Empire Top 10
Top Ten Movie Psychos
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Dr Hannibal Lector - The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Here’s the mark of the true psycho du jour: Which of the creeps on this list would you have over — and, well, be had by — for dinner? The correct answer is, of course, Dr Hannibal Lecter, proving his psychopathic credentials by being the man most well versed in etiquette and culinary delight. Sure, he may wear your face for skin after he’s boiled your liver with a nice chianti, but the man can help you catch more deadly, low-rent nutters, excavate your deepest nightmares and, what’s more, has style and class to spare — surely those things alone can excuse a few errant eating habits. -
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Norman Bates - Psycho (1960)
Well dah, right? You could argue Hitchcock’s urbane duo of Rope were more classically psychopathic, but Anthony Perkins’s unassuming, taxidermy-collecting hotel clerk Norman Bates is still the mother (geddit!) of all movie wackos, and the man who’ll forever make us think twice before drawing that shower curtain. Giving away the plot of Psycho is like revealing the ending of Titanic at this point, but we’ll spare — and envy — those newcomers who’ve yet to check in to the Bates Motel. Suffice to say that without him there would be no movie slashers, no Tyler Durden — no thriller cinema as we know it, really.
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Frank Booth - Blue Velvet (1986)
Altogether now (or not): “Mommy… mommmy… baby wants to fuck!” Ah yes, the immortal words of the dearly departed Dennis Hopper, huffing Ventolin from a plastic gas mask and hovering salaciously over Isabella Rossellini’s crotch in David Lynch’s quaint portrait of suburban America. Arguably more haunting is Booth’s insistence that his gang beat up Kyle MacLachlan to the spooky sound of Roy Orbison’s In Dreams. Rest in peace — with a Pabst Blue Ribbon — sir. -
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Rupert Pupkin - The King of Comedy (1982)
Taxi Driver’s Travis Bickle may be the obvious Scorsese/De Niro choice, but for chillingly-acted crazy we’re saying the collaboration’s fame-obsessed stalker Rupert Pupkin is their masterstroke. Predating reality TV, One Hour Photo and countless media-attention whores, this talentless amateur comedian’s dogged coveting of superstar Jerry Lewis’s celebrity is scary stuff indeed — and not just for the fact that he’s constructed a delusional world or kidnaps Lewis to get on air, but for the nagging, sickly feeling that this nobody is just a shade away from any of us.
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Patrick Bateman - American Psycho (2000)
“Do you like Phil Collins?” That question in itself should be enough to set off one’s psycho radar; when the questioner’s behaviour also extends to slicing up co-workers and call girls with an axe, dropping a chainsaw on a guest and, well, displaying a deep knowledge of the Huey Lewis And The News back catalogue, you know you’ve got a certified maniac on your hands. Still, with Christian Bale at his very finest, the controlled malevolence and hatred for humanity on display here is beyond loathsome — it’s outright enjoyable. -
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Alex Forrest - Fatal Attraction (1987)
Lesson one: if you’re married with kids, never have a weekend affair with your colleague if she looks like Glenn Close and you’re starring in a thriller set at the height of AIDS-panic. Lesson two: if you’re Michael Douglas, don’t have affairs with insane blondes (he didn’t learn: see also Basic Instinct). Close’s woman scorned was a pop-culture sensation that spawned a rash of imitators (and, arguably, Jennifer Jason Leigh went her one better in Single White Female), while the phrase “bunny boiler” became part of the lexicon for useful cautionary reasons.
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Jack Torrance - The Shining (1980)
Okay, so you know this one’s coming from the moment Jack opens his mouth during the Overlook Hotel job interview — dude, you just hired Jack Nicholson to care-take a haunted Hellmouth; what were you thinking? — but all the same, his transformation from Stephen King caricature to axe-swinging crazy cat remains one of movies’ best-loved psychotic turns. Just how great is it? When his stressed wife wakes him from the typewriter, Jack lurches up with a spaghetti string of Method Drool dangling from his chin. -
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Joan Crawford - Mommie Dearest (1981)
Imagine a cross between Sunset Boulevard’s Norma Desmond and, oh, Godzilla, and you’re getting close to Faye Dunaway’s legendarily camp portrayal of the Old Hollywood icon. Fading star Crawford may put on a face-saving veneer of class to the media, but behind closed doors — and especially for her petrified adopted daughter Christina — it’s as though Hell itself is bleeding through her mascara. Dunaway’s infamous, wildly tangential “No wire hangers!” tirade and her ensuing reign of terror upon Christina is the absolute gold standard for psycho melodrama.
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Don Logan - Sexy Beast (2000)
The mark of an irrepressible psycho is the ease with which they insinuate themselves into the lives of others when all reason suggests their associates should file a restraining order against them. Such is the blustery charm of Ben Kingsley’s London gangster in his tour de force of mental harassment, which is so beyond passive-aggressive and unrelenting that it crosses over into high comedy. Sample gem (cover your ears, kids): “You’re the problem! You’re the fucking problem you fucking Dr. White honkin’ jam-rag fucking spunk-bubble!” -
10
Anton Chigurh - No Country for Old Men (2007)
Have cattle gun, will travel. Mop-topped assassin-for-hire Anton Chigurh is the cold, remorseless shark of the Coen brothers’ existential Western — chillingly characterised by those dead eyes and a simple need to keep moving, and killing. What’s most unnerving about Javier Bardem’s performance isn’t that Chigurh is an agent of some bleak destiny, rather it’s the absolute indifference he displays toward his targets — the only time he seems to care is when the blood of a victim threatens to despoil his nice loafers.
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