Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas / Live-Action Films

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• 3:10 to Yuma (2007). After a member of the posse transporting him to the eponymous prison train insults his mother, shackled Magnificent Bastard Ben Wade promptly throws him into a ravine and utters this line to justify it.
  Wade: Day I die, Byron, I'm gettin' sprung from hell.
  Byron: I might think that too, if I came from the seed of a drunk gravedigger, and the rancid womb of a whore.
  Wade: [Whirls round, knocks back his captors, and grabs Byron from behind, holding a knife to his throat] I've always liked you Byron, but you never know when to shut up. Even bad men love their mommas. [hurls him over the cliff edge]
• American Gangster: Frank Lucas, drug kingpin, uses his fortune to buy a Big Fancy House for his mother and fills her room with copies of furniture that was taken from them when he was five, which he had remade from memory. When the dirty detectives invade the house looking for Frank's getaway money they assault his wife, shoot his dog and demolish the furniture. Frank's mom talks him out of a Roaring Rampage of Revenge ("You don't kill cops, even I know that") by threatening to abandon him. It works, and they go to church instead where Frank is arrested by the un-corrupt cops who were investigating him.
• American Me: Santana may be a brutal gang leader but he loves his mother, as she's always taken care of him even though he's the product of a gang rape against her by a bunch of racist sailors.
• In Analyze This, mob boss Paul Vitti gets very angry when Dr. Sorbel suggests that he might have an Oedipus complex (clearly, Vitti doesn't understand the term, and thinks that Sorbel is suggesting that he is actually sexually attracted to his mother). In a later scene, he's still angry at Sorbel, saying that he's been afraid to call his mother.
• Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy has this little exchange:
  Champ Kind: I will smash your face into a car windshield, and then take your mother, Dorothy Mantooth, out for a nice seafood dinner and never call her again!
  Wes Mantooth: Dorothy Mantooth is a saint! You understand me? Dorothy Mantooth is a saint!
  Ron Burgundy: Hey, let's leave the mothers out of this.
• Aquaman (2018): Gender Inverted. One of the main themes of this film is fatherhood, and most of the characters are seen to have close and loving relationships with their respective fathers.
  • Arthur and his dad start the film off by sharing a Man Hug and having some father-son time over a beer.
  • David Kane begins his first appearance by giving his son the family's Ancestral Weapon, a diving knife his father carried in WW2. His son, in turn, chooses to stay and die in a sinking submarine trying to save his father's life and only leaves when his father pulls a grenade.
  • Mera is also clearly a Daddy's Girl, and while he is willing to use her as a political pawn it is clear he cares a lot about her.
  • Orm's dialogue implies that he was pretty much raised by King Orvax and that he sees his father as the epitome of what it means to be Atlantean and strives to emulate him.
  • Orm does manage to play this straight as he blames his step-brother Arthur for his mother Atlanna being sentenced to death in the Trench. Upon seeing Atlanna alive in the finale, Orm is overwhelmed and instantly affectionate toward her.
• The Big House. Butch is a hardened killer who has committed who knows how many murders and is serving a life sentence in jail. He breaks down sobbing after receiving a letter telling him that his mother died.
• Noah from The Boy Next Door loves his deceased mother. He loves her so much that he declares that he could never hurt her in the climax, mainly because his father cheated on her and she was so devastated that she killed herself.
• In Brick, the Pin, a drug lord, lives with his mom. His mom even goes so far as to serve snacks during his business meetings.
• The Brothers (1979): The protagonist is a gangster, triad enforcer and a mobster, but still genuinely loves his mother. To the point of suffering a Heroic BSoD when his mother disowns him upon realizing he's working for the mob and is lying about his job of being a travelling executive.
• In Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, the assassin known as The Thin Man has a soft spot for the orphanage where he grew up. He regularly donates money and gifts and the reason he gets involved in the plot is to protect Max since he was also raised at the same orphanage.
• The Craft: The Ax-Crazy witch Nancy Downs has a pretty good relationship with her mother. When her belligerent stepfather strikes the mother in a mild rage, Nancy uses her newly-received powers to give him a fatal heart attack and ignores his suffering while checking to see if her mother is all right.
• Death Note (2017): Villain Protagonist Light Turner mourns his mother, who was killed by a criminal. When Light gets his hands on the titular Death Note and learns he can kill with it, one of the first things he does is kill the criminal responsible for his mother's death.
• Deewaar: Vijay, although not strictly speaking evil, is a hardened criminal who nevertheless loves his mother very much and wants to give her a nice home and all the other things she deserves.
• Defied in Demolition Man. When Huxley is looking over the list of Cryo-Cons, she notes to John Spartan, "Most of these guys don't like you." He answers that most of them don't even like their own mothers.
• In Fair Game, Evil Poacher Ringo attempts to assault Jessica after she disrespects his mother.
• The Fifth Element: Korben Dallas is a muscular blond hero, former soldier, who likes shooting at things and who is afraid of virtually nothing... except his irritable mom's phone calls, during which he never dares to talk back while she generously berates him as the worst son ever for not calling her enough. Although he probably is simply unable to.
• One particularly badass villain from the Fingerprints turns out to be doing everything to get revenge for her mother, who was murdered when she was a child.
• Four Brothers combines this with Roaring Rampage of Revenge. Saintly old lady Evelyn Mercer is shot and killed in a robbery, so her four dangerous adopted sons join forces to track down her killers.
• Jason Voorhees and his mother Pamela have a close and otherworldly relationship in the Friday the 13th series.
  • In the first film, the mother kills off kids in vengeance for Jason. The iconic leitmotif "ki ki ki... ma ma ma" is Mama Voorhees imagining Jason telling her, "Kill kill kill... mom mom mom!"
  • Before the events of Part 2, Jason made a little shrine for his mother's decapitated head and presented his victims to it.
  • In the crossover movie Freddy vs. Jason, Jason comes back to life because his mother tells him to do it. The "mother" was an image made by Freddy Krueger in order to start a killing spree on Elm Street. That kind of obedience can't be faked. When he found out who his 'mother' really was, Jason was not happy...
• In The Godfather Part II, after Michael Corleone learns of Fredo's treachery, he orders that nothing will happen to him while their mother is still alive. Once we see that shot of Mama Corleone in that casket, we know that Fredo is not long for this world...
• Joe Pesci's murderous psycho Napoleon-complex mobster Tommy DeVito in GoodFellas loves his mama.
• Michael Myers is quite fond of his mother in Rob Zombie's Halloween (2007) and Halloween II (2009). Not only does he kill the kids who insult his mom, he also has hallucinations about her wearing completely white and urging him on while he murders.
• Happy Gilmore can be a real Jerkass, but he's always nice to his grandma. In fact, the whole reason he goes on the golfing tour is to raise enough money to keep her from losing her house.
• The Hateful Eight: When John "The Hangman" Ruth asks the shady stranger Joe Cage for his motives visiting a small stopover during winter, he responds he's visiting his mother for Christmas. Subverted as this turns out to be a cover-up story.
• J.D. from Heathers outright admits he isn't sure if he even likes his father, but he clearly loved his late mother, regarding her fondly when showing her picture to Veronica.
• The Hoodlum: One of the sociopathic Vincent's last acts while he is on the run is to break into the family home to see his mother.
• I Care a Lot:
  • Roman is a vicious Russian gangster but he isn't going to let Marla get between him and his mom.
  • Subverted by Marla. Roman tries to pull this on her with her mother, but Marla calls her a psychopath and says she doesn't care what happens to her.
• In JCVD, The bank robbers get in multiple heated arguments over the brutal treatment of the hostages — two of them are Affably Evil, star-struck fanboys, who'd rather get Van Damme to show off his moves than extort the hostages, while the other one opens fire on the cops multiple times, and shoots an escaping hostage in the leg. The arguments become more heated as the film progresses, but they manage to keep it all together. Until the bastard insults another robber's mother. A point-blank headshot is the response from the other robber. His reasoning? "We agreed. Nothing about our mothers."
• Kick-Ass 2: Though Chris D'Amico's always bickering with his mom, when he inadvertently kills her he's very distraught. He clearly did care about her, even if the two did not get along.
• Kindergarten Cop: Cullen Crisp deeply cares for his mother. This would be heartwarming... if she wasn't a psychotic partner in his criminal schemes.
• In King of Thieves, Carl's major concern on being arrested is what is going to happen to his mother, who has Alzheimer's.
• The Ladykillers (2004): Despite having drawn the shortest straw and being saddled with the burden of having to murder Mrs. Munson, Gawain just can't bring himself to do the deed because the bossy old lady reminds him of his mother.
• In the second The Legend/Fong Sai Yuk movie, when the bad guys kidnap Fong's mom, Fong goes through hell and high water to get her back, including this scene, qualifying as one of Jet Li's greatest fights, where he uses an arsenal of katanas to tear apart an alley full of mooks standing between him and where the bad guys have taken her. While blindfolded. His mother may be even more badass than he is. When he is defeated by his prospective mother-in-law in the first movie, it's his mum who goes and restores the family honor (disguised as his brother).
• Also featured in a later Jet Li film, Hitman (1998). Li's character became a professional killer and expert hitman by the end of the film, as well as receiving a portion of a 200 million USD bounty money. The first thing he intends to buy with the money is a house for his mother.
• One of the first things Jeffrey Dahmer says in the 1993 biopic The Life and Times of Jeffrey Dahmer is that his grandmother might be the only person he ever loved. Indeed, he regularly brings over men to his bedroom in her house before killing them, but tries to hide this from her. He's later brought to tears when his Missing Mom calls him up out of the blue.
• Ronnie from Little Children is a convicted pedophile who loves his mother more than life itself, and is fully aware that she is probably the only person in the world who loves him. The film is notable for making a pedophile into The Woobie upon her death.
• Orin Scrivello, D.D.S. from Little Shop of Horrors has a shrine dedicated to his deceased mother, who encouraged him to become a dentist due to his sadistic nature as a child.
• Long Pigs: Anthony may be a cannibal and murderer, but he's still distraught when he learns his mom is dying.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • A gender-flipped version in Iron Man 2. Ivan Vanko, while bitter towards Tony, is perfectly willing to quietly take care of his invalid father, even though the film implies his father was abusive when he was well. But then his father dies…
  • Loki's love for his mother Frigga runs deep. It's implied she was his more attentive and affectionate parent, and she taught him a lot of his magic. She gave Loki the throne in Thor when Odin was in the Odinsleep. According to his actor Tom Hiddleston, "Frigga is the only one who still cares; the only one who still sees good in him. Everyone else has let him go."
    • In Thor: The Dark World, Thor gets Loki to cooperate by reminding him that Malekith killed Frigga, knowing that as much as Loki wants power, he wants revenge more. When he is informed of the news, he waits until he's alone before he lets his grief-inspired rage be shown by telekinetically destroying the furniture in his cell. For a character whose main trait is deception and playing with emotions, seeing a genuine reaction to an event is meaningful.
• Menace II Society: If you value your life, do not insult O-Dog's mom. He will kill you.
  Store Clerk: I felt sorry for your mother.
  O-Dog: What you say about my mama?
• In The Naked Gun 33 1/3, Rocco sees his mother fall off a stage, presumably dead, and shouts down to her, "I'm coming, Ma!" — possibly the most devoted mama's boy on this list. It is parody.
• Julian Karswell, the Satan-worshiping cult leader from Night of the Demon, is very affectionate and kind to his mother.
• In Popeye, Castor Oyl vainly attempts to box the feared contender Oxblood Oxheart for a sizable amount of money when the Oyls are evicted. Oxblood is clearly shown to have a soft spot for his doting mother/manager, which Popeye uses to his advantage when he enters the ring.
• In Preservation, the eldest of the psycho teens has Wit tied to a picnic table and is about to kill when his mobile phone rings. He halts, steps away from the table and takes the call. It's his mother and he proceeds to have a perfectly ordinary conversation where he tells her that he is just hanging out with his friends, that he'll be home in a couple of hours, and that she shouldn't worry.
• Norman Bates in Psycho has always had a twisted relationship with his mother, keeping her in the old family mansion and taking care of her needs and demands, even twenty years or more after she died.
• Tony Montana from Scarface (1983) somewhat loves his mother, even if there are rough edges to their relationship due to her being aware of his criminal activities.
• Scream (1996):
  • After being informed by Sidney that she's called the police, Stu (who has apparently lost all rationality and is bleeding to death) pathetically breaks down and sobs, "My mom and dad are gonna be so mad!"
  • Another example would be Billy, whose motive for killing Sidney's mother (and later Sidney) was that Mrs. Prescott had an affair with his father, which led to his mother walking out on them both. Sidney even calls him a "pansy-ass momma's boy."
• In Scrooged, the Ghost of Christmas Past shows to Bill Murray's character one of his first Christmas evenings. Murray begins to cry. Earlier, the Ghost had claimed that even Attila the Hun had to cry when he saw his own mother. Murray then claims (unconvincingly) that he's crying over the lump of meat his father got him as his Christmas present, which he didn't appreciate back then.
• Jacob Goodnight of See No Evil has a very good reason to love (or at least respect) his mother: she's the one who turned him into a serial killer in the first place! At first appearing to be a dotty old woman and one of Jacob's potential victims, she is eventually revealed to have been controlling him all along. You see, she's really a religious fanatic who believes that people deserve to die for having even the smallest of faults, and she uses her son as the vehicle for dispensing her twisted brand of justice.
• In Silent Hill, after the terrible and bloody vengeance that Alessa Gillespie unleashed on Christabella and the whole town that burned her alive for being born out of wedlock many years ago, the only survivors are Action Mom Rose, her daughter Sharon, and Dahlia, Alessa's mother. When Dahlia asks Rose why she is the lone survivor out of all the Silent Hill inhabitants, Rose tells her "Mother is God in the eyes of a child."
• In Sin City, Marv has the crap beaten out of him by crooked cops trying to get him to sign a confession. Marv spits blood at every paper they wave at him until a slimy District Attorney shows up and threatens to kill Marv's beloved mother. Marv signs the confession almost immediately, but not before breaking the DA's arm in several places.
• Star Trek (2009): Though he's not exactly "bad" (more like a Jerkass) for the first half of the movie, the only way to make Spock react in the movie is to insult his mother or imply he doesn't love her. You do not want to do that unless you want the shit beaten out of you. So they kill her off.
• Star Wars:
  • A case of 'Even Bad Men Love Their Fathers', Boba Fett from Attack of the Clones was shown as this. He became the most feared bounty hunter in the Galaxy and recreated the Mandalorians to honor dear old dad. ^note  It should also be noted that in the Mando culture, it's the father who does the bulk of the child-rearing. And their second-worst insult more or less translates to "deadbeat dad."
    • Boba was a clone himself; his father's price for giving his genes to make the clone army included one "unmodified" clone to be his son.
  • Nearly all of Kylo Ren's conflict comes from the love he still has for his parents. In The Force Awakens he actually kills his father to try and rid himself of it, in The Last Jedi he's ultimately unable to fire on the ship that has his mother on board, and in The Rise of Skywalker, the double whammy of feeling his mother die in an effort to reach him through the Force, and having a vision of his late father forgiving him, prompts his Heel–Face Turn.
  • His grandfather, Anakin Skywalker, also loves his mother very, very much. One particular moment that starts his jump off the slippery slope is when Shmi was kidnapped and later killed by Tusken Raiders and he decided to kill them all in retaliation. ^note In Legends, it is also revealed that his homeworld Tatooine would become a Berserk Button of sorts after this incident, and so Anakin (later Vader) never even goes near the Tatooine system if he can avoid it. This is why he never personally leads the search for the Death Star plans beyond the Tantive IV in A New Hope.
• The Heel–Face Turn of Eve Teschmacher from Superman: The Movie is prompted by the threat of her mother becoming collateral damage. She's all about being a vampy super-villain before that, too, with the big cape and the bigger boobies and everything else the job entails.
• Susano-o in The Three Treasures is a troublemaker, but he's shown to have loved his late mother Izanami.
• To Catch a Killer (2023): Mrs. Possey has been sheltering her son Dean even after she found out that he is the New Year's shooter. She shoots herself in front of him when he refuses to turn himself in. Although he tries to hold back his emotions, Dean makes it clear to Eleanor that the last of his humanity has just died. He asks her to shoot him after he falls asleep cradling his mother's body.
• Tragedy Girls: While we don't see too many scenes of the psychopathic, murderous girls interacting with their parents, they do appear to care about them, at least a little, and act affectionately towards them. Notably, the girls don't trash-talk them when they're alone, the same way they do Toby, Jordan, and Big Al, implying that the affection is genuine.
• Pluto from Us accompanies his family on their quest to slaughter their human counterparts, but cuddles up with his mother and seems fond of her. Downplayed, as compared to his family, he is only Ambiguously Evil. It's unclear whether his mother returns his love; she lets him dote on her and is gentler to him than anyone else, but it's also implied she set him up to die — or at the very least didn't try to save him — just so she could get revenge on Adelaide.
• In We're the Millers One-Eye is offended when Kenny sheepishly declines a gift basket filled with fruit (and a tarantula) from the former's mother.
• James Cagney as Cody Jarrett in White Heat. To the point where he's informed of her death while he's in prison, he flips out.
• In X-Men: First Class, Magneto is obsessed with taking revenge for his murdered mother. The whole "tortured in a Nazi concentration camp" thing didn't necessarily help either, though.

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