The movie world has its own internal logic. Things happen there that we would never accept as plausible in real life, and yet onscreen it makes perfect sense. Sometimes, even characters that would raise an eyebrow in reality appear pretty normal within that world of movie logic. But dig deeper and youll find theres a whole society of silver screen crackpots that in reality would most likely have been sectioned by now. There are iconic characters in film that we can instantly, easily recognise as suffering from one mental illness or another. Travis Bickle, The Joker, the Narrator in
Fight Club: theyre all positioned as mentally unstable in one way or another. This list of ten is instead for the characters who reside somewhere between sanity and madness, whose behaviour weve somehow overlooked and have deemed acceptable within the context of their respective movies. But rest assured, theyre absolutely nuts.
1. Daniel Plainview - There Will Be Blood
In
There Will Be Blood, Daniel Plainview is as compellingly determined and driven as the film itself. In the real world, hes an instant Section Eight. A mega-rich oil prospector that makes
Dallas J.R. look like a total wimp, this silver-tongued businessman likes to unwind by threatening the competition, killing priests and generally acting like a ruthless vampire-man. If Donald Trump was ever to carry himself in a similar manner, his next trade meeting would be held in an asylum. A complex, haunted man with obvious father issues, what makes Plainview such a compelling villain on film is just what would send him straight to a shrink in the real world. Failing that, jail.