60 Kick-Ass Female Film Characters – Part I

I think you get the point of this series. Female of all ages prove their worth on film. Here’s a starter for six:

Jeanne d’Arc – – – La passion de Jeanne d’Arc (1928)

Carl Theodor Dreyer’s silent classic is considered to be one of the greatest films ever made, and a lion’s share of the credit must go to Maria Falconetti’s landmark performance that towers above nearly all screen performances, before or since. Her Joan is made all the more real by the spare sets, expressionistic lighting and intense camera angles which outline and compliment every glance. We never doubt her character’s convictions through her trial and confession and feel the futile satisfaction that comes when she ultimately recants her confession, knowing that by doing so she seals her fate to the stake.

The secret to Falconetti’s performance is not so much the religious connection as it is loyalty to one’s own beliefs and self worth. Her emotional journey to this realization is what makes the film so moving, and we see and experience every emotion thanks to the skillful interpretation of this great actor – it was only her second screen performance and her last. Truly astounding and evocative work. – – – Steve Schweighofer

Nurse Ratched – – – One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)

The unsurpassed symbol for the manipulation of power. Nurse Ratched isn’t kick-ass in the revered traditional sense, but her calm yet steely and patronising tenor is enough to strike an overwhelming fear in those she wants to fear her. She demands authority from even the sickest of patients, and with a grotesque dexterity for evil but otherwise blank expression devoid of all emotional investment or empathy, her wishes are eventually granted.

The obdurate sphere of arbitrary omnipotence in which Nurse Ratched brews her fatal schemes is filled with a calculating callousness and a penchant for institutional corruption which more closely resembles the fantastical sadism of comic book villains rather than the commonplace bitterness of fellow drama antagonists. – – – Rhiannon Topham

Sonmi-451 – – – Cloud Atlas (2012)

This choice for bad-ass females in film is an odd choice but stay with me here: Sooni is a human clone who works as a server for a fast food joint in a dystopian Neo-Seoul in 2144, who discovers the very reason for her existence is a form of cheap labor for the powers-that-be and eventually becomes a target for extermination. She is rescued by Hae-Joon Chang a rebel freedom fighter (man, the Wachowskis love their stories dealing with uprisings!) who shows her what happens to her kind as they are slaughtered and recycled for the other clones’ food intake. Horrified with the truth, she joins the resistance and broadcasts her experience and her manifesto.

My reasoning for her inclusion here is two-fold – first, in film, the white, male protagonist is usually the “chosen one” that leads some sort of rebellion against an unjust and oppressive system (see Kirk Douglas in Spartacus, Charlton Heston in The Ten Commandments etc), so it’s utterly refreshing to watch a person of color, let alone a woman, being the centerpiece of a section of a film which deals with rising up from an oppressive system.

And second, even though she is ultimately captured and executed, her story and her words echo through time as a record of what was left behind for another group of people, in another dystopian future, where her manifesto has become scripture, and is worshiped by the tribe. – – – Jonathan Holmes

Cora Papadakis – – – The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981)

Before she landed the role of Cora in the remake of the film noir classic. Jessica Lange was primarily known for her work on 1976’s King Kong. After Cora, Lange’s career took off like a rocket, eventually garnering her the triple crown for acting, and it was this role that lit the candle. Lange brought an earthy hunger and reckless nature to Cora who, determined to escape from her domestic drudgery, plots with her new fling (Jack Nicholson) to dispatch her slovenly husband and live lustily ever after.

It’s basically Lange at the controls from the initial seduction scene and subsequently famous sweat-and-flour dusted tumble in the kitchen to the actual murder. With every glance, sigh and stance, Lange’s Cora aches with obsession for a single goal – to feel alive again. A star was born with King Kong, but an acting powerhouse made her presence known here. – – – Steve Schweighofer

Amelia – – – The Babadook (2014)

You think lifting cars with your bare hands to save your trapped baby is a big deal? Well, meet Amelia, an exhausted, distraught widow, who takes her motherly love pledge to the absolute extreme by expelling a putrid demon out of her just as it is about to guide her own hands into massacring her petrified son; making us all look like amateur parents in the process. How? By grabbing onto the fraying emotional bond she shares with her troubled offspring and riding it all the way to salvation like a boss.

Not badass enough for you? How about then getting all up in the face of malevolence, whipping the beast down to absolute submission and keeping it in her basement as a freaking pet? And for the parents reading, please consider that not only is she a single parent but said offspring is a challenging, loud, insomniac 6-year-old and not once, not once! was she even tempted to let The Babadook just… babysit for a while. – – – The Greek 

Juno MacGuff – – – Juno (2007)

Hats off to Diablo Cody for writing such a colorful, brash, but ultimately human character in Juno, and also kudos Ellen Page, another break-out actress, for bring the character to the screen with such vigor and wit. Given the subject matter, an unplanned pregnancy of a teenage girl, Juno is a girl who is aware of the dilemma she faces with casual admirer and potential boyfriend Paulie Bleeker.

Not to mention her best supportive best friend and concerned family. Juno decides against an abortion, rather to have a couple adopt the baby. It’s a decision you don’t take likely, and as much as Juno comes across at times unable to take life seriously, here she has made a choice that defines her as strong, even when we see the heartbreak she feels. – – – Robin Write