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Home / Features / The 11 best anti-hero films

The 11 best anti-hero films

Meet our favourite flawed protagonists from the days before Deadpool...

If you enjoyed Deadpool, you’re probably itching to watch another movie where the hero isn’t a shallow, humourless world-saver from planet parental guidance.

Luckily, Wade Wilson is the latest in a long line of anti-heroes. From Walter White to Frank Underwood, the hit shows of recent years prove we love flawed characters – and they don’t get much more flawed than the ones in these movies.

Mad Max: Fury Road

The reboot is as gloriously bonkers and brilliant as us fans of the originals could have hoped, but while Max is certainly a reluctant hero, he’s not exactly an anti-hero. Charlize Theron’s Furiosa, though, is. Having been the first in command of masked nasty Immortan Joe’s war rig and overseer of numerous horrific acts perpetrated against his “five wives”, she eventually has a change of heart and turns against the overlord.

Watch it on Amazon Prime Instant Video

The Crow

It may not have aged incredibly well, but the Crow remains a cult classic in which the scariest character is actually the good guy. Brought back from the dead so he can avenge his own murder and that of his wife, Eric Draven (played by Brandon Lee, who was accidentally shot and killed during filming) dons some superb gothic clown makeup and goes on a murderous rampage of anti-heroic proportions.

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Aguirre, The Wrath Of God

Klaus Kinski comes across as a terrifying nutjob in all the films he made with director Werner Herzog; this is because Klaus Kinski was a terrifying nutjob (read his repulsive autobiography if you dare). In Aguirre he plays a conquistador in search of El Dorado. One of the great films of the ’70s.

Buy it now on Amazon

Léon: The Professional

Luc Besson’s masterpiece, featuring the monastic hitman or ‘cleaner’ Léon Montana, is neo-noir film at its finest. When her family is killed by a corrupt agent, he reluctantly takes in his 12-year- old neighbour. He then trains her to be competent with an arsenal of weapons. Just a big softy, really.

Watch it on Amazon Prime Instant Video

John Wick

John Wick used to be a very bad man; a tattooed assassin for the nastiest of nasty gangsters; “the guy you send to kill the boogeyman”. But then he found love and hung up his shooting fingers. Inevitably, his quiet life goes wrong, culminating in the murder of the puppy left to him by his dead wife. Cue nasty, vengeful retaliation in the form of some of the finest gunplay committed to screen in years.

Watch it on Amazon Prime Instant Video

Birdman

Birdman is a movie about an jaded divorcee with delusions of artistic grandeur. He used to look good in lycra, but now he can’t even take care of his tearaway daughter. Played with schizophrenic finesse by Michael Keaton, this superhero-inspired flick takes gleeful aim at a man who’s incapable of saving himself, let alone anyone else.

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Falling Down

We join the divorced, recently unemployed William Foster in a gridlocked traffic jam. It’s the final straw that send him spiralling into a cathartic, GTA-style rampage across early 90s LA. Nothing escapes his wrath, with his trail of destruction taking in payphones, a self-entitled golfer and, most memorably, a fast food restaurant that refuses to serve him all-day breakfast.

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Watch it on NowTV

Dead Man’s Shoes

Shane Meadows’ tale of revenge in a sleepy Derbyshire town sees Paddy Considine’s Richard return from the army to take revenge on a gang of local thugs for tormenting his younger brother. Considine plays the ex-squaddie with all the terror of a real-life slasher baddie, sneaking into his rivals’ homes at night wearing a creepy gas mask and stalking them around town with a terrifying you-can’t-scare-me intensity.

Buy it now from Amazon

Dallas Buyers Club

Ron Woodroof is introduced to you as homophobic hell-raiser in Dallas Buyers Club. The kind of guy you wouldn’t want to share a drink with, let alone root for as he takes on the might of US law enforcement. After being infected with AIDs, everything changes for the Texas ne’er-do-well turned pharmaceutical businessman. As does your affection for him.

Watch it on Amazon Prime Instant Video

Watch it on Netflix

Mesrine

Vincent Cassel tiptoes the line between charming and loathsome in this horribly compelling two-part biopic of French ultrathug Jacques Mesrine. Hobbies: armed robbery, kidnapping, brutal murder… you may be left sceptical of his self-image as a misunderstood Robin Hood figure.

Watch it on Amazon Prime Instant Video

Kill Bill

The lack of anti-heroines in this list has clearly made Beatrix Kiddo angry – Quentin Tarantino has recently been talking up the possibility of a third instalment to her ‘roaring rampage of revenge’. Which is a great excuse to re-watch her tracksuited travails against the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, which were heavily inspired by the (also excellent) Japanese film Lady Snowblood.

Watch it on Amazon Prime Instant Video

Watch it on Netflix

Watch it on NowTV

Profile image of Mark Wilson Mark Wilson Features editor

About

Mark's first review for Stuff was the Nokia N-Gage in 2004. Luckily, his career lasted a little longer than the taco phone, and he's been trying to figure out how gadgets fit back into their boxes ever since. While his 'Extreme Mark Wilson' persona was retired following a Microsoft skydiving incident, this means he can often be spotted in the wilds of South West London testing action cams, drones and smartwatches, and occasionally cursing at them.

Areas of expertise

Smart home tech, cameras, wearables and obscure gadgets from the early 2000s.