Top 10 Movie Characters of all Time

10. Gollum
Played by Andy Serkis in the Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001-2003, dir. Peter Jackson)

9. Jeff Spicoli
Played by Sean Penn in Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982, dir. Amy Heckerling)

8. Ellen Ripley
Played by Sigourney Weaver in Alien (1979, dir. Ridley Scott) and three later films

7. Indiana Jones
Played by Harrison Ford in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981, dir. Steven Spielberg) and two later films

6. Annie Hall
Played by Diane Keaton in Annie Hall (1977, dir. Woody Allen)

5. James Bond
Played by Sean Connery in Dr. No (1962, dir. Terence Young) and six later films

4. Norman Bates
Played by Anthony Perkins in Psycho (1960, dir. Alfred Hitchcock) and, alas, three ill-advised sequels

3. Scarlett O’Hara
Played by Vivien Leigh in Gone With the Wind (1939, dir. Victor Fleming)

2. Fred C. Dobbs
Played by Humphrey Bogart in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948, dir. John Huston)

1. Vito Corleone
Played by Marlon Brando in The Godfather (1972, dir. Francis Ford Coppola)

Here is the link if you wana see the other 90
web page

Interesting.

I'd place N2 Michael, in 1972. In this movie he has more developement, as a character. And Gollum?

Gollum? Ripley? Spicoli? :rolleyes:

Not saying I have a problem with the latter two, but there are MANY MANY better ones. Travis Bickle, Man With No Name, Rick Blaine, Darth Vader, Jake Gittes, Randle McMurphy, and many more.

Vito was my favorite character from The Godfather, and personally, my favorite film character of all-time, but there's a difference between personal favorite, and the best. My vote for best goes to Michael Corleone, and it blows my mind that he isn't in the top ten. Or Travis Bickle for that matter!!!

How about Hannibal Lecter? Charles Foster Kane? I'll make a list in a little while.

The Doc

I know I'm biased, but whatever:

Vito Corleone
Michael Corleone
Travis Bickle
Jake LaMotta
Tony Montana
Tom Hagen
Sonny Corleone
Fredo Corleone
Tommy DeVito
Nicky Santoni

Lets not forget Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones. Great movie, and character.

Gollum? Eek, I hated him!

My top 10 in order:
Sonny Corelone
Micheal Corleone/Vito Corleone (they tie, I can't decide)
Scarlett O'Hara
Vincent Vega
Tommy DeVito
Tracy Lord (from the Philadelphia Story)
Angelo Maggio (Frank Sinatra in From Here to Eternity)
Holly Golightly
Gladys Benton (Jean Harlow in Libeled Lady)

1. Travis Bickle

Played by Robert Deniro in "Taxi Driver." Bickle may well be the most complex character ever depicted on film. The movie itself is a study of this one character.

2. Juda Ben Hur

Played by Charlton Heston in "Ben Hur." Heston does a supurb job in portraying a courageous Jewish Prince during the time of Jesus Christ.

3. Michael Corleone

Played by Al Pacino in the Godfather Trilogy. Could be one of the most dynamic characters ever.

4. The Man with no name

Played by Clint Eastwood in the Fistful of Dollars Trilogy. Say what you want, but Leone's protagonist is the ultimate badass of Westerns.

5. Andy Dufrane (Or however the hell you spell it)

Played by Tim Robbins in "The Shawshank Redemption." Very few characters have drawn as much sympathy from me as the audience. A very smart, sophisticated, and all around loveable character.

Just who in the hell made this list? Good grief putting ET above Darth Vader

My top ten would look nothing like theirs.

I can see putting Clints Blondi from The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly but to omit the other 2 is simply unforgiveable and punnishable by death.

Plus putting that idiot from LOTR in the top ten. :rolleyes:

A lot of the good ones like Charles F. Kane and McMurphy are later in the list.

Jake Gittes at 37??!?! Norma Desmond at 31?!!

BLONDIE? Not even the full title of MAN WITH NO NAME? at 50?!?!

The kid from Home Alone? Why is he on this list? He wasn't interesting, he was irritating. It was a stupid comedy for Christ's sake!

yeh I know I thought the list was pretty wack..it's strange how they got Vito Corleone as No 1 I thought Micheal would have been in there somewhere...why do u think that don vito was no1???

You know who was a great chracter? Peter Parker's boss the newspaper editor from Spiderman. God that guy was cool

He is the man - he got to meet spidey i envy him lol

Probley cause he was transformed from a sex symbol icon-to a 60 year old Mafia Don and pulled if of better than anybody could have imagined thats my opinon

Another great movie character: Gerard in The Fugitive, Tommy Lee Jones.

Here are Mine

Vito Corleone
Darth Vader
Michael Corleone
Henry Hill
Donnie Brasco
Jimmy Burke
Nicky Santoro
R2d2/c3po
Ace Rothstein
Freddy Kruger

A lot of the people on your list are/were real poeple Henry Hill, Donnie Brasco (aka Joe Pistone), Jimmy Burke (Conway), Nicky Santoro (Tony the Ant), and Ace Rothstein (Lefty something or other).

All good characters still, but I don't know if they count.

I'll add Frank Serpico to my list.

A lot of the people on your list are/were real poeple Henry Hill, Donnie Brasco (aka Joe Pistone), Jimmy Burke (Conway), Nicky Santoro (Tony the Ant), and Ace Rothstein (Lefty something or other).

All good characters still, but I don't know if they count. [/b][/quote]I liked the parts they played in the films so they count for me

Here's my top ten list (in no particular order):

Maggie "The Cat" Pollitt - Liz Taylor in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof". She was beautiful. She fought for the man she loved. She won!

James Bond - My preference is for the early Sean Connery movies ("From Russia with Love", "Goldfinger" and "Dr. No"). He was suave beyond belief. He always said the right thing. He always got the girl. He always won.

Rocky Balboa - Sylvester Stallone in a series of 5 movies. He was a dumb, lovable oaf who, when given a shot, took his best shot, and made us all feel good.

Holly Golightly - Audrey Hepburn in "Breakfast at Tiffany's". She was flighty and faddish, but she was cute beyond belief. She showed us that happiness is in our grasp if we only recognize it.

King Kong - (Did you expect me to leave him off my list?) Filmdom's biggest monkey showed a lot more human feeling than many other "stars" of the silver screen. He was the master of his own world but he let his guard down when he fell in love. "T'was beauty that killed the beast".

Luke Jackson - Paul Newman in "Cool Hand Luke". The quintessential anti-hero who refused to march to the beat of The Man's drummer. Wasted talent at its best.

Cody Jarrett - James Cagney plays the headache plagued sociopath who finally ends up on top of the world. KA-BOOOOM

Dorothy Gale - Judy Garland's "Wizard of Oz" character brings out the confused child in all of us and helps us realize that sometimes happiness is right in front of our nose .

Vito Corleone - Brando as the ultimate father and man who refuses to dance on someone else's puppet strings.

Rick Blaine - Humphrey Bogart in "Casablanca". The ultimate leading romantic role in movie history. "Here's looking at you, kid".

You know what's gonna happen to you? I am gonna march you over to the zoo and feed you to the yak....after I finish this drink.

I'll answer that with a quote you may have heard before:

"Go ahead, make my day". :p

I like the first better.

But being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself a question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya punk?

DV,

I believe your quote is Magnum Force.


Since I'm on my lunch and have to get back to work, I don't have a quote ready, but I love the "Pear" scene with young Vito in GFII. :p


TIS

Shame on you TIS, it's the original Dirty Harry!

Although there is a slightly reworded version of the quote said in the beginning of Magnum Force.

MR.BlONDE

Now, this is my kind of thread.

IN NO SPECIFIC ORDER:
1.) The Narrorator

• Film: Fight Club (1999)
• Actor: Edward Norton

2.) Donnie Darko

• Film: Donnie Darko (2001)
• Actor: Jake Gyllenhaal

3.) Mr. Pink

• Film: Reservoir Dogs (1992)
• Actor: Steve Buscemi

4.) Johnny Boy

• Film: Mean Streets (1973)
• Actor: Robert De Niro

5.) Michael Corleone

• Film: The Godfather Trilogy (1972, 1974, 1990)
• Actor: Al Pacino

6.) Travis Bickle

• Film: Taxi Driver (1976)
• Actor: Robert De Niro

7.) Sy Parrish (If you havn't noticed yet, I tend to enjoy anti-social/mentally disturbed character's... The Narrorator, Travis Bickle, and Sy all have that characteristic about them.)

• Film: One Hour (2002)
• Actor: Robin Williams

8.) Tyler Durden (I'm a HUGE Fight Club fan...)

• Film: Fight Club (1999)
• Actor: Brad Pitt

9.) Raoul Duke (This movie had be laughing histerically)

• Film: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998)
• Actor: Johnny Depp

10.) Brick Tamland (Few films make me laugh outloud... Comedy has really gone down-hill, but I enjoyed this one alot. It deserved mention, especially the "Brick" character, who was undoubtablly the funniest)

• Film: Anchorman (2004)
• Actor: Steve Carell

There are so many good characters, and I'm not judging which ones are the "best" by several different standards. I'm just listing the ones that I love. So while I could think of hundreds more, for now, this oughta do it.

In no particular order:

Johnny Cade from The Outsiders is a great character. A good kid who falls into a murder out of self defense, then saves a bunch of kids and pays for it with his life. Well, come to think of it, on that same Outsiders vein, Dallas Winston is quite a complex character, too. Make fun of me and call me a child of the 80's, but there's no denying that's a great story with great characters... both in the book and the movie.

Michael Corleone is obviously a good one, too. Al Pacino's amazing performance walks you through Michael's mind during the different stages of his life.

Rick Blaine is also a great character, like SC mentioned. Everything about him puts you on his side. Everything.

Trent Walker, Vince Vaughn's character in Swingers is a surprisingly faceted character... nobody could have done loser/playboy/suave/idiot/cool/swinger/doofus like Vaughn did.

What about Elwood P. Dowd? Jimmy Stewart's character in Harvey makes you love him so much, you want to believe in his rabbit friend as much as he does.

The original Linus Larrabee (Sabrina) is one of my favorite characters of all time. Okay, so I love Humphrey Bogart and included him twice in this list. So sue me... I would have listed even more of his characters, but for now, this will do. I love his tough-guy persona here, trying to "get rid" of Sabrina, but eventually, she steals his heart anyway. All together now: Awwwww.

Fanny Brice from Funny Girl has to be on my list. She's got such a cute personality, she's got you rooting for her the whole time.

Now, I love Gregory Peck anyway, but there's something about his portrayal of Joe Bradley in Roman Holiday that makes me love him even more. It's the ultimate case of a man's decency getting the better of him.

Judy Holliday, one of my favorite actresses of all time, makes it hard to pick one of her characters to be my favorite. So I'll pick two. Laura Partridge, the little stockholder who changed the future of the huge corporation in Solid Gold Cadillac is just so damn cute. She's naive, but somehow gets things done to her advantage.
Then there's Billie Dawn, the gin-playing ditzy blonde girlfriend of a millionaire who learns etiquette and U.S. history in Born Yesterday.

EDIT: I've gotta add Inspector Jacques Clouseau from the Pink Panther movies, as well as Hrundi Bakshi from The Party. I doubt too many people will disagree with me when I say this: Peter Sellers is by far one of the funniest people who ever lived.

Here's some (not all) of my top 10 characters (good thread BTW). I'll post more as I think of them but as of now, in no order:

1) Tony Montana (Scarface)
2) Jeff 'The Dude' Lebowski (The Big Lebowski)
3) Bill (Kill Bill Vol. 1 & Kill Bill Vol. 2)
4) Vito Corleone (Godfather Part I)
5) Doc Holiday (Tombstone)
6) Ghost Face Killer (Screams 1, 2, 3)
7) Lee Harvey Oswald (JFK)
8) Jimmy 'The Gent' Conway (Goodfellas)
9) Roger 'Verbal' Kint (The Usual Suspects)
10) Ordell Robbie (Jackie Brown)

Why is it some seem to be doing favorite characters rather then most memorable in all of cinema?

Yeah I did my favorite as opposed to the 10 best. I might do that later but those were my top 10

Not even ten best, but memorable. I mean, Bill and Sy Parrish would hardly qualify, although both movies are great.

Right I hear what you're saying. When I posted I misinterpreted the title and just put my favorites and it took me a while and I'm not going to delete them (although I'm sure I'll adjust them when I have my DVDs in front of me this weekend). Like I said tonight I might go back and make the list of the ten best of all time.

I don't know about everyone else, but I did because everyone's opinion on the 10 most memorable will be different, even if they try to narrow it down. It's too subjective because there are too many. So I figured, might as well go all the way and make the entire post blatantly personal.

Yeah, but when I think "Most Memorable Characters of all Time" I don't think "What characters do I like the most?" I think of which characters are thought of as the most famous, which is very broad. You can go from Nosferatu (1922) all the way to characters like Tony Montana, although I'd put a lot before him.

Leonard Shelby is one of my favorite protagonists, but I would hardly consider him one of the most memorable, especially since the film is only half a decade old.

Good one!

Harrison Ford in Air Force One.

I reguarded this as a type of opinion/favorite thing... I don't know if it's the fact that I read this topic after two days of not sleeping, saw everyone posting favorites, or if it's just that I usually see people associating the word "best" with their personal favorite's, rather than pure classic, memorable figures like Rick Blaine of Casablanca, or Jedediah Leland of Citizen Kane.

But I must admit, I'm suprised to see people listing characters other than those featured in Goodfellas, Scarface, The Godfather, etc. People are often biased on this site, not that it's a bad thing, they just tend to ignore all but gangster films. NOT ALL. But many. There are a few who have broadend their horizon's as far as film goes.

Here's my top 10 most memorable characters. Most memorable in the sense that I idolise them in one way or another, and they have at one time or another been regarded, or are still regarded, as highly influential embodiments of the times in which they lived.

1. Jef Costello, played by Alain Delon (Le Samouraï, 1967).
2. Michel Poiccard, played by Jean-Paul Belmondo (A bout de souffle, 1960).
3. Travis Bickle, played by Robert De Niro (Taxi Driver, 1976).
4. Rufus T. Firefly, played by Groucho Marx (Duck Soup, 1933).
5. Robin Hood, played by Errol Flynn (The Adventures of Robin Hood 1938).
6. The Monster, played by ??? (Frankenstein, 1931).
7. Aguirre, played by Klaus Kinski (Aguirre, Wrath of God, 1972).
8. Fast Eddie, played by Paul Newman (The Hustler, 1961).
9. Jake Gittes, played by Jack Nicholson (Chinatown, 1974).
10. Harry Caul, played by Gene Hackman (The Conversation, 1974).

Mick

SHAME. Boris Karloff. :p

SHAME: in-joke reference missed... :p

I knew it was Boris Karloff; but that's how he's billed in the opening credits to the film.

Mick

Shut up.

:p

I'll sumbit a small list of the select few (Unranked) and a breif summary:

Rick Blane - At the heart of the motion picture masterpiece "Casablanca" lies the charecter of Rick blane, the cynical, hard boiled man of the world, who was given the go-by. But below that cynical shell lies "a rank sentementalist".

T. E Lawrence - At the heart of another masterpiece of film lies one of the most enigmatic charecters in film history. Who was T.E Lawrence. He loved and abhored war. He could be a poet an a warrior. His charecter is explored and questioned, but never answered.

Oskar Schindler - Ditto for the above.

Scottie Ferguson - "Vertigo" is, to me, the single greatest film ever produced. The vunerability of Jimmy Stewarts charecter, how he was used, and ultimatley how he was destroyed is another thing that warrants his mention.

Roger Thornhill - He is the essential Cary Grant charecter. So suave and deboniar and a man of the world. He was pure majic.

Rufus T. Firefly - Just as Cary Grant was pure majic, so was Groucho Marx. In Duck Soup we see him at his wisecracking, cigar smoking best.

Scarlet O'Hara - Face it. Any list is incomplete without her. Her firey temper, and beautiful seductive qualities amke her a charecter for the ages. You didn't know weather you should love her or hate her.

Guido Anselmi - The ultimate portrayal of a man and his boredom with life. his day dreams, his fears, his life... Another great charecter.

Michael Corleone: Another enigmatic film charecter. His attempts to save his family and keep up the tradition of his father. I always felt that he had a more rich and greater charecter than his pop.

Kanji Wanatabe: A man faced with death is a tragic idea, but what if this man has never really lived? That's what is shown in the masterpiece of cinema "Ikiru". Oh,how great that performance was...