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...