Everyone Go Crazy
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“What’s the most you ever lost in a coin toss?” a psychopath named Anton Chigurh asks a countrified clerk in the Coen brothers’ new film, “No Country for Old Men,” which opens in New York next Friday. Only Chigurh and the audience know what is at stake as he flips a coin, end over end, through the air. For the sadistic, sleepy-eyed Chigurh, who is played by Javier Bardem in a performance that’s already being hailed as the year’s leading contender for an Oscar, only three kinds of people exist: Those he must kill, those he will never meet, and those bystanders who have the misfortune of crossing paths with him.
It’s not that much of a stretch to call Chigurh the first great movie psychopath of the century. But in doling out such a title, we thought we’d take a look back at some of our favorite psychos of the silver screen:
THE EVIL SISTER
Bette Davis as Baby Jane Hudson, “What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?” (1962)
Quote: “I didn’t bring your breakfast, because you didn’t eat your din-din!”
So effective was the on-screen hatred between the jaded Jane Hudson (Davis) and her sister Blanche (Joan Crawford) in “What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?” that it translated into speculation that the two actresses truly hated each other. In a career-rejuvenating turn, Davis stars as the child celebrity who watches in horror as her career fades just as her sister’s takes flight. But the film’s true horrors come later, when Blanche is paralyzed in an accident and Jane, the vindictive has-been, slowly exacts her revenge on her helpless sibling.
THE UPSTAGED SERIAL KILLER
Ted Levine as Buffalo Bill, “The Silence of the Lambs” (1991)
Quote: “It rubs the lotion on its skin. It does this whenever it is told.”
It’s Buffalo Bill’s absence from the majority of “The Silence of Lambs” that makes his appearances so unsettling. While the movie spends most of its time glowing in the vile debauchery of Hannibal Lecter from the relative security of a prison cell, Bill is doing whatever he pleases with his abductee, a terrified woman in a pit in his basement. By the time the story catches up with him, we’ve only gotten glimmers of his base dysfunctions, which include the elaborate game of dress-up he plays in front of his mirror, changing sexes in a suit made of human skin. Lecter scares us with his mind; Buffalo Bill scares us with everything else.
THE WEIRD GUY SNAPS
Vincent D’Onofrio as Private Gomer Pyle, “Full Metal Jacket” (1987)
Quote: “Sir, the private’s weapon’s name is Charlene, sir!”
It’s clear from the outset that pudgy “Private Pyle,” as he’s called, is not ready for boot camp. You wouldn’t think he was “born to kill,” either — that is, until he guns down his sadistic drill sergeant in the latrine before turning the gun on himself. The morning after he is beaten with bars of soap by his frustrated peers, who are tired of picking up the slack for their overweight bunkmate, he stares into oblivion in one of director Stanley Kubrick’s most unnerving shots. As the camera slowly encroaches, we see his formerly cheerful doughboy face twist into a sneer as he slips into insanity.
THE PLUMMERS
Christopher Plummer as Harry Reikle, “The Silent Partner” (1978)
Quote: “One night when you come home you’ll find me inside waiting and that will be the night you’ll wish you’d never been born.”
Amanda Plummer as Yolanda, “Pulp Fiction” (1994)
Quote: “Any of you f—— pricks move, and I’ll execute every motherf—— last one of ya!”
Nothing can turn your average crook into a glowering, coldblooded monster like the loss of easy money. Such is the case with performances from two generations of the Plummer family. In 1978’s “The Silent Partner,” Mr. Plummer plays a violent bank thief outsmarted by the teller (Elliott Gould), who pockets the loot and hits the alarm.
Mr. Plummer’s character then commits himself to hunting the teller down, and murders wantonly along the way. In 1994’s “Pulp Fiction,” his daughter Amanda is Yolanda, the lovebird who transforms into a raging, gun-waving firecracker, drooling at the prospect of robbing a family restaurant filled with easy marks — and hit man Samuel L. Jackson.
SILENCING THE SNITCHES
Richard Widmark as Tommy Udo, “Kiss of Death” (1947)
Quote: “You know what I do to squealers? I let ’em have it in the belly, so they can roll around for a long time thinkin’ it over.”
The role of Tommy Udo earned Mr. Widmark an Academy Award nomination — and threatened to typecast him for the rest of his career. As a cackling professional goon who, after being released from prison, lashes out at the families of informers, Mr. Widmark employed a hyena laugh and an array of nervous ticks — including wiping his mouth compulsively with the back of his hand — to hint at an ocean of mental instability lying just beneath the surface. Of course, his insanity breaks the surface when he ties a disabled mother to her wheelchair and throws her down a flight of stairs. The moral of the story: Never snitch.
THE RELAXED TORTURER
Michael Madsen as Mr. Blonde, “Reservoir Dogs” (1992)
Quote: “You can say anything you want, ’cause I’ve heard it all before. All you can do is pray for a quick death, which you ain’t gonna get.”
Michael Madsen begins Quentin Tarantino’s “Reservoir Dogs” as one mellow cat. And in one of the most infamous scenes in American film history, he remains calm as he slices the ear clean off a mortified police office — dancing gleefully all the while to Squeeze’s “Stuck in the Middle With You.”
Mr. Blonde is a slippery slope of depravity. In a movie where nobody trusts anybody, he’s the guy who’s misjudged from the start, a fact that, with every swipe of the razor, Mr. Tarantino never lets us forget.
THE METHODICAL MURDERER
Rutger Hauer as John Ryder, “The Hitcher” (1986)
Quote: “I cut off his legs … and his arms … and his head. And I’m going to do the same to you.”
More than a few iconic horror characters owe their aura to John Ryder, the methodical, malevolent hitchhiker in Robert Harmon’s original “The Hitcher.” Almost underplayed by Rutger Hauer, Ryder is terrifying because the film’s gratuitous violence — Jennifer Jason Leigh is tied to two trucks that drive in opposite directions — runs counter to his reserved demeanor. His primary victim even ends up identifying with the him. He is a monster who speaks as if he were a methodical scientist, or a well-mannered academic — a dichotomy that makes the skin crawl.
THE HUMILIATOR
Dennis Hopper as Frank Booth, “Blue Velvet” (1986)
Quote: “You know what a love letter is? It’s a bullet from a f—– gun.”
It isn’t just Frank Booth’s perverse behavior that makes him one of David Lynch’s most menacing creations. Sure, his screaming tirades, foul mouth, and aggressive behavior make him a violent guy. But there’s also the sense that some wiring in his head has frayed, that he suffers from some disorder that has taken control of his mind and body. In his very first scene, we watch through the blinds of a closet as Booth hits a woman, unleashing a bizarre form of sexual assault, all while getting blindingly high off ether that he sucks from an oxygen tank. The more the hero of “Blue Velvet” finds himself in the sights of Frank, the more it seems that this crazed man won’t just kill him — he’ll make the poor kid suffer.
ssnyder@nysun.com