A better example from the same movie (1950 version) is Henry Curtis, who his wife Elizabeth is searching for with Allan Quartermain. Henry’s skull is later found in the mines.
I am ready to be corrected on this - and there is certainly ambiguity created with all the unidentified soldiers killed in the opening battle scene - but do we ever see any of the other Ryan brothers in Saving Private Ryan? The plot is based on three brothers dying hence the urgency of saving the fourth and final one.
TCMF-2L
Yes, she’s alive at the beginning IIRC.
Ooops, right you are. No lines, though.
I think he’s dead all along - but is he named? Can’t find his name anywhere online.
The mother Adele in Killer Joe is named and seen briefly as a corpse but never alive.
Meanwhile famous John Wayne western The Sons of Katie Elder has Katie Elder as a major plot point (obviously), dead but never seen.
TCMF-2L
In Babylon 5, the Centauri leader has the decapitated heads of his enemies in jars on his desk, and he has conversations with them.
In Guardians of the Galaxy, part of the movie takes place within the corpse of a god.
One of the most quoted lines from one of the most quotable films - The Princess Bride.
‘My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.’
Elsewhere the father is given the complete name of Domingo Montoya.
TCMF-2L
Chester Copperpot and One-Eyed-Willy from The Goonies
Dog my cats! You’re right! I had completely mucked that up, and thought he was a deader, just a body in a pool, the whole movie through. I had honestly forgotten that he was alive in all the main sequences of the movie. My blunder.
(But, god damn it, I did read the OP! It was the movie I’d forgotten!)
:smack::smack::smack:
(sorry, Bryan Ekers:o)
Not 100% sure if buddy was dead, but there’s the Monty Python sketch where some poor sap is thrown into a rugby scrum. I did hear some agonized moaning and yelping, so maybe he was still alive as he was getting tossed and booted around.
In Journey to the Center of the Earth, Arne Saknussem’s skeleton is found lying on the floor of the cavern where he died, pointing to the exit, providing them with the clue they need to get back to the surface.
I think that in the 2010 version of True Grit, Mattie Ross’s father Frank Ross is killed off screen before the movie starts. (IIRC, in the 1969 version the movie starts with his murder.)
Carlotta Valdes, in Hitchcock’s “Vertigo.”
Rembrandt, Silver Streak.
If we’re going Python, then surely the canonical example is the parrot.
What about The Last of Sheila? Been a while since I’ve seen it. The movie takes place some time after Sheila’s death, but I don’t recall if there were flashbacks showing her.
Not a main character by any means, but Paula Schultz died before the events of Kill Bill vol 1 & 2. Many think she’s the wife of King Schultz in Django Unchained, but it’s unconfirmed…
All wrong! The first glimpse we have of her is riding a broomstick in the tornado that carries the house to Oz. About 3:30 seconds or so in.
That’s the Wicked Witch of the West, played by Margaret Hamilton. Her sister, the Wicked Witch of the East, is the one that is killed by Dorothy’s house falling on her. All we ever see of her is her feet (wearing the Ruby Slippers.)
In The Lost World (1925 version), the remains of Maple White, the original discoverer of the plateau, are found by the expedition after they reach it. (In the 1960 version, the same character, named Burton White, is still alive.)
If you mean from the French film with Gerard Depardieu, Guerre turns up alive at the end, and in any event, is shown as a youth just married in flashbacks earlier in the film.
I’d say this is a great example, since the whole film is essentially about the elephant in the room, aka, the corpse in the trunk in the middle of the room during a party. If we see him alive, it’s for seconds.
I think Morgyn is right. Miss Gultch morphs into the Witch of the East. He hair is down, she has a cape, her costume looks like it’s not all black, and most importantly, she appears to be wearing the ruby slippers. Margaret Hamilton plays both witches.