80. Sam Spade
Played by Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon (1941, dir. John Huston)

The character that made Bogie a star, gumshoe Sam Spade has seen more angles than a geometry professor and spotted more lies than a polygraph, but his latest case, involving a precious statuette known as the Maltese Falcon and the assorted (and colorful) villains scheming to get it, will sternly test his hard-boiled instincts. He’ll solve the case, all right, but not before he loses his partner, gets hassled by the cops, has multiple guns pointed at him, gets drugged, loses the girl and wins her back and loses her again, and utters one of cinema’s most famous closing lines.

Defining Moment: When he turns over said girl (Mary Astor) to the cops, despite the fact that he loves her. Hey, he’s nobody’s sap. (Warner DVD)

79. Hans Beckert
Played by Peter Lorre in M (1931, dir. Fritz Lang)

First seen only in shadow, identifiable through his whistling of "In the Hall of the Mountain King," this pathetic, bad-baby–faced child murderer comes into full view making faces in a mirror—the monster with no sense of self.  For much of the film he is pursued like an animal, and while we can't possibly sympathize with him, Lang's deft filmmaking forces us to feel his fear.  Once he is brought before a kangaroo court he reacts like an animal—a cornered rat, to be precise.  But still . . .

Defining Moment:  His shriek that none of his tormentors knows what it's like to be him.  "Thank God," we sigh.  (Criterion DVD)

78. “Mad” Max Rockatansky
Played by Mel Gibson in Mad Max (1979, dir. George Miller) and two later films

Max is a cowboy, but his steed is a souped-up hot rod from hell. And his terrain is not the Old West but an anarchic, later radiation-fried Outback peopled with mohawked nutjobs and various other desperados, all competing for the most precious resource left: fuel. Max, like the antiheroes of Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns, mostly looks out for number one, but when his interests intersect with those of doomed innocents, he can usually be counted on to save the day.

Defining Moment: Near the end of the original, our hero (then just a cop with stellar driving skills) sees his family slaughtered by the same brand of sickos he’ll encounter later. It’s enough to make Max really, really mad. (MGM DVD)

77. Annie Wilkes
Played by Kathy Bates in Misery (1990, dir. Rob Reiner)

In psychotic ex-nurse Annie Wilkes, Stephen King imagined a number-one fan that no writer would want—and then he stranded injured author Paul Sheldon at her isolated farmhouse. In this meaty role, Bates perfectly balances comedy and cruelty. Her Annie is a Spam-serving, pig-chasing, Liberace-grooving loon with a taste for torture and, alas for Paul (that dirty bird!), the upper hand.

Defining Moment: Distressed by the thought of her favorite writer recovering and leaving her, Annie proves her sick devotion by smashing his legs with a sledgehammer. Her cold logic and execution make for one “oogie” moment. (MGM DVD)

76. Tony Manero
Played by John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever (1977, dir. John Badham) and one later film

All you need to know about Tony Manero—his arrogance, his sexual hunger, and a charm that walks hand in hand with a seething resentment—plays out in the film’s first few minutes as he swaggers down the street, swivel-hipped, lean, and sexy as hell. And then he dances. Travolta battled original director John G. Avildsen to preserve the screenplay’s darkness, and what comes through is a basically unlikable character on the page—racist, chauvinistic, egotistical—given a subtle sweetness and vulnerability by Travolta’s layered performance.

Defining Moment: Alone on the dance floor, Tony revels in his power. The sequence was first edited entirely in close-up, but Travolta’s understandable hissy fit saved it. (Paramount DVD)

75. Dr. Strangelove
Played by Peter Sellers in Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964, dir. Stanley Kubrick)

“Strangelove, what kind of name is that? That ain’t no kraut name, is it?”

“He changed it from Merkwurdichliebe when he became a citizen.”

As the world stands at the brink of nuclear annihilation, a couple of War Room attendants speculate about the most bizarre “expert” in the joint—the wheelchair-bound, chain-smoking German with the dark glasses and one black-gloved hand whose theories on apocalyptic gamesmanship represent the point where realpolitik gets real, real gone. His creators were inspired by Wernher Von Braun. But he is ultimately sui generis, one of the greatest comic mutations Kubrick and Sellers—or anybody else, for that matter—ever conceived.

Defining Moment: His final proposal in the War Room, delivered as he’s trying to prevent his gloved hand from strangling him. (Columbia TriStar DVD)

74. Tony Montana
Played by Al Pacino in Scarface (1983, dir. Brian De Palma)

“Nothing exceeds like excess,” says trophy wife Elvira (Michelle Pfeiffer), and this Miami-set update of the 1932 crime drama certainly doesn’t stint on cash, cocaine, or gunfire. Pacino discovers his inner over-actor after a career heretofore defined by measured restraint. The result is an almost comically galvanic characterization, abetted by dialogue that’s now legendary (“Say hello to my leetle friend!”). The picture inadvertently provided a role model to the hip-hop nation, even up to the gruesome, ego-driven finale, in which this chaotic wild man learns, as so many have, that money can’t buy you love. (Not even his own depraved conception of it, as it happens.)

Defining Moment: “Why don’t you try sticking your head up your ass—see if it fits.” Even at gunpoint and with a chain saw about to slice open his friend Angel’s head, Tony doesn’t know when to shut up. (Universal DVD)

73. Norma Rae
Played by Sally Field in Norma Rae (1979, dir. Martin Ritt)

This prickly, working-class divorcée and mother of two may seem an unlikely ally for the liberal New Yorker (Ron Leibman) out to unionize her southern textile factory, but he sees in her what we do: a woman looking for a better deal. Norma Rae may be uneducated and brimming with resentment, but once she commits to the cause, she’s like Scarlett O’Hara in her single-mindedness.

Defining Moment: She stands on a factory table, silently brandishing a sign that reads “Union.” It’s the look on her face, though—a mixture of defiance, desperation, and hope—that gets the message across. (Fox DVD)

72. Lloyd Dobler
Played by John Cusack in Say Anything (1989, dir. Cameron Crowe)

“Did you really come here with with Lloyd Dobler? How did that happen?” asks a fellow reveler when golden girl Diane (Ione Skye) shows up with Cusack’s slacker at a graduation party. “He made me laugh,” she says. He made us laugh, too. Who wouldn’t love the Clash T-shirt–wearing, suicidal songwriter–befriending, kick-boxing, excruciatingly earnest guy whose career goal is to be a good date?

Defining Moment: When Diane’s dad (John Mahoney) grills Lloyd at the dinner table about his future, Lloyd responds with some inverted articles of faith: “I don’t want
to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don’t want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed. . . .” (Fox DVD)

71. Rev. Harry Powell
Played by Robert Mitchum in The Night of the Hunter (1955, dir. Charles Laughton)

Before Johnny Cash was dubbed “the Man in Black,” Robert Mitchum played a preacher whose garb was as dark as his soul. Ingratiating himself into the life of a young widow (Shelley Winters), he doesn’t take long to make his avaricious motives known; and after he’s dispatched her he has no compunction about terrorizing her kids in order to find a treasure he believes they hold the key to. And all the while, there’s something genuinely, well, evangelical about his murderous fervor.

Defining Moment: Explaining his “Love” and “Hate” tattoos: “Ah, little lad, you’re staring at my fingers. Would you like me to tell you the little story of right hand/left hand? The story of good and evil?” (MGM DVD)