Let’s list movies where the bad guy, or the evil force anyway wins totally, with almost no compensation to the side of good. Movies like Empire Strikes Back don’t really count, since there is a little victory for the good guys.
The only movie that strikes me immediately as being this way is Pet Semetary. Any others?
How about Seven…
Good question. Umm…
Chinatown
1984
Seven
The Omen
Clockwork Orange depending on how you look at it.
let me think…
Taxi Driver, where DeNiro’s character has evil thoughts, intentions and murderous acts, then gets lauded as a hero.
Here’s a thread we did about this a while back:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=19083
Last night at a DopeFest we tried to think of any subject that hasn’t already been done as a thread but couldn’t come up with anything.
Fallen. “Remember, I’m telling you about the time I almost died. See ya 'round.”
The Usual Suspects. “The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.”
The Day After. Nukes automatically win that one.
Planet of the Apes
Planet of the Apes II
Friday the 13th
12 Monkeys
Hmmm…the more I think about it, the more I realize that in some movies having the good guys win WAS pure evil.
The Last Seduction
The Paralax View
Devils Advocate ( it’s at least a draw )
The Godfather
One Day in September (documentary)
That movie where Tim Robbins is the terrorist–I can’t think of the title, but I really dig the ending. Something Road?
The Usual Suspects is an excellent choice there.
Also Shallow Grave the British movie by that name, not the other one.
The Grifters
The Last Seduction
The classic is Altman’s The Players about Hollywood, where they get away with murder in Hollywood.
yep, I agree, ** Arlington Road **
Curses, Wring and ThisYearsGirl beat me to it.
Well, let’s see…
Hannibal Lecter kills two cops and a paramedic and gets clean away in “Silence of the Lambs.”
In “Night of the Living Dead,” courage and resourcefulness end up counting for nothing, as the hero survives the night but still gets killed by rednecks.
Mel Gibson is utterly evil in “Payback,” but still gets away with his life and all the money (this doesn’t REALLY count, I suppose, in that his enemies are just as evil as he is).
In “The Wicker Man,” the good, honorable cop (played by Edward Woodward) ends up burned to death by Christopher Lee’s pagans.
In virtually ALL horror movies these days, the bad guy survives at the end, because he’s necessary for a string of profitable sequels. Evil (in the form of Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers or Freddy Krueger) HAS to triumph, or the series comes to an end.
In Stanley Kubrick’s “Paths of Glory,” the poor French soldiers are railroaded and executed by the top brass, despite Kirk Douglas’ best efforts.
I could name many more, but that’s my contribution.
Storm of the Century. Great movie.
The Exorcist…depending on how you look at it. (I personally think its one where “good guys” win, but others people think of it as a failure…)
All i can think of for now.
The Other. An early Seventies movie about a pair of twin boys, one evil, one not.
Doctor Strangelove. Not only do the nukes win, but the “tunnel gap” worriers will persist even beyond that.
The Alien series. As sure as studios want money, the baddie monsters will somehow resurrect.
Stone Cold. The good guys win, but Brian Bosworth survived this wreck to perhaps appear on camera again someday. That’s the greatest evil.
Good choice…that movie has one of the most shocking endings I have ever seen. It really sneaks up on you.
How about ** All Quiet on the Western Front **. The last scene is chilling.
In Kubrick’s Paths of Glory, evil doesn’t win. It was supposed to but the studio forced them to tack on the cheap ending where the main general dude is going to get fired. He suceeds in executing those soldiers, but he pays his price too.