Monika’s Pensieve

So this is the list of the villains that didn’t quite make it into my main list. I.e they made a strong impression on me, but I’m not sure I can call them favourites…
Sometimes it’s just because I haven’t seen the film in a long while and I don’t remember it well enough to be sure. Sometimes I really like the performance, but the character just isn’t quirky enough or interesting enough or whatever for me to feel strongly enough.

Oh, and before I begin listing - I found a site, which is dedicated solely to film villains. I thought the way they assign points for different aspects of being evil was rather amusing ;)

Rahul Mehra is a stalker, but his love for the heroine is completely genuine. It’s a chilling villain and an obsessive lover all in one and this is the combination that made the audience fall in love with Shahrukh - Darr was one of his first hit films.
Apparently, when this was first shown in Indian cinemas, the audience booed the hero during one of the final hero-villain confrontations - they wanted the villain to get the girl *grin* “I love you K…k….k….kiran” remains a classic line in Indian cinema even now (apparently SRK still gets some of his fans saying it to him).

Elektra King is a female villain in the “sex can be a powerful weapon” kind of vein. I haven’t seen the film in ages, so I don’t remember her that well. What I do remember though is that I loved Sophie Marceau in the role - she’s magnetic :) The final confrontation between her and James Bond is quite something.

I haven’t seen this for ages (probably since 1998, which would make me about 14 when I last watched it). I remember that at the time Bruce Willis made a huge impression on me. There’s something extremely human about his whole on-screen persona, which made it so much more chilling to see him cold-bloodedly murder his victims. I’ve no idea if I’d still react the same way now though, which is why The Jackal is not on my main list.

I think many people would find Olivier’s “crazy dentist” villain in Marathon Man (1976) a lot more worthy of such a list, but I never got into that one ;-P I love his performance in this, however, and IMO it’s a pretty unique villain. For one thing, it’s probably Hollywood’s first ever attempt at sneaking in a bisexual character into a very mainstream movie (an unsuccessful one - the studio cut the scene).
In the end I suppose the reason this villain doesn’t make my main list is that the studio butchered him too much. Some things about Crassus were much too subtly hinted as censorship was a bigger issue at that time. I suppose Alan Rickman’s Sheriff of Nottingham would not have made my list either if I had watched the film in its original cinematic version (the cut scenes of satanic rituals and such were later reinstated for the DVD release). In the case of Crassus, even after reinstating the scene in which he makes a pass at his male slave, a lot of things in the dialogue and in the way certain scenes are shot are just too butchered to really get Crassus’s whole essence through *sigh*

I’m not sure how much I can say about this part without it being a spoiler. Anyway, it’s a very interesting performance by Tony Curtis and it’s completely against his image. Not sure if I’m right to label his character as a villain, but I can’t tell you why I have my doubts without spoiling stuff :] Suffice to say that it’s more of an art house film than a mainstream one.

Another sexy lady that uses sex as her weapon against men. In fact she goes as far as to sexually assault the hero of the film. Priyanka is hilariously evil in this, it’s a great performance.

Brother Peter Lavin is the supervisor of a Catholic orphanage and he happens to be sexually attracted to little boys. This is another role that I don’t know how I would react to now, but I remember being awed by the performance when I saw it in my teens. I suspect its rightful place is in my main list, but as I’m not sure how I’d feel about it now, I’m keeping it here.
I’m wondering if “villain” is really the label I should be putting on the character. The film is a drama piece rather than a hero versus villain kind of thing. But then considering what he does during the film, I find it difficult not to put that label onto him, so I’m staying with it :] He’s a complex character though. From what I remember he is monogamous, which is actually a bigger strain on the 10 year old boy than if he distributed “his affections” more freely like most of the other brothers in the orphanage. It’s a very chilling film and a very unpleasant character, but it’s also a very honest and daring portrayal.

Another paedophile role - Sean Nokes is a guard in a detention centre. Though he shares his sexual inclinations with Brother Lavin, he’s a much nastier piece of work. He gets a kick out of not just the sex, but the act of torture and humiliation.
I wanted to mention the role because Kevin Bacon puts in a great performance, he really makes you hate him. In fact I remember that when the heroes of the film get their revenge, it was unsatisfactory. It was too quick, too simple and he never got confronted properly on an emotional level. The reason it doesn’t make the main list is that the character itself is very simple and just not particularly interesting.

This is the only SRK villain that I don’t root for! Or rather I do at the beginning of the film, but after a while I can’t take what he does anymore and I switch to rooting for the heroine :]
IMO this is the darkest villain SRK ever played. Generally speaking, SRK either plays villains which are so evil they’re comical or villains that have very human motivation for what they’re doing. This part is neither, it’s truly dark. Also, it’s probably the only time you get to see SRK beating up a woman black and blue. When I saw that scene in the cinema people were literally gasping and averting their eyes. He really goes whole hog on that and seeing one of the world’s biggest romantic heroes in a scene like that is quite something I tell you :] (to put it into Hollywood terms - it’s kind of like watching Hugh Grant hitting and kicking a woman until she’s all bruised and bleeding).

I’m not sure he really is a villain, perhaps antihero would be a better way to describe him. He doesn’t exactly have any sort of hero to fight with, but then a quick google search shows I’m not the only one to label him that way, so all is well :]
Anyway, Christian Bale is truly sick and chilling in this and it’s not every day that you get to see a villain who runs around naked with a chainsaw ;)

Another of the rare female villains that isn’t a “fairytale witch” or a “sex is a weapon” kind of character. Domyoji Kaede is the head of the biggest corporation in Japan and is an “iron woman” in regards to both her employees and her son.
Every appearance of the character is announced by a specific musical theme and by the end of the series every time I heard it I was like “oh no, what now?” ;)

Another of the I don’t remember the film well enough cases. I just remember I loved Joaquin Phoenix in this and I’m sure there’s a reason he makes many best villain lists ;)
On a side note - Commodus is probably the only villain on either of my lists that is into incest…