In my view, yes because that is the nature of the narrative structure. The Godfather is about Michael Corleone and his transformation, or his fall if you will, there fore he is the protagonist of the story, how can he be the villain? I would argue he is evil, but with in that particular story he is the protagonist. If he is the villain, who is the hero?

Same with Lector, he is a supporting protagonist (BTW this another pet peeve of mine, but neither Brando for the GF or Hopkins for Lambs should have won best actor but best supporting actor sure, great performances, but that's another thread

). Anyway, if SOTL, Buffalo Bill is the villain, he's the antagonist, he's the guy they are chasing.

quote:
For example, Darth Maul is not the antagonist in PM, he was just a henchman

but he works for the main villain/antagonist, Darth Sidious/Palaptine. Like Oddjob in Goldfinger. He fights the protagonist.

There are obviously some gray area's, but to me the protagonist can not be the villain, maybe that's the better way to put it.

This post was edited on 3/19/15 at 9:44 am

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Posted by Freauxzen

Utah

Member since Feb 2006

37413 posts

Posted on 3/19/15 at 11:23 am to H-Town Tiger

quote:
In my view, yes because that is the nature of the narrative structure. The Godfather is about Michael Corleone and his transformation, or his fall if you will, there fore he is the protagonist of the story, how can he be the villain? I would argue he is evil, but with in that particular story he is the protagonist. If he is the villain, who is the hero?

Same with Lector, he is a supporting protagonist (BTW this another pet peeve of mine, but neither Brando for the GF or Hopkins for Lambs should have won best actor but best supporting actor sure, great performances, but that's another thread ). Anyway, if SOTL, Buffalo Bill is the villain, he's the antagonist, he's the guy they are chasing.

Spot on.

Lecter is not a villain, and the seemingly hypnotic form of his performance has made people label him incorrectly constantly (and laud him incorrectly, he isn't THAT good). He's scary, he's evil, but he isn't THE antagonist.

And even villain is a difficult word to use, it's too closely related to the idea of narrative and who is the focus.

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Posted by alajones