Director Ridley Scott has had a rather rough run at the box office in the last decade, with several major movies falling short of box-office expectations. Most recently, he returned to the sci-fi genre after a nearly decade-long gap with The Dog Stars, which grossed less than $40 million worldwide against a reported budget of around $100 million. The relative success of Scott’s biggest hit of the decade, Gladiator II, was dampened by its high production cost of around $300 million.
However, Scott has always had a love/hate relationship with box-office success. While his sci-fi classic Blade Runner famously underperformed commercially, a fellow neo-noir thriller emerged as a major hit despite having received mixed reviews. The movie in question isn’t regarded as one of Scott’s finest, although it has developed quite a strong cult following. It was recently added to the library of a free streaming platform, giving a new generation an opportunity to check it out.
Released in 1989, the film starred Michael Douglas in the lead role of an NYPD detective who is sucked into the Japanese underworld while repatriating a Yakuza member. The movie grossed more than $130 million worldwide against a reported budget of $30 million, emerging as a rather solid hit.
However, it received mixed reviews, and is now sitting at a 56% score on the aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes. Despite this, Scott’s film emphasized the elegant atmospheric style he brought to Blade Runner, this time highlighting the dangerous underbelly of Japan’s organized crime scene. It’s an entertaining watch in Scott’s filmography, especially for fans of old-school action thrillers.
Collider Exclusive · Villain Personality Quiz Which Criminal Mastermind Would Be Your Nemesis? Lecter · Joker · Moriarty · Chigurh
Four of the finest criminal minds ever put on screen. One of them would look at you and see something worth their time. Eight questions decide which one comes for you, why they picked you, and what they would want when they arrived.
🍷Lecter
🃏Joker
♟️Moriarty
🪙Chigurh
01
What would a criminal mastermind notice about you first? Great villains choose their opponents carefully. Something about you got their attention.
02
How do they make first contact? The introduction tells you everything about what is coming next.
03
What do you actually believe about right and wrong? Every nemesis is really an argument about the thing you believe most.
04
What finally gets under your skin? Everybody has a pressure point. Finding yours is the whole plan.
05
They have made their move. How do you fight back? This is the part of the film where the audience finds out who you are.
06
What would they use against you? A good villain never brings a weapon you have not already handed them.
07
What do they actually want from you? The money is never the point. Something else always is.
08
How does it end between the two of you? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides who comes for you.
The Case File Is Complete Your Nemesis Is…
Four criminal masterminds. One of them was always going to be yours.
Here is who comes for you, why they picked you out of everyone available, and what they want from
the encounter.
The Silence of the Lambs · Hannibal · 1991–2002
Hannibal Lecter
Your nemesis does not want to beat you. He wants to know you
completely, and he is patient enough to wait for it. The frightening part is how good the
conversation is.
Lecter is the most dangerous kind of opponent: the one who finds you interesting. He
never raises his voice, because he has never needed to.
You keep a great deal to yourself and you are careful about what you show. That reserve
is exactly the door he would knock on.
The films understood something other thrillers missed. The horror is not the violence.
It is being perfectly understood by the wrong person.
He would be unfailingly polite about all of it. That is the worst part.
Batman · The Dark Knight · 1989–2019
The Joker
Your nemesis is not after money, territory or revenge. He is
after a demonstration, and you are the person he has chosen to prove his point on.
The Joker only picks opponents who believe in something. Your decency is not a defence
against him. It is the entire reason he showed up.
He has no plan you can predict and nothing you can take away, which removes every tool
you would normally reach for.
His whole argument is that you are one bad day away from being him, and you would spend
the rest of your life proving him wrong.
He would call it a magic trick. You would call it the worst night of your life.
Sherlock Holmes · The Final Problem · Since 1893
Moriarty
Your nemesis respects you, which sounds flattering until you work
out what it means. He chose you because nobody else was worth his time.
Moriarty is the original criminal mastermind, the template every later one borrows from:
a mind the equal of the hero’s, pointed the wrong way.
You enjoy being the cleverest person in the room. He is counting on exactly that, and he
has already built the room.
This is the rare nemesis who would be genuinely disappointed if you lost badly. He needs
the game to be worth playing.
It ends the way these things always end. Two people, one problem, and only one way down.
No Country for Old Men · 2007
Anton Chigurh
Your nemesis has no personal interest in you whatsoever, and that
is precisely what makes him unsurvivable. You are not a rival. You are a stop on the way.
Chigurh does not negotiate, gloat or explain. He arrives, he asks one question, and the
answer was decided long before you opened your mouth.
You trust yourself to handle things. He is the one problem in the world that has no
interest in how capable you are.
No Country for Old Men rewrote the screen villain by removing the thing audiences
quietly rely on: the sense that talking might work.
Call it. He will wait.
Ridley Scott Defended the Neo-Noir Thriller Against Poor Reviews
We’re talking, of course, about Black Rain. Also starring Andy Garcia and Ken Takakura, the movie was marketed as Douglas’ first project following an Oscar win for Wall Street. The film’s consensus on the aggregator website reads, “Black Rain has its fair share of Ridley Scott’s directorial flair, but its paint-by-numbers story never rises above genre conventions.”
The production was difficult, but Douglas wrote in his autobiography that working in Japan was an eye-opening experience. Scott still stands by the movie, dismissing its criticism in an appearance on Marc Maron‘s podcast five years ago.
You can now watch Black Rain on Pluto TV, and stay tuned to Collider for more updates.
