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97. Ben Kingsley as Don Logan
Sexy Beast (2001)
Gandhi who? Seriously, this is about as 180-degree different from Kingsley's most lauded role as it is possible to be. Sexy Beast is about a retired gangster who is doing his best to say "no" to a request from his old crime buddy Don (Kingsley) to un-retire and do another job.
Don is psychotic. What is so scary about him is his unpredictability. He can be incredibly violent as well as incredibly still. And he interchanges the violence and stillness with an alarming ease. Loads of other cinema "bad boys" have made an impression with their stillness or calmness. Marlon Brando stroking that cat in The Godfather, Anthony Hopkins just standing behind that plexiglass in Silence of the Lambs, etc. But Kingsley's stillness seems much more sinister because we see so much of his brutality. His Don Logan seems as if he would just as soon beat you to death with a chair as look at you. That is scary.
As is his relentless pursuit of ex-gangster Gal. He reminds me of a killer in a slasher movie. He can't be stopped, he can't be reasoned with, and he will not take no for an answer. He's frightening when he's beating somebody down, but he's even more chilling when he's not, because underneath all that composure you can positively feel the anger simmering beneath his skin, ready to explode at any moment.
Sexy Beast (2001)
Gandhi who? Seriously, this is about as 180-degree different from Kingsley's most lauded role as it is possible to be. Sexy Beast is about a retired gangster who is doing his best to say "no" to a request from his old crime buddy Don (Kingsley) to un-retire and do another job.
Don is psychotic. What is so scary about him is his unpredictability. He can be incredibly violent as well as incredibly still. And he interchanges the violence and stillness with an alarming ease. Loads of other cinema "bad boys" have made an impression with their stillness or calmness. Marlon Brando stroking that cat in The Godfather, Anthony Hopkins just standing behind that plexiglass in Silence of the Lambs, etc. But Kingsley's stillness seems much more sinister because we see so much of his brutality. His Don Logan seems as if he would just as soon beat you to death with a chair as look at you. That is scary.
As is his relentless pursuit of ex-gangster Gal. He reminds me of a killer in a slasher movie. He can't be stopped, he can't be reasoned with, and he will not take no for an answer. He's frightening when he's beating somebody down, but he's even more chilling when he's not, because underneath all that composure you can positively feel the anger simmering beneath his skin, ready to explode at any moment.
(mystery)