What’s a movie where actually the “bad guy” wins, but it’s not obvious?

[LeonardhoFstader1 Joined: Nov 3rd, 2020 Topics: 1 Posts: 0 View Predictions]

#1203817504

My girlfriend and I watched “Four weddings and a funeral” the other night. You know, classic romcom. But mid-movie we realized that Andie MacDowell is actually the antagonist: her character willingly and openly cheats on her fiancé/husband and when things don’t work out she sabotages Hugh Grant’s character’s wedding. In the end she gets everything she wants and probably won’t change her ways.

Another movie that comes to mind is Top Gun, where Tom Cruise’s character is an unpredictable egocentric maniac, who kills his best friend, while the official antagonist portrayed by Val Kilmer is a textbook soldier.

What are other movies, where the bad guys win in the end, but it’s not Bond-villain-obvious?

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[Dan Jo Joined: Aug 16th, 2017 Topics: 6 Posts: 834 View Predictions]

#1203817984

Edward Norton in Primal Fear

Juliette Binoche in Damage

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[Lexa Joined: Feb 22nd, 2018 Topics: 0 Posts: 213 View Predictions]

#1203818017

Not sure if I’m getting this right but

Leonard in Memento

Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network

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[Dan Backslide Joined: Apr 24th, 2016 Topics: 63 Posts: 5681 View Predictions]

#1203818094

Henry Hill technically wins in Goodfellas, but he’s such a self pitying asshole that his normal life feels far worse to him than imprisonment. So he wins, but he himself can’t see it. Which is for the best, as it means he still is punished in his own way.

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[FairWeatherAffair Joined: May 11th, 2018 Topics: 7 Posts: 1022 View Predictions]

#1203818227

Gone Girl? Tough one to pinpoint a bad guy; both protagonists are pretty terrible.

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[Chitanda170 Joined: Apr 1st, 2020 Topics: 0 Posts: 352 View Predictions]

#1203818383

Is not a movie but the ending of Game of thrones was exactly that, Bran was the villain and he won at the end, he played 4d chess while the others played checkers

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[Dan Backslide Joined: Apr 24th, 2016 Topics: 63 Posts: 5681 View Predictions]

#1203818419

Chitanda170 wrote:

Is not a movie but the ending of Game of thrones was exactly that, Bran was the villain and he won at the end, he played 4d chess while the others played checkers

Going along with that, Sansa acted like a xenophobe who jumped at the first chance to take power for herself under extremely nonsensical and selfish reasons, which she’s never called out on.

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[Chitanda170 Joined: Apr 1st, 2020 Topics: 0 Posts: 352 View Predictions]

#1203818465

Dan Backslide wrote:

Going along with that, Sansa acted like a xenophobe who jumped at the first chance to take power for herself under extremely nonsensical and selfish reasons, which she’s never called out on.

I totally forgot about Sansa, you’re right, she was another villain. I never thought that I would hate the Starks at the end.

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[Brayden Fitzsimmons Joined: May 3rd, 2015 Topics: 120 Posts: 7935 View Predictions]

#1203818470

Black Panther — T’Challa ideology shifted and to Erin’s despite the latter dying.

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[wattsgold Joined: Oct 6th, 2018 Topics: 4 Posts: 2622 View Predictions]

#1203818482

Chitanda170 wrote:

I totally forgot about Sansa, you’re right, she was another villain. I never thought that I would hate the Starks at the end.

I fucking hate the Starks = Low-rate Lannisters.

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[John Nguyen Joined: Aug 2nd, 2017 Topics: 3 Posts: 294 View Predictions]

#1203818551

Didn’t you ask the same question in reddit?

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[John Berchmans Joined: Jan 22nd, 2018 Topics: 6 Posts: 4555 View Predictions]

#1203818739

It was a book before it was a movie, but I felt like Sayuri became a really awful person by the end of Memoires of a Geisha. She ruins Pumpkin’s chance to become the adopted mother of the okiya, which pretty much destroys their friendship in the process. She aligns herself with a Nazi ally just for the money and status protection it gives. And she treats Nobu, a man who literally saved her life and did so much for her, like absolute shit just because of his face, refusing him as her Danna for said Nazi dictator, later having sex with the ambassador just to get him to leave her, and then finally succeeding in making him so angry that he abandons her when The Chairman tells him everything. I know she was treated awfully as a child and lived in a cruel world, but that doesn’t make me feel any less sorry for Pumpkin, Nobu, and all the other good people she hurt just so she could get what she wanted, which was The Chairman.

John's Best of 2020

Best Picture: Soul
Best Direction: The Midnight Sky
Best Actor: Chadwick Boseman
Best Actress: Viola Davis
Best Supporting Actor: Delroy Lindo
Best Supporting Actress: Amanda Seyfried
Best Screenplay: Soul

John's Best of 2021

Best Picture: Nomadland
Best Direction: Nomadland
Best Actor: Lakeith Stanfield
Best Actress: Frances McDormand
Best Supporting Actor: Daniel Kaluuya
Best Supporting Actress: Dominique Fishback
Best Screenplay: Judas and the Black Messiah

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[Stank83 Joined: Mar 8th, 2020 Topics: 77 Posts: 1308 View Predictions]

#1203819772

Zodiac
There Will Be Blood
The Wolf of Wall Street
The Irishman

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[facaw Joined: Apr 7th, 2017 Topics: 0 Posts: 24 View Predictions]

#1203819798

The Devil’s Advocate
Fight Club
The Dark Knight
Candyman
The Silence of The Lambs (both sides win)
No Country for Old Men (nobody wins, but the bad guy doesn’t lose either).

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[Dan Backslide Joined: Apr 24th, 2016 Topics: 63 Posts: 5681 View Predictions]

#1203819826

Stank83 wrote:

Zodiac There Will Be Blood The Wolf of Wall Street The Irishman

None of the villains win in The Irishman. They all go on to live unfulfilling, sad, lonely lives. Or they were murdered.

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