Favourite movie characters.
Seen at Film Experience.
What are my ten five favorite characters in the history of movies?
Anne in The Good Thief (2001)
Anne: You look pretty good for a man your age.
Bob: What age is that?
Anne: You know... Stone Age.
One look at the curve of her wrist, slender but wiry, the unapologetic, fearless directness of her eyes, and I was in love. If The Good Thief is on the one hand a film about Bob's last big score, the miraculous turn-around in his career before he retires from thievery, it's also a film about young Anne's instruction and induction into that life. Her story begins as Bob's is coming to its grand finale, and you feel excited for her future.
Han in The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006)
Han: There's no 'wax on wax off' of drifting. You learn by doin it. The first drifters invented drifting out here in the mountains by feelin it. So feel it.
In the middle of the most unusual installment of this frenetic franchise you have Han, the American expat, and the only character who seems to be saying dialogue that has any actual meaning in the movie. It helps that he's played by Sung Kang, by far the best actor in Tokyo Drift, but Han's presence in the movie, so unexpected and wholly welcome, stands out for me because of how Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance he is, in total contrast to everybody else (with the possible exception of Neela, whom I ship with Han, just a little bit). Mentor, tragic antihero, Han is no Miyagi figure, and stubbornly resists easy categorisation. Han is a bridge between two worlds, but also a fatalist, and a self-made exile to both worlds. This seems to be quite a common theme in characters I care about.
Geoffrey Chaucer in A Knight's Tale (2001)
Chaucer: I will eviscerate you in fiction. Every pimple, every character flaw. I was naked for a day; you will be naked for eternity.
Who else but Paul Bettany, tall, blond and lanky, could have played this role, and made it so completely his own?
Lawson Pines in A Love Song for Bobby Long (2004)
Lawson Pines: You know you eat like shit?
Pursy Will: You drink too much.
Lawson Pines: Okay.
The odd man in the triangle of father-daughter-student. A writer, a penitent, meek in person but a perceptive judge of his dearest and closest, a generous friend, and the one who unobtrusively gives the film its narrative voice.
Isabella in Miami Vice (2006)
Isabella: [showing a picture of her mother to Sonny] See? Lucinda Somebody's wedding. Everybody's with couples, husbands and wives. They all pose. But she is more special.
Gong Li is...amazing, okay? And Isabella is beautiful and strong and a survivor. Asian and Latino, passionate but realistic. A look from her burns me into my seat.
It's weird - a look at this list, and you'd think that I never watched movies before the 2000s.
What are my ten five favorite characters in the history of movies?
Anne in The Good Thief (2001)
Anne: You look pretty good for a man your age.
Bob: What age is that?
Anne: You know... Stone Age.
One look at the curve of her wrist, slender but wiry, the unapologetic, fearless directness of her eyes, and I was in love. If The Good Thief is on the one hand a film about Bob's last big score, the miraculous turn-around in his career before he retires from thievery, it's also a film about young Anne's instruction and induction into that life. Her story begins as Bob's is coming to its grand finale, and you feel excited for her future.
Han in The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006)
Han: There's no 'wax on wax off' of drifting. You learn by doin it. The first drifters invented drifting out here in the mountains by feelin it. So feel it.
In the middle of the most unusual installment of this frenetic franchise you have Han, the American expat, and the only character who seems to be saying dialogue that has any actual meaning in the movie. It helps that he's played by Sung Kang, by far the best actor in Tokyo Drift, but Han's presence in the movie, so unexpected and wholly welcome, stands out for me because of how Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance he is, in total contrast to everybody else (with the possible exception of Neela, whom I ship with Han, just a little bit). Mentor, tragic antihero, Han is no Miyagi figure, and stubbornly resists easy categorisation. Han is a bridge between two worlds, but also a fatalist, and a self-made exile to both worlds. This seems to be quite a common theme in characters I care about.
Geoffrey Chaucer in A Knight's Tale (2001)
Chaucer: I will eviscerate you in fiction. Every pimple, every character flaw. I was naked for a day; you will be naked for eternity.
Who else but Paul Bettany, tall, blond and lanky, could have played this role, and made it so completely his own?
Lawson Pines in A Love Song for Bobby Long (2004)
Lawson Pines: You know you eat like shit?
Pursy Will: You drink too much.
Lawson Pines: Okay.
The odd man in the triangle of father-daughter-student. A writer, a penitent, meek in person but a perceptive judge of his dearest and closest, a generous friend, and the one who unobtrusively gives the film its narrative voice.
Isabella in Miami Vice (2006)
Isabella: [showing a picture of her mother to Sonny] See? Lucinda Somebody's wedding. Everybody's with couples, husbands and wives. They all pose. But she is more special.
Gong Li is...amazing, okay? And Isabella is beautiful and strong and a survivor. Asian and Latino, passionate but realistic. A look from her burns me into my seat.
It's weird - a look at this list, and you'd think that I never watched movies before the 2000s.