The 15 Biggest Movie Badasses

A while back, after rewatching Drive to try and see if I missed something, something that makes it worthy of the praise it got as opposed to the follow-up Only God Forgives, which Cannes critics ripped into. And I realized two things. One is that Drive is still a terrible movie, and this isn't the last you'll be hearing of that. The other is that there's few things harder to do in a movie than craft a badass character. Even defining badass is hard, but like Potter Stewart said of obscenity, you know it when you see it. And you don't see it too often. A lot of time, we don't get badass. We get exaggerated machismo, tough posturing, and in the end it either end up moronic or lame. Ignorance doesn't equal badass. Anti-intellectual doesn't mean badass. Senselessly violent doesn't equal badass. Hell, one of the most badass men in history was Teddy Roosevelt, and he was a nature lover in touch with his feelings. Hell, Hemingway was a total badass, and he was so not anti-intellectual that not only did he read books, he wrote them. There's a very specific formula for crafting a badass, and while nobody has ever been able to put it into words, a few filmmakers have been able to commit it to film. Below is my list of the 15 Biggest Movie Badasses. My friend Josh Paige and I both undertook the challenge of naming what, in our opinion, are the 15 most badass movie characters. Of course, we set a fairly strict rule: Movie-exclusive characters only. They could be in books or video games later on, but they had to be born on the screen. No "based on" folks. No real people (sorry Yip Man), no literary characters (There goes James Bond and Shaft), no superheroes. Just ass-kickers of the silver screen. Submitted for your approval or disdain are my picks:

The 15 Biggest Movie Badasses

15) Merida (voiced by Kelly MacDonald)- Brave

Kids need action heroes too, you know. And until Pixar shattered every mold that existed for kids movie heroes with an arrow from the quiver of the sassy Scottish archer, the only badass role models for girls in movies were all rated R. Merida takes charge of her life, refusing to fit any stereotypes, both societal and cinematic, and gives Katniss and Robin Hood a run for their money with her bow. Will she be joining the Expendables soon? No. But the red-headed heroine is about as badass as a PG rating will allow.

14) Rick (played by Humphrey Bogart)- Casablanca

What do Woody Allen and Jean-Luc Godard have in common (besides that weird version of King Lear and banging their actresses)? An admiration for Bogie's badassness, as seen in Play It Again, Sam and A Bout De Souffle, respectively. And though he'd captured cool in many a gangster flick, and was the definitive Phillip Marlowe, his finest role will always be the lonely owner of Casablanca. Though he fires less shots here than almost any other major role, there's not a scene in the film where he doesn't just emanate cool. True, helping out your ex's new guy doesn't normally qualify as badass, but I think the one exception to that is "helping out your ex's new guy to defeat the god damned Nazis". Plus, he found a way to make even a goodbye badass. That takes skill.

13) El Mariachi (played by Carlos Gallardo & Antonio Banderas)- The Mexico Trilogy

Robert Rodriguez's $7000 case de molar flick could have easily wound up the Mexican bargain bin video it was meant to be. Instead, it spawned two sequels, kickstarted a career, and wound up in the Library of Congress. And its all thanks to a nameless musician who can tocar la guitara and patear el culo like a hijo de puta. Unlike a lot of action heroes, El Mariachi changes (and thats not solely because of a recasting once Dimension gave Rodriguez a budget) throughout the three films, from a frightened young man surviving on instinct and luck to a weathered, worn down warrior on a war path. He isn't the super-human killing machine Machete (who Rodriguez would later bring to the screen in his own trilogy). El Mariachi, even at his most outlandish (anyone remember the crotch gun?), is brilliantly human in the vein of a gunslinger from the worlds of Leone or John Ford.

12) The Bride (played by Uma Thurman)- Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2

Taking in hours of blaxploitation and kung fu flicks at a time when he probably should have been taking Ritalin, Tarantino's mind is practically an encyclopedia of badassery. Every film he's made has had some seriously badass motherfuckers, even if only one has the wallet to prove it. If this list went to 30, it'd just turn into a Tarantino cast list. But the truth is one shines above the rest. While most of Quentin's crew are just background-less charicatures of cool, ceaselessly moving onward from one victim to the next like a shark, Beatrix Kiddo is all about her past. Her wedding day massacre is depicted both in serene Ozu-like black & white and a frenetic anime sequence soaked in red. Nothing could better sum up the duality of The Bride. And unlike her revenge-oriented counterpart, Django (who just happens to be an expert assassin through "instinct"), Beatrix goes to soul-crushing and knuckle shattering lengths in her training with Pai Mei, gearing up the slaughter the remnants of her past, since they robbed her of a future. And really, only a true badass could rock a yellow tracksuit, am I wrong?

11) Ethan Edwards (played by John Wayne)- The Searchers

The king of the cowboys, John Wayne had his finest moments in what might be the greatest Western ever made. Ethan Edwards might be the original anti-hero, out to rescue his niece (or possibly daughter, some say) from the grips of the Comanche tribe whatever way he has to, even is it means a bullet through her heart. His hate for the Comanche is so strong, he even shoots the eyes out of their corpses, so that their souls might be "doomed forever to wander the earth" rather than find the spirit land. His final moments in the doorway are some of the most heartbreaking in cinema, his cool head under pressure is inimitable, and if you need any more reason to accept his place on this list, you should know Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan cited Ethan Edwards as a major influence on Walter White's final moments. So for all you BB fans needed another fix, take "Baby Blue" off repeat and find your local Best Buy's Western section. Ethan'll be waiting.

10) Dirty Harry (played by Clint Eastwood)- The Dirty Harry series

So, this may be a little bit cheating, since Harry Callaghan is loosely based on a real San Francisco detective Dave Toschi (who is portrayed by Mark Ruffalo in the film Zodiac going to see himself portrayed by Clint Eastwood in Dirty Harry. A Dave Toschi film within a Dave Toschi film. Suck it, Inception), it's so loosely based it barely counts. The definitive "loose cannon cop", there's practically no need to explain the badass qualifications of Harry Callaghan, since they've entered into the public consciousness like almost no other character. Who doesn't, by the age of 10, know "Do you feel lucky, punk?" or "Go ahead, make my day" (I can't speak for the current generation, but for those of us raised on the Spielberg-era pop-culture soaked Kids WB cartoons, we practically saw the entire Dirty Harry quintilogy acted out by Tiny Toons)? Even when the series lost steam, even when the 1980's declared a jihad on American cinema, even when Jim Carrey pranced about a soundstage set to Guns N' Roses, even then the title figure maintained a commitment to kicking ass few have matched.

9) Jeff Costello (played by Alain Delon)- Le Samurai

In le cinema français, cool isn't just an option, is a key criteria. Emulating the American noir movement, and blending in a fair amount of Euro-chic, the French did for the gangster flick what the Italians did for the Western; they took it from us and sent it back revamped, revitalized and revolutionary. And nobody was better at the old fedoras and firearms than Jean-Pierre Melville, whose Le Doulos, Le Cercle Rouge and Le Samurai should be essential viewing for any "crime film" fans. Of the three, La Samurai has by far the most intriguing protagonist, in the form of the near mute Jeff Costello. A grey fedora, a tan trench coat, white gloves and a gun. In truth, that's all he is. He has no history, no friends beyond a woman who loves him and an ally with a garage, he's everything a certain scorpion-jacketed stunt driver tried to be. A killer-for-hire who seems to mirror every ounce of anger in James Cagney's grapefruit smashing gangsters with a collected zen that makes him all the more deadly, all the more terrifying, and all the more awesome.

8) Lee (played by Bruce Lee)- Enter The Dragon

Any list of badasses that doesn't have a Bruce Lee film should be burned and forgotten. For shit's sake, Bruce Lee was such a badass, not only has there been countless films about him (not to mention ones that used footage of him after his death to try and sell crappy kung fu flicks), there's been at least 5 movies on his teacher, Yip Man. That'd be like making movies about Liam Neeson's character in Batman Begins. And Lee took all of Yip's knowledge, and blended it with other forms of martial arts to invent his own style and discipline that's still being taught today. And while Lee had several roles in his career, the only one that ever came close to mirroring both his disciplined personality and his incredible kill was the protagonist from the legendary kung-fu film Enter The Dragon. Everyone knows the story, if only because it has been replicated or parodied ad nauseum. But none of the copies come close, not even Spongebob on Karate Island, because none have the masterful Lee leading the charge, snapping necks and fighting claw-handed men. 

7) Indiana Jones- The Indiana Jones Quadrilogy

Indiana Jones joined the American cultural lexicon in 1981 with Raiders of the Lost Ark, but it felt like he'd been here forever, cracking his whip alongside Paul Bunyon and John Henry in the annals of American folklore. And maybe that's because of Spielberg's efforts to make a period piece that also felt like a period film, but it could just because Harrison Ford's wisecracking archeologist felt so welcome on our screens and in our imaginations. Hell, if the theme song isn't already in your head by now, your parents failed you. Indy knew when to run and when to fight, and when to just shoot the guy with the swords. He can swing from a whip, outrun a boulder, and even get hit on by a girl's eyelids. He was getting too old for this shit before Murtaugh was even a twinkle in Danny Glover's eye, and he stands by his convictions like a real man; hell, he refuses to believe in magic even after seeing a guy get his heart ripped out in the everybody-forgets-it's-a-prequel Temple of Doom. He's a badass you've known since you watched that VHS of Last Crusade at your cousin's 7th birthday, and he's a badass you'll want to be every time you see a whip, from now until the end of your days.

6) Sanjuro Kuwabatake (played by Toshiro Mifune)- Yojimbo & Sanjuro

As a film fan, especially a lover of Kurosawa and the jidaigeki genre, picking one Toshiro Mifune role is like picking children. He was the Japanese Samuel L. Jackson. He was badass personified. He brought badassness to even the worst of roles. But if forced to chose the best of them all, you kinda gotta go with Yojimbo, the film so brilliant its been ripped off and remade countless times, most famously by Sergio Leone as A Fistful of Dollars. That's right, The Man With No Name has a daddy, and his name is Sanjuro Kuwabatake. A yojimbo, or bodyguard, hired by two rival crime lords, bits the two against one another to save the town they run. The character was so beloved that Kurosawa quickly changed the script of his next film to make a sequel. The deadly ronin only ever had two films, but there have been countless spiritual sequels spawned from Mifune's righteous killer.

5) John McClane (played by Bruce Willis)- The Die Hard series

Die Hard is considered by many to be the greatest action film of all time. Its protagonist ranked 12th on Empire Magazine's "100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time". His catchphrase is the greatest movie quote you can't say on TV. Not bad for a NY cop who just wanted to get rid of his jet lag. And even if the more recent entries have been pissing in the Die Hard pool, the McClane chlorine of kick-ass will never run dry. At his best when battle German-accented Englishmen, McClane redefined what an action hero could be. Q once advised 007 to "never let them see you bleed". McClane violates that advice every frame of his films, especially after dashing across broken glass. Certain superspies are always impeccably dressed. McClane fights terrorists barefoot in a tank top. And while Mr. Bond gets by on gadget after gadget from Q branch, McClane is lucky if he gets a machine gun (ho, ho, ho). Compared to the Rambos and Rocks of the world, Bond is the thinking man's action hero. But with McClane, they're as equal as they are opposite. Also, for the sake of clarification: I'm aware the movie Die Hard is loosely based on the book Nothing Lasts Forever. But that screenplay was later adapted as a Commando sequel, and then eventually remorphed into the ass-kicker we have today. And while the plot is similar (building is held hostage, villain named Gruber), John McClane has shit-all to do with some World War 2 fighter pilot named Joe Leland.

4) Nurse "Coffy" Coffin (played by Pam Grier)- Coffy

I'll come clean: Until I remembered my own rule about "no characters from books", John Shaft occupied this slot. I'd forgotten the 1971 film was based on a 1970 novel of the same name. I was all ready to justify Shaft beating John McClane and Indy. To explain that he's a complicated man, that he's a sex machine, and that he'll risk his neck for his brother man. That he's one bad mother…well, you know the rest. But alas, Shaft is ineligible for this list. I wasn't sure what to do, until I remembered Coffy. If Shaft kickstarted the blaxplotiation genre, Coffy solidified it, as well as Pam Grier's status as a legend of the genre. Coffy is all those things: complicated, sexy, heroic and self sacrificing. Hell, she does everything Shaft does, and still finds time to be a nurse in her day job. Though Grier would play similar roles in Foxy Brown, Sheba Baby, and an homage to her B-movie roots in Tarantino's Jackie Brown, nothing would ever top the pure badassery of Nurse Coffy.

3) Ellen Ripley (played by Sigourney Weaver)- The Alien series

Though Ellen Ripley is undoubtedly the ballsiest women in space, she was originally supposed to be even ballsier. As in, having balls. Ripley was written as a man, but in a stroke of genius and major risk-taking, they changed it to a female. This isn't to suggest women can't be action heroes, or that they're any less capable than men. It's just that in the Hollywood landscape at the time, there weren't a lot of leading ladies who could carry such an intense role, because up until that point, the delicate flowers were the only ones allowed to rise to the top. Hell, before Ripley, the closest thing we had to an Alpha female was Annie Hall cause she wore a tie. Though Annie Hall is more closely tied to the Alien franchise than just that. It was, in fact, Woody Allen's date from the end of the film (a then relatively unknown Sigourney Weaver) who took on the role of the Nostromo crew member who ends up the "final girl" of this slasher film in space, except unlike Sidney Campbell or Nancy Thompson, this one is armed to the teeth and ready to go. Yes, its true that Ripley has only ever been understood by James Cameron (The man behind Fight Club not being able to write for women, I get that. But the dude who did Amelie? I expect more), but Sigourney always embed her with a confidence and edge that makes her by far one of the most badass characters, on this planet or any.

2) The Man With No Name (played by Clint Eastwood)- The Dollars Trilogy

The monicker "The Man With No Name" could be further from the truth. In reality, Clint's gunslinger has three. In A Fistful of Dollars they call him Joe, For A Few Dollars More dubs him Manco, and of course Tuco frequently calls him Blondie in The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. Whatever name you know him as, you know the man. A man of few words, but many bullets. A man with a sneer on his face, a cigarillo in his mouth, a poncho on his shoulders and a gun at his hip. With an intensity conveyed as much through Ennio Morricone's score as Clint Eastwood's performance, The Man With No Name might be one of the most important figures in cinema history. His is the face that changed the Western forever. His is the spirit that lives on in countless heroes, from shameless ripoffs like The Driver in Drive to spiritual sons like Walt Kowalski in Gran Torino. Because really, as a man, if you've ever walked away from any moment of badassery in your own life, be it a fight you won or just a parking ticket you talked your way out of, you hear in your head "The Ecstacy of Gold" swelling behind you.

1) Han Solo (played by Harrison Ford)- The Star Wars (for now) Trilogy

It had to be. There's no other choice. It's Han Solo. It has been Han Solo, and it will always be Han Solo. No matter who you think should beat him, you're wrong. You like your cowboys? Your John Waynes and Clint Eastwoods? Boom, Han Solo is a cowboy, but in space. And Chewbacca is a way better companion than Tuco. You like James Bond for being suave, his love 'em and leave 'em attitude, and always having a quip up his sleeve? Han Solo is always ready with a cool line, can win over even a princess, and you want love 'em and leave 'em? Cause it don't get much better than being frozen in carbonite, and having your last words in response to "I love you" be "I know". Prefer Ripley's willingness to defy the odds when outnumbered by aliens? Shit, Han doesn't just defy the odds, he ignores them. And don't even think about telling him them. And as for Indy fans? He is Indiana Jones. But with a spaceship. Han is what makes those Star Wars movies magical. He adds an air of whimsy and badass to an otherwise heavy story of destiny and good vs. evil. Arguably the best part of the original trilogy, practically inarguably the best part of Return of the Jedi (the only thing making the Endor segments tolerable), Han is essential to the Star Wars mythos. Just think what a Star Wars movie would be like without Han. Actually, we know what that looks like, and it looks like a crap ton of CGI and a racist fish person.

So there's my list. You can find Josh's list over here on his blog, and feel free to leave a comment. I'm sure there are some folks raring to argue. I look forward to hearing folks thoughts. Even if its just "Josh was right". To be fair, I haven't seen his list. There could be overlap. They could be completely different. But if you like this kind of stuff, two takes on a list, well, there's something special in the works, rest assured.