If Rooney Mara's fearless turn as Stieg Larsson's goth-punk hacker heroine Lisbeth Salander teaches us anything, it's that you should never, ever cross a woman with fire in her heart and vengeance on her mind. But the titular Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is just the latest in a long history of utterly human movie heroines who remind us how ferocious and unrelenting a woman wronged can be. Celebrate the fictional ladies who have helped teach society not to fuck with the so-called "fairer" sex, and let their righteous fury be a lesson to us all during this warm and fuzzy holiday season.
9. Lady Vengeance, Sympathy for Lady Vengeance
The name says it all -- hell hath no fury like a young mother forced by a loathsome killer to confess to a murder she didn't commit. Out of the clink, Geum-ja (Lee Young Ae) follows in the footsteps the great cinematic female convicts who've come before, setting laser sights on getting her daughter back and exacting revenge on the enemy who ruined her life.
8. Brenda, Savage Streets
Linda Blair may have earned a Razzie nomination for her turn in 1984's Death Wish knockoff Savage Streets, but her girl gang leader Brenda was a force to be reckoned with: Mess with her deaf sister and her BFF and expect a one-woman, crossbow-wielding teen angel of death.
7. Sarah Connor, Terminator 2: Judgment Day
The first time SkyNet messed with Sarah Connor, the unassuming young lady ran for her life in unfortunate totally '80s wear. Years of militia training and push-ups later, she was ready for her brush with the latest Terminator model, having undergone a total mental and physical transformation. A storm's coming... and her name is Sarah Fucking Connor, you robot scum!
6. Shoshanna, Inglourious Basterds
Some Nazi hunters take a more direct approach (see: First Lieutenant Aldo Raine), others sit and seethe in quiet fury, take employ of a Parisian cinema, and plot to kill Hitler and his minions as they sit unawares in the coziness of a movie palace. Shoshanna (Melanie Laurent) may not have a collection of scalps to display in victory, but she gets her revenge... and how!
5. Madeleine, They Call Her One Eye AKA Thriller - A Cruel Picture
Abused, traumatized into muteness, forcibly hooked on drugs and coerced into prostitution, her eye cut out for disobeying orders, the petite antiheroine of Thriller (Christina Lindberg) doesn't fare much differently from countless other victims in the annals of rape and revenge exploitation cinema... until, one day, she starts amassing weapons and taking assorted lessons in the lethal arts. Clad in a black trenchcoat with a sawed off shotgun at her side, One Eye exacts her own justice on her violators, one at a time.
4. Yuki, Lady Snowblood
Some avenging heroines seek retribution for wrongs done unto them; the gorgeous Yuki (Meiko Kaji) was conceived by a vengeful mother solely to hunt down the circle of conspirators who slaughtered her family. Her very reason for living is revenge, and does she get it -- no amount of love, no pleas for compassion, not even death can stop this sword-swinging avenging angel from leaving death and destruction in her wake.
3. Coffy, Coffy
Blaxploitation star Pam Grier offered nothing but heroines never to fuck with over the course of her career, so you can really take your pick; still, Grier as vigilante nurse Coffy, cleaning up the corrupt city's drug-infested underworld? So. Bad. Ass. Watch her blow away those rotten dope pushers! Marvel as she catfights with a henhouse of hookers! She is, as they say, the baddest one-chick hit squad that ever hit town.
2. The Bride, Kill Bill. Vol. 1 & 2
Giving the resourceful Coffy a run for her money is Uma Thurman's aggrieved assassin The Bride, who suffers a litany of wrongs - fiancé killed, shot in the head, left for dead, and worse. What pushes her to the top of the list is twofold: For starters, she's not just battling pimps and pushers, she must slice her way through a host of her highly trained, oft-deranged fellow pro killers. Second, they took away her child. Never underestimate a mother's eternal wrath. And speaking of maternal instincts...
1. Ellen Ripley, the Alien franchise
It's not just that Sigourney Weaver's iconic sci-fi heroine is the baddest lady of action in the movies. In a film series that has seen aliens and facehuggers claim untold human life, it's unassuming warrant office Ellen Ripley who possesses the skills not only to survive, but to fight back. And how. Space ship cargo hatch battles! Hand-to-hand (and face to double-chompered face) heroine vs. queen power loader combat! Fearless death dives into molten lead! Whether her enemies are extraterrestrial or human, as long as her heart is still beating (even her clone heart!), Ripley will never let them win. Telling acid-blooded alien murder-creatures and greedy corporate suits to screw off earns her the number one spot on this list, and in our hearts.
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