An anti-hero is usually thought of as a bad guy pitted (super-imposed) against those that are even worse bad guys than he is and so by comparison (or default) he comes out looking like a good guy. (Kind of giving a whole new light to the axiom: “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”)
In fact it is their errant ways, unsavory practices, questionable morals, double standards, vice and criminal activities that have delivered them to this moment of crisis. Interestingly, even after the, usually life threatening, peril is resolved they do not unanimously convert to the life of a moral, law-abiding citizen. For many, their last, and in the majority of instances first, good act costs them their very lives.
Interestingly, experts do not always define the anti-hero as the cathartic villain, the enraged vigilante, or the noble criminal, but believe that anti-heroes can also appear in the form of the clumsy developing hero, the listless drifter, the drunken failure or the flawed everyman. As a writer, especially as a fledgling screenwriter, I do not agree with the latter types. Whatever the case, the end result is once again the sum total of the orchestrated efforts of a gifted Writer, a talented Actor and a visionary Director. And as with true heroes and heroines, there are common denominators that define the really great anti-heroes no matter what their era or province.
The consummate Hollywood anti-hero also manifests an epic persona with a distinctive personality, history, abilities, and vulnerabilities. Whether intrinsic or circumstantial, he or she will also demonstrates serious personality flaws. They lie, steal, cheat, hurt people… all of the above… or even worse.
The consummate Hollywood anti-hero is also confronted with an epic crisis, challenged much in the same manner as heroes are, but what is typically challenged more than anything else is their humanity and/or love of family. We come to identify with them so strongly we make a conscious decision to overlook their shortcomings, even criminal behavior, and cheer them on to victory as vociferously as for any glistening white knight.
The consummate Hollywood anti-hero must also overcome his fears, his weaknesses, his shortcomings, his doubts and obstacles to achieve his epic victory.
In storytelling, anti-heroes are as ancient as the mythological gods and Sinbad the Sailor. We have enjoyed them for centuries. Modern versions and cinematic takes on this age-old theme serve much the same literary function: Provide another device, albeit a somewhat unsettling one, that forces the audience to confront deep-seeded psychological dilemmas. Is it ever OK to lie, cheat, steal… even kill? Is there a line that should not be crossed no matter what? If that line is crossed… can we ever go back?
What do our answers to these questions say about us?
Robert McDougal and Virginia Baker of Entrapment, Lestat de Lioncourt of Interview With the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles, Tony Montana of Scarface, Butch and Sundance of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrows of Bonnie and Clyde and Paul Kearsey of Death Wish, Death Wish II, Death Wish III and Death Wish IV are among many of my favorites.
My most anti-heroic Hollywood anti-heroes are listed here below:
Thomas Crown
Director John Tierman, Writer Leslie Dixon and Actor Pierce Brosnan bring us Thomas Crown of the Thomas Crown Affair 1999 reviving the 1968 classic of Master Writer Alan Trustman, Director Norman Jewison and Actor Steve McQueen. Thomas Crown… the likeable rogue, a combination Donald Trump and Alexander Mundy (It Takes a Thief) and one of my most memorable characters. Love makes fools of us all. Whether the love of a treasure we can’t have or the love we’re forbidden to have… love makes fools of us all. In the end… what are we most willing to sacrifice?
Jonathan E
Director Norman Jewison, Writer William Harrison and Actor James Caan give us Jonathan E of Rollerball 1975. Jonathan E is the Michael Jordan of 2018 times ten. Why? Because, unlike Mike’s, Jonathan E’s game is a matter of life and death. (One of Jonathan’s career stats was: “Most fatalities in a single game… Nine.”) Imagine surviving a years-long fight to the top of your brutal sport only to find out that your survival is not viewed by the powers that be as a great victory, but a capital crime.
Imagine finding out that your superman athletic accomplishments are all part of an elaborate mind control system designed to keep you and the rest of humanity enslaved. Imagine your only way out is to let the system break you and enslave you… or let the system draw you in deeper and kill you. A true (anti)-hero, Jonathan demonstrated that he’d rather die on his feet… than live on his knees and, even kill if has to, to be the last man standing.
Michael Sullivan
Director Sam Medes, Writers Max Allen Collins and Richard Piers Rayner and Actor Tom Hanks made us believe in Michael Sullivan of Road to Perdition 2002. How do people end up where they are and evolve into who they are. If we were to transport Michael Sullivan through space and time like say to 1930’s Germany or 1980’s Palestine who would he be and what would he be doing? What would we do? In the end the beast that, in true Romulus and Remulus fashion, who rescued you from the treacherous woods… the perfidious beast you tried to feed and appease…, (in true bestial fashion), turns on you. Now what? You always knew it would.
Joe Black (Death Personified)
Director Martin Brest Writers John Osborn and Jeff Reno Actor Brad Pitt incarnated Joe Black [Death Personified] of Meet Joe Black 1998. Although we longed for a way for [Death] to spare the patronly and beleaguered William Parrish (Anthony Hopkins) and for a way for [Joe Black] to reward the unconditional love of Allison Parrish (Claire Forlani), his thoroughly quashing Drew and the treacherous ambitions of a renegade board of directors were more than enough. As of this moment there are six billion of us. A billion of us are starving to death. Hundreds of millions have been slaughtered in warfare. Millions are dying from diseases that a simple glass of clean water could prevent. What a precious gift life as a human being truly is.
Achilles
Director Wolfgang Peterson Master Writer Homer and Writer David Benioff and Actor Brad Pitt actuate Achilles of Troy 2004. The consummate warrior or merciless killing machine?
Both. His one-man assault on the Trojan beachhead and Temple of Apollo was one of the most intense hand-to-hand combat sequences in the history of motion pictures, (Achilles took out like 20 guys…), only pausing for us to be mesmerized by the (human) blood dripping from the tip of his war helmet. Briseis’ referring to him as a “Murderer…” was putting it mildly.
Those twenty slash and stab victims, and later the valiant Hector, were only guilty of protecting their homes and families. Achilles’ keen intellect and surgical skills-at-arms intrigued us. Like an expert wanting to diffuse a ticking time-bomb, we want to get into Achilles head and see what makes him tick. What really drives him? What’s really eating at him? Perhaps, if we can’t terminate his headlong rush into destruction… maybe we can find a way to divert him down a path that at least gives his imminent death purpose.
Briseis: Why did you choose this life?
Achilles: What life?
Briseis: To be a great warrior.
Achilles: I chose nothing. I was born and this is what I am.
Briseis: “I thought you were a dumb brute. It would have been easier to forgive a dumb brute! …”
Vito Corleone
Director Fracis Ford Coppola, Writer Mario Puzzo, Actor Marlon Brando and Actor Robert Dinero presented Don Vito Corleone of The Godfather 1972 and The Godfather Part II 1974. Spawning such cult sobriquets as: Ozzy Osbourne “The Godfather of Heavy Metal”, James Brown “The Godfather of Soul”, Neil Young “The Godfather of Grunge” and Gil Scott-Heron “Godfather of Rap”, Don Vito Corleone’s indelible mark on popular culture is undeniable. Perhaps what we saw in Don Corleone was every virtue we admired in every king and emperor in history and every felony we overlooked when we review their legacy or when we benefit from their vice-subsidized benevolence. The paradox of the noble dictator, the magnanimous tyrant, the well-meaning, although misguided, patriarch.
Michael Corleone
Director Writers Actor Al Pacino Michael Corleone (Al Pacino), ”The Godfather 1972, The Godfather Part II 1974 and The Godfather Part III 1990.” The tragic son of the tragic father. Would he break free from the lucrative but deleterious curse? Or would his love of his father’s legacy, (and his intoxication with power), prove to be a literal gravitational black hole? Every bit as tragic as Scarface, the Corleone family’s implosion was just a matter of time. Money can’t buy love. Especially when it’s blood money.
King Kong
1933 Master Writer/Director Merian C. Cooper, Director Ernest B. Schoedsack and Writers Edgar Wallace, James Ashmore Creelman and Ruth Rose follwed by 1976 Director John Guillermin and Writer Lorenzo Semple Jr. with Actor Rick Baker set a royal table and an enormous expectation of for 2005 Writer/Director Peter Jackson, Writers Fran Walsh and Phippa Boyens and Actor Andy Serkis to deliver King Kong 2005. Everyone of us who’s ever had a heart, everyone of us who’s ever had a doomed crush, everyone of us who’s been a fingertip away from having that guy or gal that we just couldn’t have… fell every inch of those 102 floors and 1,224 feet when a mortally wounded King tumbled from the top of the Empire State Building to the streets below. But, there’s one thing you must understand. Kong was not a good guy. He was a wild animal with a history of human carnivorism and, as is true of any wild animal, could have reverted back to his gruesome ways at any turn. (Remember what happened to the wrong lady in the 1933 original?) Rescuing damsels in distress is a good thing. Eating them later is not a good thing. (Not picking your teeth afterwards is unforgivable.)
Porter
Director/Writer Brian Helgeland, Master Writer Donald E. Westlake and Actor Mel Gibson create Porter of Payback 1999. Porter was a dastardly person, who lived a dastardly life and had only the most dastardly of intentions. Rather than seeing the light and turning over a new leaf, for money that he himself stole subsequently stolen from him, Porter was willing to commit whatever additional crime necessary or suffer whatever injury to get, (not a penny more… not a penny less…), it back. Only the deeper darkness of the souls of his adversaries made this dark (hero?) shine at all. But shine he did.
Henry Gondorff aka Shaw
Johnny Hooker aka Kelly
Director George Roy Hill, Writer David S. Ward and Actors Paul Newman and Actor Robert Redford bring to life the cinematic tag team of Henry Gondorff aka Shaw Johnny Hooker aka Kelly, respectively, of The Sting 1973. The ultimate con artists perpetrating the ultimate scam. We admired the split-second timing and precision execution of these two, everything but two-bit, hustlers in this edge of your seat suspense life-and-death game and consoled our consciences with the cliché’: “You can’t cheat an honest man…”
