Slight SPOILERS for THE SILENT PARTNER

I just revisited THE SILENT PARTNER last night with Elliot Gould and Christopher Plummer. Plummer is top notch as the psychotic criminal bank robber. Watching it, I wondered if he took the role to show people that he wasn't always the nice guy that he was usually cast as. Regardless, he is excellent in it.

So what are some of your favorite sleazy/psycho turns by respected actors. I am thinking more along the lines of roles that they chose when they had opportunity, not something that was required because their career was down in the dumps.

Off the top of my head...

Peter O'Toole's turn as the crazed, syphilitic sex maniac Tiberius Caesar in CALIGULA (1979)...

Malcolm MacDowell's role as the titular incestuous, horse-fondling, loveable rapist in same...

Burt Lancaster as ageing, coprophilic paedophile in Bertolucci's vile NOVECENTO/1900...

Donald Sutherland as child-murdering fascist pig in same...

Frank Finlay splaying naked screen wife Stefania Sandrelli's legs apart for explicit amateur photography sessions (while she's still asleep) in Tinto Brass' THE KEY...

(Hmmm. Lots of Tinto Brass here...and all the films I can think of so far are Italian. Bravo, land of my forefathers!)

Okay, just to extend the borders a little...there's always Sharon Stone in BASIC INSTINCT. Thank you, Paul Verhoeven.

Good choices. Last night I thought of two more:

Laurence Olivier as the Nazi in MARATHON MAN

Richard Attenborough as serial killer John Christie in 10 RILLINGTON PLACE

Don Stroud as a child molesting foetus smuggler in PERDITA DURANGO

Andy Griffith as a sleazy, loudmouth rockstar in A FACE IN THE CROWD

Andy Griffith as an industrialist cum crazed biker in PRAY FOR THE WILDCATS

Donald Sutherland as a child stomping Homer Simpson in DAY OF THE LOCUST

Robert Blake in LOST HIGHWAY (and now in real life)

Dirk Bogarde in THE NIGHT PORTER, DEATH IN VENICE, and THE SERVANT

Klaus Kinski in everything

The cast of CANDY: Marlon Brando, Richard Burton, James Coburn, John Huston, Walter Matthou, Ringo Starr, etc...

Now HERE is a movie that very seriously needs a proper dvd release!

Harvey Keitel in BAD LIEUTENANT

Jeremy Irons in DEAD RINGERS

Anthony Hopkins in THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS

Michael Caine in DRESSED TO KILL

Art Garfunkel in BAD TIMING is got to be one of the all-time 'out of character' roles by any actor (so much so many feel he's miscast, I don't).

Andrew McCarthy as Henry Miller in Cluade Chabrol's QUIET DAYS IN CLICHY is certainly a head-turner.

I wouldn't consider Jeremy Irons performance in DEAD RINGERS to be particularly 'sleazy', in the context of the film and the charcters(s).

Gene Hackman in THE HUNTING PARTY

Rod Steiger in THE LOVED ONE

Henry Fonda in ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST

Don Rickles in CASINO (small part, I know)

Bette Davis in WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE

Patty Duke in VALLEY OF THE DOLLS

Being that this is the cult board, I'd bring up Karen Black, who was in plenty of great films in the 1960s before heading into the wilder/weirder/worse films that came in the '70s and beyond. No need to list her cult titles here.

How about the film I saw last night. ELIZABETH TAYLOR in "The Drivers Seat" (1974). I'm still trying to process what I saw!

I'm fascinated by Henry Fonda's appearances in several films that were desperately "below him" in the late '70s, like TENTACLES. It looks to me like he didn't even know he was in a film about a giant killer squid, more like someone paid him several thousand bucks to sit by a telephone and recite dull dialogue that could have been written for any film.

Kirk Douglas and Harvey Keitel in SATURN 3 is a strange matchup between actor and genre.

Glenn Ford appeared in a slasher film, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME, and a terrible Italian horror film called THE VISITOR. What's interesting is that he's very good in both films; the guy was actually trying, as opposed to walking through parts that were clearly beneath him.

Richard Burton in THE KLANSMAN 1974 and BLUEBEARD 1972
James Mason in MANDINGO 1975
Elizabeth Taylor AND Richard Burton in BOOM! ha ha

Elizabeth Taylor and Robert Mitchum, Mia Farrow in SECRET CEREMONY----totally brain-damaged, amazing huh?-fest

Brando's weird, effeminate perf in DR. MOREAU

RE: Henry Fonda in TENTACLES being paid to "sit by a telephone and recite dull dialogue"

When the Monthly Film Bulletin (England) reviewed this film back when it came out they reported that Fonda literally phoned in his part.

What I love about that film is that the hero for the first half--a crusading reporter--is played by septuagenarian John Huston, who is referred to as her "baby brother" by his co-star, Shelley Winters who's a good 16 years younger than Huston. The second half, when Bo Hopkins and Cesare Danova (do I have that right?) go after the octopus is a lot duller.

John Huston in WINTER KILLS
Melanie Griffith in FEAR CITY
Kathleen Turner in CRIMES OF PASSION
Joe Spinell in TAXI DRIVER, MANIAC
Anthony Perkins in THE EDGE OF SANITY
Roddy McDowell in 5IVE CARD STUD
Tony Curtis in CASSANOVA & CO.
Marty Feldman in SEX WITH A SMILE
John Saxon in BLAZING MAGNUM
Steven Prince in TAXI DRIVER
Michael Rooker in HENRY PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER

So many good ones already. Here are a couple more suggestions:

Al Pacino in CRUISING,
Rutger Hauer in THE HITCHER,
Franco Nero in HITCH-HIKE.

Rodney Dangerfield in NATURAL BORN KILLERS.

And I've seen James Mason in MANDINGO mentioned; he's got nothing on Warren Oates in the "sequel", DRUM.

HCH

This one was the first I wanted to mention but I came second! I think this is Ferrara's best.

Also Ursula Andress in MOUNTAIN OF THE CANNIBAL GOD- I still cannot believe her involvement in such a picture! Especially when I think of the explicit sex scenes that the Ahchor Bay disc features. Ursula is not in these scenes but it's still weird that she's in an Italian cannibal film.

Lawrence Fishburne in DEATH WISH 2 taking part in Sylvana Galliardo's (Rosario) gang rape! Probably the nastiest rape scene ever filmed! Not to mention Jeff Goldblum in DEATH WISH.

Roger Moore and Stacey Keach (who was also in MOUNTAIN...) in SICILIAN CROSS, an Italian mafia/exploitation film which makes his Bond films look like children's stuff.

And how about Harvey Keitel in TWO EVIL EYES? By the way, I think that this is an excellent movie with a great performance by Harvey.

I believe Cynthia Nixon of Sex and the City fame plays an underage prostitute in the 1981 film TATTOO.

Willem Dafoe and Joe Monetgna in "Body of Evidence" - in two minds about checking this one out again, my dreams are still haunted by candle-wax....

I'll second Kathleen Turner in "Crimes of Passion", sleazy but a very fine performance in an oddly touching film.

Steve

Considering that he was one of Ingmar Bergman's favorite actors, Max Von Sydow has appeared in an absolutely astonishing number of sleazy/crappy films: THE EXORCIST, ESCAPE TO VICTORY, JUDGE DREDD, FLASH GORDON, NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN, etc.

Sir Alec Guinness certainly didn't know what he was appearing in when he agreed to a cameo in Anthony Waller's clever slasher movie MUTE WITNESS. Waller didn't shoot the rest of the film for almost a decade!

It's not surprising that Guiness can't remember the name of the movie in his autobiography!