In Dark City, the protagonist’s love interest effectively dies, as her former memories/personality are erased.
I think also “All Quiet On The Western Front.”
How can you forget “The Poseidon Adventure”(1972)? The good Reverend Gene Hackman leads the few survivors who believe in him to safety only to sacrifice himself to a fiery pit.
“Take me God! Take ME!!”
I love that cheesy ass movie.
According to the director, the events in Total Recall really are a hallucination, and the film fades to white at the end instead of black because the hero just got lobotomized in the real world.
In Star Wars: Episode III, Mace Windu gets killed before the final act.
What do you MEAN he wasn’t the hero of the film?
In Being John Malkovich, nobody dies, but Malkovich ends up getting his mind taken away and living as a puppet for the rest of his life, while John Cusack’s character ends up having to spend a lifetime imprisoned and helpless inside another person’s mind.
Granted, it’s hard to say who’s really a hero in this film.
Arlington Road, I think.
I think you mean Mace Motherfuckin’ Windu.
Ghost Dad.
Or just Ghost, for that matter.
Not to get sidetracked, but there seems to be a resurgence of little kids getting whacked, at least in genre flicks:
In Pan’s Labyrinth the little girl is shot and killed by her stepfather, in The Host the little girl dies at the end, in Return of the Living Dead: Necropolis the heroic little boy gets his brains chomped on, and in the indie zombie flick Pathogen, the entire main cast of junior high kids is wiped out.
And don’t forget Grindhouse, with Dakota’s (Marley Shelton’s) son.
Does King Kong count?
in Children of Men, Clive Owen’s character dies before the ship finds them
Yeah, good example.
Remember, the OP asked for movies where the good guy dies “before his bad guy counterpart gets his just deserts.”
In many of the movies listed so far, there is no “bad guy counterpart.”
Never mind, wrong film I was recalling. Sorry.
Sir Rhosis
And the good man that was Luke’s father was killed by Darth Vader. From a certain point of view.
or good guy, for that matter.
Mace Motherfuckin’ “Sith On A Mutherfuckin’ Ship” Windu?
Although he DID get better.
You have excellent taste in movies mate ,coincidentally I rate AH as one of the best movies ever.
In Fallen, Denzel Washington’s character dies.
In Very Bad Things, just about every character dies (however there really isn’t any “good” characters in that movie, they’re all bad/evil in some way).