We’ve seen plenty of dead bodies in films throughout the years but most of them are really just for ornament value. The stiffs featured here know how to earn their keep in their respective movies, serving a genuine purpose in all manner of ways …
11. Septimus
From Stardust (2007)
Played by Mark Strong
How did he die? It’s complicated. This prince drowns – in thin air – after a voodoo doll made for him is thrown into a pond by the 5000-year-old witch, Lamia (played by Michelle Pfeiffer). The same witch he had tried to assassinate just moments earlier.
Usefulness in death? For evil-doing. His lifeless body is quickly re-animated by Lamia in order to prevent the movie’s hero, young Tristan (Charlie Cox), from making his own attempt to kill her. Using the voodoo doll like a remote-control, she makes Septimus have an extraordinary sword-fight with Tristan – while his ghost sits on the sidelines and watches with his dead brothers.
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10. Sgt. Pembry
From The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Played by Alex Coleman
How did he die? He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. The cop has his face cut off with a pocket-knife by Hannibal Lecter (played by Anthony Hopkins) in order for the good, albeit cannibalistic, doctor to escape from his courthouse prison.
Usefulness in death? For Lecter, quite. Dressing him in his own white prison outfit, he dumps the cop’s corpse down an elevator shaft for the purpose of creating a diversion. Lecter then uses the skin of the man’s face so he can in fact play the part of the wounded policeman and make his getaway via an ambulance. Brilliantly done in an utterly sadistic kind of way.
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9. Norma Bates
From Psycho (1960)
Voiced by Virginia Gregg, Paul Jasmin and Jeanette Nolan.
How did she die? Well, this sweet old dear was killed in a jealous rage by her psychopathic – albeit loving – son, Norman (played by Anthony Perkins), after he found her sleeping with another man. This other guy wasn’t even family. Yeah, the boy was a little nuts.
Usefulness in death? Again, quite for the killer of the piece, for a time. Her mummified corpse is a replacement for the actual living ‘mummy’ he snuffed out. She spends her days sitting in a rocking chair looking out the window or being carted around the family home by her son. Of course, it was her involvement with stiffs that led to the whole messy situation anyway.
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8. Bernie Lomax
From Weekend at Bernie’s (1989)
Played by Terry Kiser
How did he die? He was whacked (well poisoned with a lethal injection to be precise) by a hitman in his own beach-side vacation home after he was found to be ‘diddling’ the wife of a mob boss who’s in cahoots with. Though the hitman later thinks he didn’t actually kill him, thanks to the utter brilliance – or is that stupidity? – of the two main characters, Larry (Andrew McCarthy) and Richard (Jonathan Silverman).
Usefulness in death? He does allow Larry and Richard, who are really just two schmuck employees Bernie invites over for the weekend to stay alive. Bernie had actually wanted them killed by the said hitman, Paulie (Don Calfa), due to business reasons, but not while he was in their general vicinity. When they discover this though a phone message, they create the illusion that he is in fact still alive. Thereafter, the two main characters were constantly seen walking around with a stiffy strapped to their leg. (All right, stop it! No more stiff jokes)
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7. Ben Thomas
From Seven Pounds (2008)
Played by Will Smith
How did he die? He actually kills himself by sitting in a bathtub full of water, and then dropping a jellyfish in, which continually stings him until he is dead. You see, seven innocent lives were lost, including that of his fiance, after he caused a road accident because he was stuffing around with his phone while driving.
Usefulness in death? Haunted by what he’s done, Ben donates seven pounds of flesh, which includes his kidney, heart, part of his liver, a lung, his eyes, bone marrow, and … his beach house, to seven people in need.
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6. Persian Soldiers
From 300 (2007)
Played by Various Actors
How did they die? As members of Persian emperor Xerxes’ invading horde, they bite off a little more than they can chew when confronted by the quality – not certainly not quantity – of King Leonidas’ men at the narrow pass of Thermopylae. They are absolutely slaughtered by the sword and spear of the scantily-clad Spartans. That’ll teach ‘em.
Usefulness in death? The multi-skilled Spartan soldiers use the Persian corpses as mortar for a massive defensive ‘Wall of the Dead’. The 300 (well, it might have been a little less than that number by this stage) ultimately push the wall onto an approaching contingent of Immortals, the masked warriors of Xerxes’ never-ending legion. Waste not, want not – that’s what the Spartans always said. “This! Is! Recycling!” The Spartans even whistle while they work when constructing the bloody blockade.
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5. Uruguayan rugby players
From Alive (1993)
Played by a variety of actors
How did they die? Based on the remarkable true story in which a plane carrying the Stella Maris College rugby team crashes into the Andes mountain range in 1972. Twelve of the 45 passengers are killed in the immediate impact, while another 17 die from the freezing conditions.
Usefulness in death? Well, 16 survived thanks largely to the fact the others had died, having feasted on the flesh of the corpses after their proper food (you know, of the non-human variety) supply runs out. Fortunately for the actors portraying the survivors – including Ethan Hawke as the team’s coach, Nanda Parrado – when they are shown to be dining out on their former friends and family, they are only eating turkey jerky.
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4. Jackie Boy
From Sin City (2005)
Played by Benicio Del Toro
How did he die? A sword-wielding prostitute called Miho (played by Devon Aoki) turns this slimeball plain-clothes cop into a ‘Pez dispenser’ by slicing his throat after he and his mates start harassing one of her working girl colleagues in Old Town. Before being sliced and diced he accidentally shoots the muzzle of his gun into his forehead after it jams.
Usefulness in death? Very, in particular his head, which is later used to carry a grenade that detonates while in possession of a group of mob enforcing mercenaries, led by Manute (played by Michael Clarke Duncan) sent to take down the prostitutes of Old Town. Jackie Boy was also good as a driving companion, capable of being involved in hallucinatory conversations with the driver, Dwight (Clive Owen).
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3. An Al Capone Goon
From The Untouchables (1987)
Played by … No Idea, but please let me know
How did he die? The hood makes a mad dash to a nearby shack after Eliot Ness, his band of ‘Untouchables’ and a group of mounted police intercept an illegal shipment of liquor up in the Rocky Mountains at the border between Canada and the US. Ness (Kevin Costner) catches up with him and ultimately blasts him with his shotgun – the Chicago way.
Usefulness in death? Another of Capone’s goons alive and take him back to the aforementioned shack, but their attempts to get him to translate an all-important ledger that conceals the mobster’s accounts prove unsuccessful. That is until frustrated veteran cop Malone (Sean Connery) cleverly steps outside, grabs the dead body on the porch, puts his pistol into its mouth and demands, “I’ll give you to the count of three to tell me what I want to know!” before shooting him – Again. Unaware his henchman buddy was in fact already dead, Goon No.2 spills the beans, and probably his bladder.
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2. Jacques Sauniere
From The Da Vinci Code (2006)
Played by Jean-Pierre Marielle.
How did he die? The curator of the Louvre in Paris was murdered by the deranged albino monk, Silas (played Paul Bettany), for being the Grand Master of a secret organisation called the Priory of Sion – not to mention a sexual deviant to boot.
Usefulness in death? Despite passing on he actually leads the American symbolist Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) and his cutesy French cryptologist off-sider Sophie Neveu (Audrey Tautou) to uncovering the truth about the society he led, and the truth behind the Holy Grail it has kept hidden from the world for a couple of thousand years. He leaves vital clues on the floor of the Louvre written in his own blood just before dying.
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1. The Human Shield
From Total Recall (1990)
Played by … Some Poor Bastard
How did he die? Sadly for this poor schmo he was simply caught in the wrong place at the wrong time – in the line of fire between Doug Quaid (played by big Arnold Schwarzenegger) and the goons hired by his adversary Cohaagen (Ronny Cox) while riding an escalator.
Usefulness in death? If it wasn’t for The Human Shield sacrificing his own worthless body to protect that of our hero Quaid, Mars would not have been saved from the dictatorship of Cohaagan. To Quaid’s credit he does wait until this innocent bystander has been killed by the goons before throwing him around like a rag doll. And then is shot what seems like a few hundred times.
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I loved that scene with Septimus in Stardust!
Jason Bourne using the body of the hit man to cushion his fall down the spiral staircase shaft in The Bourne Identity.
Very clever, wasn’t it Nat.
Pretty under-rated movie to boot.
Look out for more from Mark Strong (Septimus) in the very near future, starting with Ridley Scott’s Robin Hood.
John, where were you when I was putting this list together?
Great selection mate.
If you’ve got anymore let me know.
I might even update the list.
Cheers
Agreed. I thought it was a fantastic movie!
Mark Strong is phenomenal. I loved him in Rocknrolla, and I’m not afraid to admit that I loved Revolver as well, and his role was great in that film as well!