The Pyramid of Villainy!

There are only three types of villain in movies and comic books.

Let me clarify that by defining what I mean by "villain". Every movie has protagonists and antagonists. Protagonists are your main characters: The guy you root for and who - in Hollywood at least - wins at the end. Antagonists are the guys who don't win. The ones who try to stop the protagonist achieving his goals. They're usually dead by the time the final credits roll and they have many different motivations, depending on the plot of the movie. But not all protagonists are Heroes and not all antagonists are Villains.

Oceanography.

As an experiment, I recently sat down to watch Ocean's Eleven, and then immediately afterwards watched Ocean's Eleven.

Comparing a movie to its remake is an interesting exercise. It's not like comparing a book or play adaptation, or even an early draft of a screenplay to its finished version. You get to see exactly what the writer based the remake on, and compare the director's choices to his predecessor. This includes overall style, cinematography, casting, hell even the music choices can be compared directly.

I hadn't watched either film in years, and certainly never both in a short period of time (let alone the same evening) and what I found was something unique - something I didn't expect to see at all.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee....

So I watched "Flatliners" a few days ago. Those of you born after the cold war have probably never heard of it. Quite successful when it was released in 1990, it promoted its then B-list stars into the heady stratosphere of B+.

Basically the movie is about how Kiefer Sutherland's character - a med student crazier than a jacuzzi full of weasels - ropes four of his fellow students into an illegal and highly dangerous experiment to see what happens when you clinically die and are then brought back to life.