The 5 best Wall Street movie villains of all time

To some, everyone on Wall Street is a villain. It's easy to hate a guy who's making millions of dollars a year. The world of finance has given us some great real-life villains like Bernie Madoff and Jordan Belfort (the real "Wolf of Wall Street"). So naturally, filmmakers have been inspired to imitate.

On screen, we adore our Wall Street super-villains. They appear impenetrable and invincible with delightfully underhanded tactics: When they steal someone's money, they offer to help their victims look for it; they have strong wives and very sexy girlfriends; they speak in sound bites like "Greed is good"; they surround themselves with scapegoats and disposable people; they keep lying, even when everyone knows they're lying — "I didn't do it!"; they act like the devil but dress like an angel. All of which makes the inevitable crash in the third act just as fun to watch as the climb in the first two.

Click ahead for the top five Wall Street movie villains of all time, their best line — and what they might say about Janet Yellen and the Fed if they were at Jackson Hole this week.

Commentary by Turney Duff, author of "The Buy Side."
August 21, 2014

The movie: Arbitrage

The villain: Robert Miller, hedge-fund magnate (Richard Gere)

The plot: The story follows Miller, who's desperate to complete the sale of his trading business to a big bank before the fraud at the firm is exposed. Aside from a shady business, the guy's juggling a wife (Susan Sarandon), an art dealer, a mistress (Laetitia Casta) and some vicious rivals.

Why he's a great villain: Financial fraud, adultery, manslaughter, leaving the scene of an accident, cooking the books to sell his company and calling a young friend with a criminal past who's trying to live an honest life and making him an accomplice. And he gets away with it all… or does he?

Best line: "When I was a kid, my favorite teacher was Mr. James. Mr. James said world events all revolve around five things: M - O - N - E - Y."

What he'd say about Yellen and the Fed: "This meeting will be as climactic as Lance Bass coming out of the closet. This will be color by numbers and box checking. Labor-market developments...blah blah blah, wages...blah blah blah… Janet knows secrets save money. Buy her some yoga pants — we're taking the jet to Canyon Ranch for a peaceful retreat. She'll be less guarded in the downward-dog position. Maybe I can get her to spill a secret."

The movie: Boiler Room

The villain: Greg Weinstein, senior broker at a small brokerage firm called J.T. Marlin (Nicky Katt)

The plot: Seth Davis (Giovanni Ribisi), a college dropout with a serious desire for wealth, suddenly lands a job at J.T. Marlin, working for Weinstein. As Davis excels and his career starts to take off, he begins to question the legitimacy of the firm and how it makes money.

Why he's a great villain: Weinstein is a chauvinist who puts money above all else and is just plain evil. He'll slice you up with insults.

Best line: "We don't sell stock to women. I don't care who it is, we don't do it. Nancy Sinatra calls, you tell her you're sorry. They're a constant pain in the a-- and you're never going to hear the end of it alright? They're going to call you every f--ing day wanting to know why the stock is dropping and God forbid the stock should go up, you're going to hear from them every f--ng 15 minutes. It's just not worth it, don't pitch the b--ch."

What he'd say about Yellen and the Fed: "You know what Janet Yellen needs? She needs to get l--d. Someone needs to jump on that grenade. I'd do it myself, but there isn't enough Viagra in the world to get me to do that."

The movie: Trading Places

The villain: The Duke brothers, Randolph and Mortimer (Ralph Bellamy and Don Ameche), who own a commodities brokerage firm

The plot: The Duke brothers are always bickering and their latest bet is about being born into success. So, they set out to ruin the life of privileged Duke employee Louis Winthorpe III (Dan Aykroyd) and give street hustler Billy Ray Valentine (Eddie Murphy) Winthorpe's job — and his life. Will Winthorpe become a criminal and Valentine a success?

Why they're great villains: They spend thousands of dollars flipping two lives and you find out later that the wager is just $1. Greed is a normal component to any villain, but the meager bet shows that that being right is more important to them than winning a big payoff — and they'll go to any lengths to earn that bragging right.

Best lines:

Randolph Duke: Ezra. Right on time. I'll bet you thought I'd forgotten your Christmas bonus. There you are.

Ezra: Five dollars. Maybe I'll go to the movies ... by myself.

Mortimer Duke: Half of it is from me.

What he'd say about Yellen and the Fed:

Randolph: Jackson Hole is wonderful this time of year. It truly is. I know Janet's a marvelous bridge player but this quantitative easing game is a rich man's welfare.

Mortimer: Perhaps they'd be better off putting a Kardashian as head of the Fed.

The movie: American Psycho

The villain: Patrick Bateman, Investment banker in mergers and acquisitions for Pierce & Pierce (Christian Bale)

The plot: A materialistic, hedonistic life from the 80's … clubs, drugs, loveless relationships; everything about status, image, superficiality. But our protagonist / antagonist has a deep void inside of him. He's simply … not there.

Why he's a great villain: Bateman is insecurely insane or insanely insecure — it doesn't matter.

Best line: "Their early work was a little too new wave for my tastes, but when Sports came out in '83, I think they really came into their own, commercially and artistically. The whole album has a clear, crisp sound, and a new sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the songs a big boost. He's been compared to Elvis Costello, but I think Huey has a far more bitter, cynical sense of humor."

What he'd say about Yellen and the Fed: "Three years in a row we've got a policy plan. Do you know how many sit-ups I can do in three years? They call it QE, but it really should be called QP … Quantitative Pleasing. Main Street is too stupid to know what they need, give them a 64 oz. Slurpee and some Skittles and they'll shut the hell up … You know what the problem is with the millennials today? They don't understand the true art of a impeccable business card … Hey Jean, get Kevin Roose on the phone, invite him to dinner at Indochine tonight around 9 p.m. There are some things I'd like to dismember with him."

The movie: Wall Street

The villain: Gordon Gekko, corporate raider (Michael Douglas)

The plot: Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) is a young stockbroker who is willing to do anything to climb to the top of Wall Street, including getting insider information for Gekko, who takes Fox under his wing.

Why he's a great villain: Gekko is smarter, better looking and more powerful than anyone. He doesn't play by the rules—he invents them.

Best line: "Did you think you could've gotten this far this fast with anyone else, hun? That you'd be out there dicking someone like Darien? No. You'd still be cold calling widows and dentist tryin' to sell 'em 20 shares of some dog sh-t stock. I took you in."

What he'd say about Yellen and the Fed: "There's only one thing better than money … That's free money. The public thinks they want to hear about employment improving and that we don't have inflation. But the market wants to hear that it's not improving, which means more free money. The market loves free money. See I'm not sure if Janet takes a limo or a broom to work every morning, but she needs to realize that the less people know the better. Have you ever seen a 7-year old take off a Band-Aid? They slowly and meticulously pull the adhesive from the skin. And guess what? They can't do it. They can't take off the Band-Aid … I like to rip it off when they're not looking … So don't look!"

Read more:
The 12 types of people on Wall Street
Wall Street 101: From bathroom etiquette to sucking up
Sam Polk: How I left Wall Street and launched a start-up
Raj Mahal: 7 things I don't miss about Wall Street