Since Abhi my colleagues at Sepia Mutiny have apparently stopped doing their earlier hourly updates on what Kal Penn is up to, I feel it is incumbent upon me to remind readers that second-gen actor Kal Penn plays one of Lex Luthor’s henchmen in the new film Superman Returns (aka, the “American version of Krrish“). Reviews have been pretty positive, though there are still some signs that the film may be a load of “Kraptonite” (or, in a nod to Manish, Krraptonite!), but how can that stop me from loyally supporting the ABCDeNiro?
And no, he doesn’t play a vaguely middle-eastern terrorist type. Nor does he speak in a bad Indian accent. In fact, in the final cut of the film, I gather, Kal Penn doesn’t have any speaking lines at all. Also, his character is named “Stanford.” Ah well: if they don’t have you playing the demonic terrorist, they’ll have you whipped as the “model minority.” Sigh.
At least he’s on the right side. From the trailers, this version of Superman seems like one of those movies with a hero so annoyingly earnest you end up rooting for the bad guys to win. Of course, with bad guys as charismatic as Kevin Spacey (or indeed, Kal Penn), that comes pretty easily. Can you think of other examples in this genre? Bad guys so diabolical and cool that you’re practically depressed when they’re finally vanquished at the end?
you kill me man.. that’s really funny.. or maybe just the summertime jooces flowing free.
Now, do we have to support bad actors like [Kal Penn – i am ashamed of my name], because they are brown?
“Nonetheless, women still look rather shady.” “you kill me man.. that’s really funny.. or maybe just the summertime jooces flowing free.”
just to clarify, i didn’t say that. i was quoting from an article about the afi’s list of heroes and villains. wish i could take credit for it:)
Sharon who? Here’s my list of ladies…
Kathy Bates as Annie in Misery Tina Turner as Aunt Entity in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome O-Ren Ishii from Kill Bill was pretty badass and ruthless Reagen from The Exorcist!!! The White Witch from Chronicles of Narnia Alien Queen from Aliens (she counts!) Demi Moore in Disclosure
Animated:
Evil Lyn from He Man and the Masters of the Universe The Queen from Snow White Wicked Witch of the West Cruella Deville Ursulla in Little Mermaid
Some scary lads in Lynch flicks:
Willem Defoe as Bobby Peru in Wild at Heart – with his little teeth and gummy sneer shudder Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet Bob/Leeland in Twin Peaks Robert Blake as the Mystery Man in Lost Highway – I think he was bad, I still haven’t made complete sense of the flick. But he sure was scary as hell.
This game kicks ass.
Okay, a few more suggestions:
Badass male villains: Magua, Barron Vladimir Harkonnen
Badass Female Villian: Natasha Henstridge in Species
Here’s my list of favourite baddies (which intersects fairly non-trivially with my list of favourite movie characters):
McKellen (Sir Leigh Teabing) in The Da Vinci Code (the only reason I sat through the movie!) Schwarzenegger (The Terminator) in T1 Pitt (Tyler Durden) in Fight Club Carradine and Madsen (Bill and Budd) in Kill Bill 2 Travolta, Willis, Jackson, …. (Vince, Jules, Butch, ….) in Pulp Fiction Stone (Catherine Trummel) in Basic Instinct Hoffman (I forgot the name) in MI3 McDowell (Alex) in A Clockwork Orange Sellers (all of them) in Dr Strangelove
Abraham (Kabir) in Dhoom! Bajpai (Bhikhu Mhatre) in Satya Kharbanda (Shaakaal) in Shaan Amjad Khan (Gabbar) in Sholay
Was she the Half-French Half-Japanese chick? Or was that the sidekick of O-Ren? I keep googling for Half-French Half-Japanese singles. Somehow nothing useful turns up.
glenn close in fatal attraction, bette davis in of human bondage (not purely villainous but really destestable), the little foxes, whatever happened to baby jane, angela lansbury in manchurian candidate.
Male Villains: Hans from Die Hard (second best movie villain ever next to Darth), and for that matter his brother from Die Hard 3. Agent Smith from the Matrix, and Prince Humperdink, Vizzini, and Count Rugen from Princess Bride. Actually, any character from the later movie would work in any “best of” game. DeNiro as Capone in the Untouchables Females: Nurse Rachet from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest…Can’t think of any others that haven’t already been mentioned. Would Ziyi Zhang in Crouching Tiger be considered a villain? Most of the movie, she was, but she did see the light at the end.
“pathetic”
Are you my shadow?
Nurd.
Dune rules. I was lucky enough to find the first six books and three add ons (one each on main houses) on ebay for 30 bucks. It was a total steal.
Gotta put in the Mel Gibson movie villans. The Mad Max dude, Edward Longshanks, and the crazy English Col. from The Patriot. Mike Madsen in Resevior Dogs cutting the dude’s ear off was pretty crazy too. Horror movie villian like Pinhead, Jason, and Freddy are classics.
The woman in “The Hand that Rocks the Cradle” was pretty sinister as a villan.
Gotta give props to the warden and head of the prison guards from The Shawshank Redemption.
Joaquin Phoenix in Gladitor played his role as Commodus to perfection while Jack Nicholson was kick ass in The Shining. I’ll second almost any Bond villain, those guys were the shit.
Michael Jackson – “Ghosts” Tonya Harding – “Breakaway” . .
O-Ren Ishii was played by Lucy Liu and she was formerly one of Bill’s assasins before she took over the japanese mafia group. The half-french, half-japanese lady was her lawyer/side kick. All the female villians – Vivica Fox, Daryl Hanna etc in that movie were pretty bad-ass!
No love for Mugambo?
Neha –
My day was going rather well until you dropped that Robert Blake bomb on my ass, damn near scaring the t*ts off of me.
…who was PROBABLY separated at birth from THIS little pant-pissing freak: Lady Elaine Fairchild from Mr. Roger’s Land of Make Believe.
thanks killbill.
AAARRRRGGGHHHH! Fugging puppets!
And another dude in the running for scariest male: PENNYWISE
Sorry DDiG, I’m late, thanks Kill Bill!
More posts on Kal Penn as Lex Luthor’s henchman: one, two, three.
dave chappelle as rick james
More from me:
Zelda. I can’t remember the name of the show (80s puppets), but that was one scary alien Martian invader. Totally demented.
Alan Rickman as the Sheriff of Nottingham in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. The one with Kevin Costner in the lead role. Mr Rickman almost completely stole the show.
Manoj Bajpai in Road. If you’ve seen this film (also starring Vivek Oberoi and Antara Mali), you’ll know what I mean.
Another two for the Trekkies: Hoshi aka Empress Sato and Kira, both from the “Mirror Universe” episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise and DS9 respectively. Now those were two seriously bad girls and very foxy indeed in their villanous roles. Kira was even outrageously bisexual, the saucy minx. Both of them could have benefitted from a healthy spanking session with a suitably strict instructor, namely me.
Jai, you are totally biting off my call as Alan Rickman from Die Hard…and don’t even try to tell me that he was better in Robin Hood.
Vurd.
Meryl Streep as Hillary Clinton in The Manchurian Candidate was creepy in the extreme. Bad bad woman, and not in a good way.
Evil Abhi in The Sepia Mutiny. Baad.
Spoor Lam in the same. Baaaad.
amardeep –
actually, we should all be happy to know exactly ONE line from kal made it into the final cut of the movie. at least the director did a good job of showing a healthy number of desis in the hospital scene.
one step at a time.
Alan Rickman in ANYthing. Ditto on the previous comment regarding him as Severus Snape. Much as I love Harry Potter, I’d love to see Snape get his day… though after the last book I’m incredibly excited to hear what’s to come for Snape.
NOOOOOOOOOOO, please please don’t get me started on Harry Potter speculation!!!!
How about Miko in Sin City (she of the deadly Samurai sword)?
And nobody beats Mogambo 🙂
Yeah, he’s cool as Snape, he aight in Robin Hood. But again, I just can’t compare any of those roles w/ Hans in Die Hard. Sorry to snipe about this, but Snape (and I haven’t read any of the books) as far as I can tell, isn’t even a villain. Does he even count?
When I first glanced at the headline I thought this was going to be about the real-life Lex Luthor, Narendra Modi…
Anyways… no reference to Kill Bill can be complete without Go Go Yubari, the schoolgirl from Hell. “How about now, big boy? Do you still wish to penetrate me?… Or is it I who has penetrated you?” shudder
It’s a shame that documentaries have been left out thus far: – George W. Bush in Fahrenheit 9-11 was deliciously evil. – The spoiled white girl in Spellbound gave you sympathy for the others. – McDonald’s in SuperSize Me is outright deadly.
When it comes to calling people out for using that wack, piece-of-shit phrase, I’m your Huckleberry. Best of all, this poet warrior has my six.
.
Comment #1: ANNA is going to take over the world one day, so I think I’m going to side with ANNA on this point just because I don’t want to be on her bad side when said event happens. Plus, I think she’s right.
Comment #2: BrooklynBrown, there are plenty of people who would disagree with you about your choice of docu-villains. Although, I must admit I am not one of them.
Comment #3: I’ve decided that keeping track of blog comments is far too addictive and I should definitely STOP.
True that. My point was actually to distinguish between the construction of a villain rather than the actual villain. Perhaps a Decepticon in another light may be a more honorale hero than any Autobot? Who knows? But I suspect that the plethora of villains named above have about as much to do with camera angles, editing, and facial movements than they have with actual dastardly deeds.
On a different note, Sriram, I liked your “Todos Locos” tune. Cool music, bro!
I guess Brad Pitt in Fight Club and Jack Nicholson from Batman come to mind immediately
Thanks man!!!
Manoj Bai was awesome in ‘Aks’ as well. Creeped me out big time.
Gong Li was superb in ‘Memoirs of a Geisha’. I was completely enchanted with her wickedness.
Alright. Well I guess that settles that. wack, piece of shit phrase. That there is an airtight response.
And which poet warrior would you referring to. Because I have many a poet warrior having my six, seven, eight and nine.
Before Tom Cruise jumped the proverbial (couch)shark, he did make a pretty slick villian in “Collateral”.
It’s an adequate response to something so obviously inappropriate. We’ve discussed why we disapprove of that offensive, useless term for months, most recently via that post I linked to, from Amardeep. I don’t need to reinvent the wheel.
is somebody seriously arguing the right to use the term “uncle tom” and not have any backlash?
trying to think of some female baddies.
I think Kajol in Gupt was AWESOME! =D
i reviewed the above with the point of view that a villain one sympathizes with is really a representation of one’s id, someone one can relate to or aspire towards. A villain woul alternately be called “cool” by those who feel constrained by societal norms and seek an escape, or “tragically likeable” by those who see the representation as reflections of one’s darkest thoughts. It is the latter for me I suppose.
Funnily my thoughts turned to russian literature and to dostoevsky, tolstoy in particular – possibly because the morality plays are stark but not over complicated. i ran down the list of hadji murad, the eternal husband, notes from the underground, brothers K,… but the choice was not difficult. my fav is raskolnikov.
still, my original hypothesis doesnt quite hold for the cross-gender selections above, or does it?
I was surprised to see “Jism” at my local Blockbuster (I live in Jackson Hts.). I watched it and I could not believe how horrid it was, especially the so-called “femme fatale.” She resembled petrified wood, she was so stiff. What a waste of my life…
And mine is Sofya Semyonovna Marmeladova:) that must be the coolest name ever for someone living in sin:)
what’s not to love in a villain, if (s)he embodies one’s aspirations.
just thinkging out loud.
is your current partner so familiar and good, your needs manifests itself in the desire to save a fallen woman.
are you so tired of keeping up appearances in matters of control, that your fantasy is to yield yourself to a powerful other.
is there a teacher or an older person from your present or past who you’d like to seduce.
Is that like he’s not an actual actor, but he was born to parents who come from a country called actor-ia?
😛
ECFI Uncle points out that Superman is Desi.
AH MY GAWD, hairy_d, how do you know these things? I will always lust after Mr. Uchida, my 7th grade “computer science” teacher.
Predator from the the Predator movies is the coolest alein ever. Why couldnt he beat the hell out of some Arnold?
Magneto from X-Men
Sam Jackson in Pulp Fiction
Maybe Superman wasn’t but E.T. was 🙂
I would add:
Jennifer Jason Leigh from Single White Female Al Pacino from The Devil’s Advocate The woman from the Piano Teacher (ooh that was brutal!) and Mum-ra.
Matt Damon in “The talented Mr.Ripley” was chilling.
M. Nam