5 Film Albinos (and Everything That's Wrong With Them)
5. Silas - The Da Vinci Code (Paul Bettany)
Starring alongside a clean-shaven Gandalf, Dr Octopus, Amelie and Tom Hanks dead-rodent hairstyle, Paul Bettany helped to bring Dan Browns historical/religious/silly phenomenon to the big screen in 2006. He played Silas; a crazy, murderous, self-flagellating albino monk who desperately tries to conceal a secret that could be disastrous for the Catholic Church. Throughout the film he hunts down our heroic religious iconography and symbology professor, before accidently shooting Alfred Molinas Bishop Manuel Aringarosa in a police siege. Unable to live with his sins, he runs into the line of fire and dies in police assisted suicide. But Wait... If The Da Vinci Code tells us anything about Silas it is that he is an expert assassin. Throughout the film he is said to have killed the four protectors of the keystone, offs a nun without blinking an eye, and engages the London police in a vicious gun battle. Not bad, considering that he is most likely legally blind. In most eyes, the optic nerve (which connects the eyeball and brain) includes fibers that stay on one side of the brain, and some that cross over to the other. Melanin provides the signal that indicates which fibers should cross over and which should not. With albinos, though, their lack of melanin results in an improper crossing which leads to poor depth perception. This means that it is unlikely that Silas would even be able to drive a car (as he is shown doing in the film), let alone be such a good shot. Other films with Albino killers include Lethal weapon, Stick, and The Firm.
Matthew Chard is a writer who has lived and worked across Australia, USA, South Africa, UK, Cambodia and Tanzania. When not writing articles he can be found working on his next novel, traveling, in the surf, or listening to David Bowie while wearing red Spider-man underpants.
