10 movies where the two lead characters never cross paths
Great movies require tremendous actors, but they don’t necessarily need to have chemistry.
Actors tend to get more press than anyone else involved in the filmmaking process, not only because it is the most visible aspect of a film, but also because the component that audiences latch on to, regardless of how they feel about the stars.
However, the way that characters are portrayed onscreen is manipulated by the writing, directing, and editing of their stories, so no matter how important they may seem at the moment, their significance in a film all comes down to a matter of perspective. The filmmaker chooses to highlight certain instances that have an emotional impact, and it’s all for the sake of making an entertaining or gripping narrative, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the characters need to share scenes with one another, such that some characters who play important roles within a film don’t even meet within the continuity.
There can be many reasons for this, as it’s most common within ensemble or anthology films in which characters are spread out more thinly and don’t necessarily have to visibly see one another to have an impact, whereas, on the other hand, given how temperamental some actors can be, keeping them apart isn’t necessarily a bad thing all of the time.
10 films where the lead characters never meet:
Rey and Poe Dameron, ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ (2015)
Star Wars had a massive task at hand as the franchise sought to define itself under its new era at Disney, where not only did the new Star Wars: The Force Awakens have to justify the $4billion sale of Lucasfilm, but it had to wipe away the toxic reputation of the trilogy of George Lucas’ prequels, which it did by attempting to emulate the style of the original trilogy through the central trio of John Boyega’s Finn, Daisy Ridley’s Rey, and Oscar Isaac’s Poe Dameron, who would be the heroes of the new saga.
However, Poe is lost and presumed dead early on after helping Finn escape from the New Order, and doesn’t interact with Rey at all, only being introduced to one another in the final scene of the sequel, Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
Sheriff Ed Tom Bell and Anton Chigurh, ‘No Country for Old Men’ (2007)
The Coen brothers directed one of the greatest ‘Best Picture’ winners of all-time with No Country for Old Men, which was a profound study of generational violence that brilliantly adapted the work of Cormac McCarthy, with a key theme being that Sheriff Ed Tom Bell, played by Tommy Lee Jones, unable to comprehend the shocking brutality inflicted upon the other characters, as he is always a few steps behind the remorseless killer Anton Chigurh, portrayed chillingly by Javier Bardem and his unusual haircut.
Bell ends the film delivering a solemn monologue about his dreams, revealing that he has woken up to a reality and nation that he no longer understands, all the while never crossing paths with Chigurh, but only his aftermath. While Jones, who was ostensibly cast to play the protagonist in the film, and Bardem were both nominated, and the latter ended by cinching the Academy Award for ‘Best Supporting Actor’ for his all-time great villain performance, the two never interacted onscreen.
Mia Wallace and Jules Winnfield, ‘Pulp Fiction’ (1994)
Pulp Fiction is perhaps the most influential film of the ‘90s because it channelled everything that Quentin Tarantino was great at, and he poured his love of crime and exploitation cinema into a two-and-a-half hour odyssey filled with memorable exchanges and shocking moments. He was able to keep the audience on the edge of their seats by constantly flipping expectations, and his brilliance lay in the fact that even though the story isn’t told in chronological order, all of the different stories end up connecting in one way or another.
Although Uma Thurman’s Mia Wallace goes out dancing with John Travolta’s Vincent Vega, she never meets his partner, Jules Winnfield, played by Samuel L Jackson, and while both share a strong connection with the intimidating gangster Marsellus Wallace, portrayed by Ving Rhames, they don’t actually share any scenes together; in fact, Thurman and Jackson are two frequent Tarantino collaborators who don’t interact in any of his films.
William Wallace and King Edward, ‘Braveheart’ (1995)
Mel Gibson may be a polarising figure who has equally attracted backlash and praise from his Hollywood contemporaries, but Braveheart is unquestionably a masterpiece in historical epic cinema. While it’s filled with enough inaccuracies to send any historian spiralling, the film was an empowering and thrilling examination of how the Scottish revolutionary William Wallace launched a campaign to free his people from the rule of the English King Edward, played by Peter Hanly, by raising an army of Guerilla soldiers.
Gibson is at least able to authentically fulfil the reality of Wallace’s fate, as the Scottish leader was executed in brutal fashion by the English crown, and despite the film’s controversial inclusion of a romance between Wallace and Princess Isabelle, played by Sophie Marceau, he never gets to meet the ruthless monarch/enemy who had ordered the massacre of the Scottish people and the conquest of their land.
Max and Immortan Joe, ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ (2015)
Mad Max was a franchise that seemed to be left in purgatory because it took 30 years for George Miller to make another film after Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, the final film that featured Mel Gibson as the titular drifter. The new film Fury Road may have hired Tom Hardy as his replacement, but it really ended up being the story of Imperator Furiosa, played by Charlize Theron, a female warrior who rebels against the powerful warlord Immortan Joe, brought to life terrifyingly by Hugh Keays-Byrne.
The emotional crux of the film involves Furiosa freeing the female slaves that have been captured by Joe before ultimately leading an attack against him and his army of War-Boys, with her garnering the honour of finally putting Joe’s reign of terror to an end, as Max is more or less a passenger in the adventure who only occasionally gets a moment to shine, never crossing paths with the antagonist.
Lieutenant Aldo Raine and Shosanna Dreyfus, ‘Inglourious Basterds’ (2009)
Quentin Tarantino assembled another amazing ensemble thriller with Inglourious Basterds, a love letter to international cinema and the World War II films that he had grown up watching, where, in a clever reworking of history, he set up various groups of characters involved in the premiere of a Nazi propaganda film, which would set the stage for the assassination of Adolf Hitler.
The Jewish theatre owner Shosanna Dreyfus, played by Melanie Laurent, plots to execute Hitler after barely surviving the murder of her family by the ruthless ‘Jew hunter’, Colonel Hans Landa, played by Christoph Waltz. Brad Pitt’s Lieutenant Aldo Raine and his team of commandos visit the theatre the same night to stage their own assassination of Hitler, but at no point do he and Shosanna ever meet, or even become aware of one another. Still, Raine does end up getting revenge on Shosanna’s behalf when he captures and scars Landa.
Stanley Spector and Frank TJ Mackey, ‘Magnolia’ (1999)
Paul Thomas Anderson has made many great films, including the best of last year, but Magnolia might be his most ambitious work to date, as the three-hour epic examined the lives of different troubled characters in the San Fernando Valley as they sought love, redemption, and faith within a miserable world, and turning in the most commanding performance in the film is Tom Cruise, who delivered his most transformative acting to date by playing the chauvinistic inspirational speaker Frank TJ Mackey.
Frank’s misogynistic worldview is a result of the resentment for his father, Earl Partridge, played by Jason Robards, who was a former producer on the game show What Do Kids Know? The show still exists, and the new child prodigy, Stanley Spector, played by Jeremy Blackman, becomes a breakout star, but he and his father, Rick, played by Michael Bowen, never cross paths with Frank.
Han Solo and Yoda, ‘The Empire Strikes Back’ (1980)
Mark Hamill may have been the primary hero in Star Wars as Luke Skywalker, but it was clear that Harrison Ford had stolen the show as Han Solo, which led to anticipation for The Empire Strikes Back, often ranked as the best of the series, resting on what he would do next, given that he was being pursued by the bounty hunter Boba Fett, played by Jeremy Bulloch.
The breakout star of the film ended up being Yoda, played by Frank Oz, the Jedi master who trains Luke after he is sent to Dagobah by the force spirit of Obi-Wan Kenobi, and since Han is on a separate mission with Carrie Fisher’s Princess Leia, he never ends up meeting Yoda, who dies in Return of the Jedi before Luke is even able to explain his experiences with his Jedi mentor to Han.
Javier Rodriguez and Montel Gordon, ‘Traffic’ (2000)
Steven Soderbergh is a filmmaker beloved by actors, which isn’t surprising given how many A-listers tend to pop up in his best films, and although he works frequently, 2000 remains the most impressive year of his career, where he directed two films, Traffic and Erin Brokovich, both of which earned nominations for ‘Best Picture’ and ‘Best Director’. Soderbergh ended up beating himself by winning the Oscar for Traffic, a massive crime epic that explored the ramifications of the War on Drugs from the perspective of politicians, law enforcement, and drug dealers.
Due to the fact that Traffic is fairly evenly divided between three distinct storylines, the Mexican federal police officer Javier Rodríguez Rodríguez, played by Benicio del Toro in an Academy Award-winning performance, and the undercover DEA agent Montel Gordon, played by Don Cheadle, never end up crossing paths with one another.
Michael Corleone and Vito Corleone, ‘The Godfather: Part II’
The Godfather is such an all-time great cinematic masterpiece that there was no way that a traditional sequel would have ever done it justice, so in a brilliant move, director Francis Ford Coppola and original author Mario Puzo crafted an even more ambitious epic that served as both a prequel and continuation of the original film. While the film showed the exploits of Al Pacino’s Michael Corleone after ascending to the top of the crime family, it also went back in time to show the origin of his father, Vito, played by Robert De Niro, who had been played in the first film by Marlon Brando.
Since Vito’s death in The Godfather is what leads Michael to go down the same dark path in order to live out his version of the ‘American Dream’, The Godfather: Part II became an even more damning examination of how the past is doomed to repeat itself, while also resulting in De Niro and Pacino not sharing any screen time together.
