In his Oscar acceptance speech for Best Original Screenplay, awarded to his script for Django Unchained, Quentin Tarantino said that the reason he hopes his movies will stand the test of time is the strength of their characters. He mentioned this when he was thanking the actors for bringing his characters to life.
Love his movies or hate them, there’s no denying that the notorious filmmaker can write fascinating characters, cast the perfect actors to play them, and direct them to truly revelatory performances. Across Tarantino’s filmography, there are plenty of protagonists that fans love — and villains they love to hate.
Protagonist: Mr. Orange
Throughout the first half of Reservoir Dogs, the color-coded jewelry store robbers don’t know who they can trust. Someone among them is an undercover cop, but they have no idea who it is. Around the midpoint, when a barrage of bullets stops Mr. Blonde from burning a police officer alive, Mr. Orange is revealed to be that cop.
He spends most of the movie bleeding out from his own gunshot wound, but flashbacks reveal that he’s an honest cop who assimilated into the team in the interest of pursuing justice.
Villain: Bill
As the title of Kill Bill would suggest, Bill is the bad guy. He doesn’t actually appear on-screen until Volume 2, in which flashbacks reveal that he was once in a prosperous romantic relationship with the Bride.
David Carradine brought a lively energy to his delivery of all Bill’s monologues, ensuring that long stretches of dialogue were compelling in an action movie — which isn’t easy to do.
Protagonist: Shosanna Dreyfus
Tarantino’s best protagonists are the ones who go through extreme adversity, emerge from it as a stronger person, and use their newfound strength to exact revenge upon the wrongdoers. Shosanna Dreyfus is a prime example of this.
She’s a Jewish refugee whose entire family was killed around her while they were hiding underneath the floorboards of a dairy farm in Nazi-occupied France. She managed to escape, adopt a new alias, and become the owner of a movie theater. The premiere of a Nazi propaganda film presents her with the perfect opportunity to burn the Third Reich’s top brass alive.
Villain: Calvin Candie
Tarantino has said that Calvin Candie is the only character he’s ever created that he really hated. He could even appreciate Hans Landa as a guy who’s been given a job and wants to do it right. Candie is the only one with no redeeming qualities whatsoever.
Leonardo DiCaprio’s delightfully camp performance as Candie contrasts the character’s pure evil with a theatrical eccentricity.
Protagonist: Jackie Brown
Jackie Brown is the only protagonist that Tarantino has adapted from another writer’s work. But she was originally called Jackie Burke in Elmore Leonard’s source novel, and Tarantino tweaked the character to suit the magnetic on-screen persona of his legendary leading lady Pam Grier.
All the other characters assume Jackie to be naïve and easy to manipulate, but she’s actually the one manipulating the whole situation in her favor.
Villain: Stephen
While it’s easy to hate Calvin Candie as a sadistic white slaver, things get a little more ethically complex when it comes to the secondary villain, Stephen, a house slave. Samuel L. Jackson played the role as suitably deplorable, siding with Candie and developing a real hatred of Django.
When Stephen confronts Broomhilda about her connection to Django, it’s terrifying. Jackson’s ominous performance was snubbed for a Best Supporting Actor nod.
Protagonist: The Bride
While filming Pulp Fiction, Tarantino pitched the opening scene of a revenge thriller to Uma Thurman, telling her it would open with a bruised, bloodied woman staring up at her would-be killers. Thurman suggested that the woman be wearing a wedding gown. Thus, the Bride was created.
In true exploitation fashion, Kill Bill begins with the Bride at her lowest point. Then, on her quest for revenge, the story keeps dragging her lower and lower, justifying her vengeance further. Thurman’s fierce, human portrayal of the Bride makes her rather easy to root for.
Villain: Mr. Blonde
Michael Madsen brought a cool charm to the role of Mr. Blonde. When he’s leaning against a wall, sipping a milkshake, he looks like James Dean. But when he shows off his sociopathic nature, killing for fun, he’s suitably disturbing.
Mr. Blonde’s greatest moment is, without a doubt, the “Stuck in the Middle with You” torture scene, which masterfully juxtaposes goofy dancing with blood-soaked ultraviolence.
Protagonist: Django Freeman
Spaghetti westerns have always been about revenge fantasies set against an ugly historical backdrop. As a freed slave who becomes a sharpshooting bounty hunter who eviscerates white slavers, Django Freeman is one of the genre’s all-time greatest heroes.
Jamie Foxx was the perfect actor to bring Django to life, brilliantly portraying his hero’s journey and nailing all the character’s well-timed quips.
Villain: Col. Hans Landa
Tarantino worried he’d written an uncastable role when he was in pre-production on Inglourious Basterds and couldn’t find an actor to play Hans Landa, the proud S.S. colonel who’s termed “the Jew Hunter.” And then he found Christoph Waltz, the master of his craft who saved Tarantino’s movie.
Landa dominates the screen whenever he enters a scene, from his opening dairy farm investigation to his if-the-shoe-fits confrontation at the movie premiere. Waltz more than earned his Oscar, solidifying Landa as one of the most sinister villains ever put on film.