that happened in the past (which was never really explained). They'd just say things like "It's just like Chinatown." Whatever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rX5XpFm7jps

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

Top 100 (#20/33); Cheers (#17); Villains - Nurse Ratched (#5)

As Brinthia said in her review, this movie was, um, interesting. That's about it. I don't get how it's an inspirational movie. I certainly wouldn't call it that. And as for Nurse Ratched being a villain, well, she wasn't particularly nice. But I don't think I'd say she was evil. Not like Maleficent or Voldemort.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSiVZ524yW4

Scarface: Shame of a Nation

Villains - Tony Camonte (#47); Top Ten - Gangster (#6)

This is the 1932 film, not the 1983 version starring Al Pacino (and probably laden with f-bombs). This version was good - your typical 1930s gangster movie. Personally, I like it better without all the swearing and violence.

The movie, however, was pulled from theaters quickly after it's release (supposedly because it encouraged gangster behavior, although I think it's more likely because it boldly stated that the government was just standing back allowing it to happen). It's only recently been re-released.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n__zOO9AEa8

Double Indemnity

Top 100 (#38/29); Thrills (#24); Stars - Barbara Stanwyck (#11), Edward G. Robinson (#24); Villains - Phyllis Dietrichson (#8); Passions (#84)

Very good mystery movie, with lots of twists and turns.

But still I wonder - what's the deal with Barbara Stanwyck's hair?