Sympatico/MSN asked me to pick Jack Nicholson’s five best anti-heroes as a sidebar to an interview they’re running today. Here’s what I came up with.
Slight problem: “Anti-hero” means you can’t include Jake Gittes in “Chinatown”, or the Joker in “Batman”, or the dual role he played in “Mars Attacks!”, or the disintegrating crusader of “The Pledge”, or the self-parodic devil of “The Departed”.
I almost squeezed in the jewel thief he played in “Blood and Wine” a decade ago, but what do you push out to work that in?
Ah, Jack. How you confound us.
(Still a little leery of “The Bucket List”, though.)
@ Don: I don’t think Jack Torrance qualifies as an anti-hero, either. Tragic fool, certainly, but that’s just different enough to push him off the list.
(And dude, turn your caps lock off.)
Could toss in honourable mentions for his conflicted border guard in The Border or the skid-row bum who sees dead people in Ironweed, but only in a pinch.