The movie "Emperor’s Club," portrays a Machiavellian character in a young male student who becomes a successful businessman years after. I couldn’t forget this character’s name, Sedgewick (which I had to google for correct spelling).
The movie is about a teacher who believes in teaching history (or was it Literature?) to instill moral character in his students. He believes in being virtuous. That’s when Sedgewick enters the plot, wherein he didn’t see the purpose of being moral and thus being a negative influence on the other boys. The teacher saw potential in him and tried to pull strings to enter him into this Roman-themed quiz bee wherein two students battle out in answering the most number of trivia questions correctly. Sedgewick cheats and wins, and the teacher was the only one who noticed yet he didn’t expose Sedgewick, but instead confronted him. Sedgewick didn’t care, and years gone by. Sedgewick was now a successful businessman hoping for a position in the government as he invites this teacher to create a re-match of that quiz bee with the same audience and opponent. Again, he cheats and is seen by the teacher, and the conversation they had after the competition greatly showed the Machiavellian in Sedgewick.
The teacher confronts the grown Sedgewick: “All of us, at some point, are forced to look at ourselves in the mirror and see who we really are. When that day comes for you, Sedgewick, you will be confronted with a life lived without virtue, with principle, and for that I pity you.” (That, I believe, sounded Aristotelian.) Sedgewick responds: “Who out there gives a shit about your principles and your virtues? I mean, look at you. What do you have to show for yourself? I live in the real world where people do what they need to do to get what they want. If it’s lying and if it’s cheating, then so be it.”
The film “V for Vendetta” (based on the animated comics) is prone to many interpretations, especially the character that “V” portrays. Despite all these interpretations of him, I saw a hint of Machiavelli in him when he sought to kill those who were involved in his horrid unintentional transformation to the masked vigilante he is now known to be. His destructive acts not only include killing the people who were hindrances to his goal, but also blowing up different infrastructures, especially the parliament in the end. He saw these acts necessary to attain his goal, which are actually morally ambiguous. But mentioning this, he seemed more UTILIATARIAN as he believes that in order to have the liberty (or happiness) the citizens of his state is entitled to, he had to do those acts. He saw that it was the right thing to do as it would cause a greater number of people good.