5 Minor Characters That Need Their Own Movie

1)      Percy Potts, The Lost World (1925)

Percy Potts is arguably the GREATEST CHARACTER IN MOVIE HISTORY! He is the wimpy stork clerk who successfully melts the icy heart of Gladys (the would be fiancée of the movie’s protagonist, Edward Malone).  It is Gladys that actually sets the plot in motion by telling Edward that she cannot marry until he has looked death in the eye. While Edward and company are risking their lives in South America, Gladys changes her mind and falls head over heels in love with the nebbish Percy.  Edward, rather than being angered by this, is relieved – for he has fallen in love with the angelic Paula White. He wishes the two love birds good luck and is on his way.

What the movie could be about:

Percy’s courtship of the lovely, but distant Gladys.  Percy will, at first, be extremely timid around Gladys, but eventually he works up the courage and asks her out on a date. Gladys, impressed by this “act of bravery,” agrees and, rather unexpectedly, finds herself falling in love with the squirrelly store clerk. As they are about to embark on their Honeymoon, all the traffic in London has come to a complete halt. They get out of their car and can’t believe what they are seeing: an Apatosaurus rampaging through the city streets.  After the excitement has worn down, they bump into Edward, who is delighted to hear Gladys’ news. 

2)      Earl, Halloween 4 (1988)

If Percy Potts is “arguably” the greatest character in movie history it’s only because he has a challenger to that title in the form of Earl, the bar owner in Halloween 4. When Earl learns that Michael Myers is back in town he forms a posse to track down the masked killer.  Unfortunately, Earl and his pals are extremely inept; they accidentally gun down the town drunk, Ted Hollister, whom they mistake for Michael Myers.  Earl comes to a gory end when Michael Myers reaches through the driver’s window of his pick up truck and rips off his head. 

What the movie could be about:

It would essentially be a reboot of Halloween 4 told entirely from Earl’s point of view. It will follow the many misadventures that Earl and his pals get into that fateful night, culminating in their gruesome deaths. However, an end credits scene will reveal that Earl has miraculous survived the attack and will devote the rest of his life to ridding the world of evil.

3)      Annie, Friday the 13^th (1980)

      

      Annie is the cheerful camp counselor who gets her throat slit in Friday the 13^th. She never actually makes it to the camp site and is murdered in the woods, while attempting to flee the killer. 

What the movie could be about:

Since Annie never makes it to the campgrounds, it would be impossible to show the events of Friday the 13^th from her point of view, rather, her story would best be told as prequel. It will depict the events that lead to Annie’s decision to become a counselor at Camp Crystal Lake. It will begin in complete chaos as Annie's high school sweet heart breaks up with her so he can sleep with college girls.  This will throw Annie into a bit of a crisis, however, she will find meaning in her life when she realizes that she is really good with children. One day, while scouring the wanted ads in the newspapers, she will find on opening at Camp Crystal Lake. The movie will end with her bidding small town “farewell,” and then heading off to her tragic destiny.

4)      The Pizza Delivery Man, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)

If you grew up watching the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, then you will remember the scene where Michaelangelo short changes the Domino’s pizza man for being two minutes late. This, naturally, pisses the guy off and he complains to himself about getting a “new route.”

What the movie could be about:

After having this unusual encounter, the Pizza Delivery Man, rather than getting a new route, instead decides to get a different job. After weeks of searching, he gets a stocking job at a retail store.  However, it is not the paradise that he was expecting, especially after he learns that the management is part of a satanic cult that is bent on taking over the world. After mulling over this for a few days, he decides to clear his conscience by doing the right thing……..giving them his two weeks notice. He then gives them a half ass speech about “evil always losing” and then goes back to being a pizza delivery man. 

5)      The Hotel Manager, Ghostsbusters (1984)

Ghostbusters is generally regarded as the greatest movie of the 80s! I would provide a link to back my claim, but I don’t have the time. Just take my word for it! Who can forget the scene in the Sedgwick Hotel dining room? Ray, Igan, and Peter destroy the place while attempting to capture Slimer. More importantly, who could ever forget the uptight, twitchy manager of the hotel?

What the movie could be about:

These modern day filmmakers have got it all wrong: instead of making a third Ghostbusters movie, they should make a movie about the haunted hotel. The movie would center on the manager’s, unsuccessful, attempts at dealing with the paranormal activity, while trying to keep his sanity. It would essentially be a remake of the Marx Brothers movie The Cocoanuts, but with scary ghosts in place of the boring musical numbers. It gives the filmmakers a chance to continue the franchise, while doing something completely different at the same time.  

The Lost World (1925)

The Lost World was the pre-cursor to King Kong and the grandfather of the modern day blockbuster; many of today’s special effects extravaganzas follow its template, a slim framework to hang its special effects on.  The special effects in The Lost World are dated, but they are charming in their crudity, and are certainly the best parts in the film. The non effects scenes are rather unremarkable, but passable. The Lost World suffers from two major flaws:

1)      The Love Triangle. The character of Paula White (the appealing Bessie Love) was not in Arthur Conan Doyle’s novel and was created specifically to provide the character of Edward Malone (Lloyd Hughes) with a love interest.  This in itself isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it takes an awkward turn for the worst with the introduction of famed hunter Sir John Roxton (Lewis Stone), who also vies for Paula’s affection.  The problem is that this love triangle is a complete mismatch in Edward’s favor, Paula doesn’t return Roxton’s affections, she just shrugs them off. Often, the relationship between Paula and Sir John comes off as being more father/daughter than potential lovers, because it’s so tame. If one were to edit out the title cards in The Lost World, Sir John would come across as a concerned father wanting the best for daughter. It doesn’t help that Lewis Stone was old enough to be Bessie Love’s father. The Love Triangle, for all its build up, is much ado about nothing; Sir John takes Paula’s rejection of him in relatively good humor and remains friends with Edward.  There is never any moment where it threatens to tear apart the expedition, instead everyone remains agreeable throughout. It might have helped had there been a least once scene in which Sir John contemplates letting Edward get mauled by a dinosaur, or setting his gun sights on Edward, instead of the Ape Man that is tormenting him throughout the movie.  Instead, it’s a rather dull subplot that could have easily been discarded.

 

2)      Harry O. Hoyt’s pedestrian direction.  A common occurrence throughout the film is how Hoyt will constantly undercut the tension in a by cutting back and forth between two different locations. Early in the film, the expedition party has downed a tree to get across a chasm. When the tree falls, the films cuts to a Brontosaur (or to be correct, an Apatosaurus) grazing in the jungle. It is startled by the sound of the tree falling. Cut back to the expedition walking across the tree on a time. Cut back to the Brontosaur. Cut back to the party. Whatever tension Hoyt was trying to get out of the party crossing the chasm is completely deflated by the comical Brontosaur munching away on the greens. It is an extremely odd directorial decision that only baffles the viewers; a few cut a ways last for merely a split second.
The reveal of the dinosaurs is rather unremarkable as well. Professor Challenger and company finally come upon the plateau, the sight of Challenger’s previous expedition and the disappearance of Maple White (Paula’s father), when the film abruptly cuts to a long shot of a Pterodactyl gliding into frame.  There is no build up to its appearance, it just randomly appears. It takes Challenger and friends a couple of seconds to notice its existence and when they finally see it, they are absolutely amazed.  In King Kong, the film heightens its suspense by slowly revealing Kong to the audience; first all we hear is a roar, then a couple of footsteps, then the sound of trees being knocked over, and finally, after nearly a minute of screen time has passed, Kong emerges into frame, and we in the audience can’t believe what we are seeing. The Pterodactyl scene doesn’t have quite the effect, because there is nothing to clue us in to its appearance. I’m sure in 1925, audiences must have been blown away by what they were seeing, but to the modern viewer it’s just as an awkward moment, “Oh, look! A Pterodactyl! MEH!” When we first saw Kong, we immediately feared for Ann Darrow’s (Fay Wray safety), but the Pterodactyl is never a threat to our protagonists; it munches on an animal in its talons and then promptly flies away, never to be seen again.

For many years the only available copy of The Lost World was a heavily mutilated print that ran a little over an hour, consequently giving the film a very disjointed feel about it. In 1998, a 93 minute print was located and it helped fill in a few narrative gaps, though even this print is missing important scenes (the original print ran 108 minutes).  One of the crucial scenes the 1998 print added back in was Edward’s relationship with his fickle girlfriend, Gladys. Edward desperately wants to marry her, but she rebukes his proposal saying she will “only marry a man of great deeds and strange experiences – a man who can look death in the face without flinching!” This is Edward’s main motivation for going on the expedition in the first place (as it is in the novel), yet this scene was surprisingly deleted from most prints, making you wonder why Edward would willingly risk life and limb for an expedition he doesn’t really believe in; he, at first, thinks Challenger’s claims of dinosaurs in the Amazon are complete nonsense.  It also essentially deletes Edward’s character arc, he goes from thinking the world of Gladys to finding true love in the arms of Paula. At the end of the film Edward bumps into Paula again, only to find that she has married a nebbish clerk named Percy Potts, and he couldn’t be more delighted. He has a few laughs with Gladys and her husband, wishes them luck, and then goes running into the arms of the awaiting Paula. It’s great to see these two scenes restored, because it gives the character of Edward some depth, instead of just being a handsome face that stumbles through the scenery. I personally would love to see Percy Potts get his own spin off; his story of how he landed a complete babe like Gladys would be an inspiration to geeks everywhere, especially me.  He has never left London his entire life and is afraid of his own shadow, yet he somehow manages to win the hand of the lovely Gladys ----truly inspirational!

 

However, the best thing about The Lost World, other than its special effects, is Wallace Beery’s portrayal of Professor Challenger, which is spot on from the book. Challenger has the mind of Einstein, but the body of a Neanderthal, and often gives into his more primitive instincts; it is revealed that he has attacked three reporters that tried to interview him. When Edward reveals that he is a reporter, Challenger lunges at him, but Edward is able to hide amongst the crowd. Later on, Edward sneaks into Challenger’s house and tries to plead his case, but Challenger won’t hear any of it, and the two of them tumble and tussle out the front door. It’s only after that Edward reveals he is a friend of Sir John Roxton that Challenger backs down and is willing to listen.  Challenger has all the intelligence in the world, but distances people with his boorish behavior. It takes the intervention of Edward to get the expedition funded; he is able to sell it to his newspaper as a rescue mission to save Maple White (which makes for a great human interest story).  It is a great performance from Beery, sadly, he gets lost in the shuffle once the special effects and the love triangle take front and center.  Professor Challenger has little to do in the second half, except antagonize fellow scientist, Professor Summerlee (Arthur Hoyt).

There is also a misguided attempt by the filmmakers to turn Sir John Roxton into a tragic figure; for all of his world renown, he is a lonely man. This might have worked if Sir John was a compelling figure, but he’s a complete bore.  It also doesn’t help that Edward is the audience surrogate; we see the world through his eyes, so naturally he’s the character we empathize with most.  He desperately seeks the love of Gladys, something that most of us can relate to and foolish jumps into dangerous because he wrongly thinks it will impress her. He’s a fallible character, hence relatable. Sir John is a rather distant character and his interest in Paula is a foolish pipe dream.  When the movie ends with him standing alone on the streets of London, we are totally indifferent to his plight. Lewis Stone is a fine enough actor, but he’s given very little to work with here. He played a very similar role in the camp classic The Mask of Fu Manchu and is much more effective, largely because he is a perfect foil for Karloff’s depraved madman. Plus, he’s so single minded in his goal to stop Fu Manchu that he doesn’t have time to pursue much younger women. PHEW!

 

Bessie Love has a great appeal as Paula White, largely due to her very expressive face. Indeed, Love’s likability is able to gloss over the fact that Paula is kind of a flake.  She could easily avoid the awkward moments with Sir John, if she just stated that she wasn’t interested in him, instead she laughs off his advances. She could easily throw out the word that most men dread to hear, “FRIENDS,” but she doesn’t even do that.  She avoids confrontation; because she doesn’t want to hurt Sir John’s feelings. However, inevitably the truth comes out and Sir John is heartbroken. It is even more infuriating that it is Edward that tells Sir John that Paula and him are going to get married. It is the ultimate cock punch!  Sir John is able to muster a smile, despite having his heart stomped on. When it looks like the expedition will make it back to civilization, after all, Paula calls off the engagement with Edward, because of his obligation to Gladys (which is kind of moot point, given that Gladys doesn’t love Edward and never agreed to marry him).  Once it is revealed that Gladys is married to the awesome Percy Potts, Paula, once again, kicks Sir John to the curb and embraces Edward. UGH!   Love would later go onto to star in The Broadway Melody, which was the first sound feature to win the Oscar for Best Picture. Alas, it has not aged particularly well, but she manages to liven up the proceedings with her likable personality.  This time around, her character is on the fuzzy end of a love triangle; her bland boring boyfriend falls in love with her younger sister.

When The Lost World is mentioned, no one ever thinks of the cast and the director, but rather the stop motion special effects by Willis O’ Brien. As mentioned in the introduction, the special effects are extremely dated and fairly jerky at times, but there are some genuinely effective moments.  The most famous scene is the Brontosaur rampaging through London at the film’s climax, but to me, the most nightmarish sequence is the Allosaur attack on the expedition party. It’s a rare moment where the filmmakers are able to build up some tension; the Allosaur is first seen in the shadows, obscured by a couple of trees. The only thing visible is its eyes, which come across as two glowing orbs floating in the night sky. It finally emerges from the trees and attacks the party. They are able to repel it by throwing a torch in its mouth. It’s a brief scene, but highly effective.  It’s one of the few scenes in the movie where the actors actually interact with a dinosaur; usually the effects scenes are fairly unrelated to the actual storyline. It is common to have a scene with the cast doing a bit of business, then the film will cut to two dinosaurs duking it out, then cut back to the cast, who are completely oblivious to the prehistoric wrestling match that just occurred.  The Lost World is relevant, because in many ways, it proved to be a test run for the much superior King Kong, which still inspires filmmakers to this very day.  Also, it gave us the memorable character of Percy Potts…a truly original creation. Hopefully, a young filmmaker will realize the potential of this awesome character and give him his own movie. It is long overdue!

Credits:

Cast:  Wallace Beery (Professor Challenger), Bessie Love (Paula White), Lloyd Hughes (Edward Malone), Lewis Stone (Sir John Roxton), Alma Bennett (Gladys Hungerford), Arthur Hoyt (Professor Summerlee), Bull Montana (Ape Man), Margaret McWade (Mrs. Challenger), Finch Smiles (Austin), Jules Cowles (Zambo).

Screenplay: Marion Fairfax.
Based on the novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
Director: Harry O. Hoyt
Running Time: 93 min.