Angel Heart.
Good call. And a good movie. I won’t spoil it for people who haven’t seen it.
The Ghost Writer
One of my favourite movies of all time
Brazil (1985)
Nearly every western war and spy movie set after WW2
Oceans 11
I’m assuming that it’s been taken as read that this post will be full of spoilers.
Fallen (1998). IMDB doesn’t include ‘horror’ in the genre list, but it’s got supernatural elements to it, I suppose.
The Vanishing (1988) aka Spoorloos. Not the American remake, obvs.There will be blood. Oil mogul thrives while america plunges into depression. Plainview and people like him will go on to be more influential down the line. Like prescott bush or hw bush.
Jin-Rou
Grave of the Fireflies
Brazil (1985)
Chinatown (1974)
Conspiracy (2001)
Fallen. Denzel sets a very neat trap for the demon… but not neat enough.
Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog as well. While the Doc may have been mostly noble and Hammer mostly awful, it ends (somewhat ambiguously) with the Doc actually turning into a villain.
Fallen was the one I was going to add. Glad to see it here!
I’m still disappointed we never got the Dr. Horrible sequel…
Pretty much any Batman movie. It’s subtle, because it’s not chaotic evil, but lawful evil—the status quo, established hierarchic power structures and systemic injustices that plague the city remain in place. In fact, enforcing and protecting status quo is the whole raison d’entre of Batman, who is an extremely priviledged rich individual benefitting and profiting from the status quo. And thus has no desire to enact real societal change, unlike eg Baine.
I’d argue James Bond is also the same. Yes, Bond villains are evil—irrationally and comically so—but like Batman, Bond represents, enforces and protects the same hierarchic power structures and systemic injustices that give rise to these villains.
Then there is Star Wars and all this light vs dark side. But if you stop and think about it, Sith and Jedi are just two sides of the same medal. Jedi mind trick that coerces someone to do something against their will is extremely evil by its very concept. Especially in how trivialized its use is in the movies. Also, there is nothing civilized about lightsabers. These are horribly dangerous to the wielder and their opponent alike, will easily cut through hull plating by accident (a bad thing when a cm of material is all that’s standing between you and hard vacuum). And would in reality not make a clean cauterized cut, but explosively flash boil the target with the end result like being blown from a cannon.
Lawful, systemic evil is the most devilish kind of evil; it’s so subtle it goes unnoticed and is even celebrated as good, no doubt in no small part due to the vast propaganda machine lawful evil loves to build up around itself.
It’s not just Batman. This is a common trope in the superhero genre. Pop Culture Detective has a great video on the subject: https://youtu.be/LpitmEnaYeU
Good one, didn’t think of Batman in this light. Btw it’s raison d’être
guys, it’s raisin’ the etcher
The replies to this comment sum up to
But jedi are the good guys cause they say they are the good guys.
To add to the star wars situation, the jedi are just as bad for the force as the sith, if not worse. They enforce a rigorous dogma that forces their own to suppress all emotion from a young age out of fear that they may be corrupted by the dark side. Not only does this literally make Darth Vader, but it leads to an entire society of emotionally stunted psychics who apparently go rogue very often. They’re not sustainable.
Ignoring the new movies because I genuinely can’t figure out what they’re about, Anakin fulfilled the prophecy at the end of the original 3, destroying the incredibly powerful dogmatic regime of the jedi and killing both master and pupil of the sith leaving only independent, self governed force users dotting the galaxy.
Jedi: We teach restraint to powerful individuals to keep the universe in harmony. This means defending the weak, and often preserving the status quo.
Sith: We teach powerful individuals to fuck shit up, including each other, just because they can. This means culling the weak, and shaking up the status quo.
StarWars Leftists: Jedi are protecting the peace, the council is righteous!
StarWars Libs: Sith are changing the status quo! They’re anti corruption!
StarWars Centrists: These two are virtually the same!StarWars Anarchists: Fuck 'em all! Power to the people!✊🏴
No, they aren’t.
Why the hell don’t Star Wars fans understand Star Wars, it’s not that deep and even when they go looking they splash around in the shallow end of the pool
Saltburn
I don’t want to spoil anything but if you’re even in this thread you need to watch, The Girl With All The Gifts. It’s fuckin brilliant!
The book is great as well, there is also a prequel book “The Boy On The Bridge”
The Usual Suspects is the first one that comes to mind that isn’t horror and the villain winning by getting away. Does that fit the ‘evil wins’ concept you are looking for?
Would Reservoir Dogs also count in that case?
None of the thieves got away at the end of Reservoir Dogs.
This is not to say that “good” triumphed at the end either.
Mr Pink walked away with the diamonds before the police arrived. It’s not clear if he was caught or not but he did walk away. https://youtu.be/0GQc_SwSp_U?si=1XjXFxckgrvR_6EV
Gone Girl (2014). Then again, maybe that one counts as horror.
Nah, I’d call it a thriller.