Ed Ranks the Top 10 Gary Oldman Roles

Gary Oldman is the best. He can play any role in the world and it would be awesome. I don't think this ranking needs any further setup or explanation other than that.

10. Rosencrantz (Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead) - Are you a fan of absurdist, existentialist tragicomedies about the conflict between art and reality featuring two minor characters from Hamlet? Well, you're in luck! British playwright Sir Tom Stoppard (co-writer of the screenplays for Brazil and Shakespeare in Love) wrote just such a play which was later adapted into a 1990 movie starring Gary Oldman and Tim Roth in the eponymous roles. Everyone was in this film! It had Iain Glen from that thing, that other thing, and that other thing as well; that main character guy from House of Cards (no, the OTHER House of Cards); and that guy who should have been eaten by the shark. If you aren't a fan of this idea you should still watch it anyway because Gary Oldman is in it.

9. Ludwig van Beethoven (Immortal Beloved) - Remember that one time when they made that movie about Beethoven that was speculative nonsense with no real historic fact? It had basically the same plot structure as Citizen Kane if you replace the newspaper reporter with an assistant, the millionaire tycoon with Beethoven, and Rosebud (spoiler alert: a sled which certainly did not kill Ethan Frome) with a love letter that uses the words "Immortal Beloved." Pretty much, Beethoven wrote a love letter to his supposed love but the letter never said who exactly that was. So this was a movie sort of about that...if that sort of thing interests you. And if it doesn't interest you, at least you get to see Gary Oldman with crazy person hair for 121 minutes of your life.

8. Lee Harvey Oswald (JFK) - While we're talking about Gary Oldman playing historical figures that Gary Oldman in no way resembles in movies with almost no basis in actual fact, how about him as Lee Harvey Oswald? But Gary Oldman can pull it off anyway, because he's Gary Fucking Oldman. Back and to the left. Back and to the left.

7. Sirius Black (Harry Potter Franchise) - I'm not really a fan of those Harry Potter books or films, but I guess they must have been okay enough for Gary Oldman to be in them. In trying to do a little internet research about this role... I came upon the following phrases: "also known as Padfoot or Snuffles (in his Animagus form)," a pure-blood wizard," "the son of Orion," and "fought in the First Wizarding War." Reading those words made me lose several brain cells and throw up in my mouth just a little. This was a cultural phenomenon that I was just unable to understand. I recommend simply fast-forwarding through the entire film series to only watch scenes with Gary Oldman, Alan Rickman, or Emma Watson (after she turned 18, creepers). 

6. Sid Vicious (Sid & Nancy) - Don't do heroin, kids. Even if your heroin dealer is your mom.

Oh hai thar!

5. Count Dracula (Bram Stoker's Dracula) - Over the course of the years the character of Dracula had become a parody of itself thanks to a relentless series of horror films from Universal and Hammer. They were all sort of derivatives of Bela Lugosi just like every pirate for fifty years after Robert Newton was just a rehash of his Long John Silver. It would take an actor of tremendous talent to save Dracula from himself and make him interesting again. An actor of that caliber has only one name - Gary Oldman. This dark, moody, eerie, operatic take on the legend broke all the molds. This could be a legendary movie beloved for all history (AKA immortally beloved?) if not for Francis Ford Coppola deciding that Keanu Reeves should somehow be inserted into this film.


4. Egor Korshunov (Air Force One) - Egor Korshunov was a Russian terrorist and loyalist to a deposed and arrested Kazak dictator named General Ivan Radek. They fought in the Russian army together and saw some shit back in Afghanistan. In order to get General Radek released from prison, he figured a great idea would be to disguise himself as a journalist to get on Air Force One and kidnap the President of the United States. This would be a great plan in almost any scenario. Unfortunately, Egor Korshunov failed to take into account that during this particular scenario the President of the United States was HARRISON FORD. Sorry Gary Oldman, it was inevitable that President Indiana Jones would say something pithy while strangling you with a parachute and throwing you off of his airplane.

Admit it, you were rooting for him over that French bastard

3. Norman Stansfield (Léon: The Professional) - Corrupt and unhinged DEA agent Norman Stansfield does not like it when people steal cocaine from him. He tends to do things like murder them and their families. Usually when he does this, he tries to kill the entire family. And I mean everyone. EV-ERY-ONE!!!!!!!! Unfortunately, one time he failed to gun down a 12-year old girl (herein referred to as "Jailbait Natalie Portman"). Well, Jailbait Natalie Portman escaped and creepily became best friends with a grown-ass man named Léon who was, conveniently, a hitman. Jailbait Natalie Portman then spent the rest of the movie trying to undergo some Arya Stark-like assassin transformation so that Léon could teach her to get sweet revenge. Oldman's portrayal of Standsfield is often cited as one of the greatest film villains of all time, and has been referred to as "astonishingly histrionic," "divinely psychotic," and (my favorite) "the best overacting." Oh yeah, and Oldman's character also had an obsession with classical music - particularly Beethoven. That's so Oldman meta.

2. Sgt. / Lt. / Commissioner James Gordon (The Dark Knight Trilogy) - Every once and a while the stars align and people decide that it's time for Gary Oldman to play a good guy again. I know, it's very strange and makes us all feel weird on the inside. But Gary Oldman always knocks it out of the park. Let's face it - Jim Gordan had always been boring and useless. He's a police commissioner in charge of a police force so inept at doing their job that he's just gone and let some vigilante run the city's justice for him. Essentially the entirety of his job was just to turn on the bat signal or call Batman on the red phone. Once again, Gary Oldman added some layers to the character to make him actually interesting and complex. Gordan has to work with Batman outside of the regular justice system because it's simply so corrupt. Gordan sees the corruption and walks the fine line between fighting what he can and simply accepting the rest of it because he knows when fighting it will be counterproductive (and might lead to his own death). He has to walk the shades of gray himself to ensure that Harvey Dent is remembered as a hero. And Gordan was actually there for the death of Bruce Wayne's parents, giving some deep personal connections to Wayne/Batman beyond simply relying on him. Will anyone ever be as good of a Jim Gordon as Gary Oldman was? The answer is obviously no.

Behold the power of the space soul patch

1. Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg (The Fifth Element) - Billionaire industrialist/weapons dealer Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg has a simple, modest plan. That plan is to assist a great evil that appears every 5000 years (called the "Ultimate Evil," "Anti-Life," and "Mr. Shadow," but let's just go ahead and call it "Satan") by ensuring that the only weapon capable of defeating that evil is captured and delivered to it. Said weapon is actually a set of four stones with the markings of the classical four elements, as well as fifth element which is Milla Jovovich wearing small pieces of white tape. Oldman is so amazingly over-the-top in this film as Zorg. He didn't just turn things up to 11... I'm pretty sure he's somewhere around 16. Subtlety and nuance be damned, this is 100% camp. And who says camp can't win a ranking? Not me, because I just did it.