The Best "Forgotten" Movie Villains

When you think "movie villain", it's likely that Darth Vader will be one of the first names that pops into your head, and that's not a bad thing. He's everything a villain should be - ruthless, powerful, intimidating, the list goes on. But among the most iconic and best remembered bad guys in cinematic history, there are a few "gems" that nobody would recognise if you uttered their names. Here's some that I think are either underrated, ignored, cast out or completely unknown. Some aren't as forgotten as you'd expect, but I've mentioned them because they're not worth forgetting about and are perhaps heading that way. Spoilers within!

1. Norman Stansfield (Gary Oldman), Léon (1994)

"You don't like Beethoven. You don't know what you're missing. Overtures like that get my juices flowing,"

Gary Oldman is, quite simply, one of the best actors to have ever taken to the screen. In what is, arguably, his best performance, Oldman plays corrupt DEA agent Norman Stansfield, a man who will literally stop at nothing to make sure people aren't trying to get one over on him. Stansfield is a character that defines "depth" - every moment he is on the screen it is mesmerising, captivating. You feel like this is a real person, not somebody acting a part - it's no Nicholas Cage character (by that, I mean, in every one of his movies, there's no significant changes between the way he portrays the guy in Ghost Rider to the guy in The Wicker Man - he's reading lines, he's playing himself). This largely comes down to Oldman's performance, but the lines this character has are incredible ("I've had enough of this Mickey Mouse bullshit!"). Stansfield is a maniac - his obsession with Beethoven is largely ironic and completely in constrast with his character; a pill-popping, short-tempered, almost child-like psycho. But it's also in this character's bad qualities that you find yourself in awe, which is what makes Stan such a fantastic villain. Because he's so "cool" in the way he goes about things, it is that attitude that makes him attractive as a bad guy. As he spends the movie trying to take down hitman Léon, you're slightly torn as to whether you do want him to actually succeed, even after witnessing him storm an apartment at the beginning and kill a four-year-old kid. It's most likely because, rarely, as film-goers, are we given a bad guy who plays so well both story-wise and performance-wise. Oldman not only shows us the sort of height that should be reached everytime we've got a villain on our hands, he crafts a character that is just as likeable as he is dislikable. And, even when it does come to the point where we must bid Stansfield farewell, he even manages to go out in style. Léon, dying, hands him a pin - a pin to which, unluckily, belongs to one of many grenades that are strapped to Léon's body. "Shit," Stansfield utters quietly - line that sums up his entire character's persona - before being blown to oblivion.

2. Roy Batty (Rutger Hauer), Blade Runner (1982)

"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain,"

Perhaps he is not "forgotten" in the sense that Stansfield is, but it is not often you'll ask somebody who they think to be the best movie villain and Roy Batty will come up. Or, not enough people will sight him as one of the best, which, in my opinion, is cinematic blasphemy. Rutger Hauer's performance as the poetic replicant leader Roy Batty is something of dreams, and I mean that in the literal sense - Hauer's Batty embraces a poignant feel, an all-knowing, wise performance, proof that, as many have said, Hauer really understood his part and his character. But it it is Batty's position of the movie's "villain" that is interesting - all throughout the film, it becomes increasingly clearer that perhaps Batty isn't a villain at all. The question is never really answered, but we as an audience are expected to make up our own minds. He does not, in fact, have that much screen time overall - we are introduced to Batty in the beginning, and he re-appears towards the final act of the film, desperate to "meet his maker". Tyrell, who, in fact, fits this description, gives Batty the title of "prodigal son" - religious imagery associates with Batty frequently, especially at the end, where he pierces his own hand with a nail, suggestive of a crucifixion. Hauer plays Batty to perfection, however, all throughout. It is as if he actually is Roy Batty, born to play the part, the character. Like Norman Stansfield, Roy Batty is a character who reeks depth - this character has experienced things that others could only dream of ("I've seen things you people wouldn't believe...") and, though we as audience don't see any of them, it's convincing. What is interesting about the character's development is that in the end, the replicant, the "inferior", saves the apparent human character, Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford). His sudden realisation that all life is precious is as poetic as the character, and, quite magnificently, rounds off Batty as one of the best movie villains of all-time.

3. Frank (Henry Fonda), Once Upon A Time In The West (1968)

"My weapons might look simple to you, but they can still shoot holes big enough for our little problems,"

Frank is brilliantly evil. Ironic as he was the first "bad" character Henry Fonda took on after he had established himself as a classic hero in the Western genre. Still, he plays it absolutely spot-on. It may be in Ennio Morricone's fantastic score that Frank is really brought out as this cold-blooded "incarnation of evil", but it goes without saying that his time on-screen is menancing to the maximum. As a "businessman", Frank's goal is to secure some land - land that has, to his annoyance, owners. After killing them (a brutal scene in which he mercilessly murders a family), Frank thinks his troubles are over, but they are far from it. Not only is Harmonica on his tale (Charles Bronson), somebody has returned home and has taken his land. Fonda's Frank is blunt and cool-headed, but his downfall comes in the form of the past. It's obvious he has killed many men, people that didn't deserve it, perhaps. We learn this as the movie goes on, but we never see it. This gives Frank an immortal power over us as audience members - we know of these things, but we can only imagine the horrific situations in which that have taken place. Right at the end, we are shown for the first time just how Frank works... it seems killing a family isn't the worst thing he could do. He has no alliances to anyone, which suits him fine until his own men turn against him - still, he does away with them and thinks nothing of them. He's the strict businessman of today, translated to a different time period where he can get away with a lot more. Frank will do anything to get to the top - betrayal, murder, rape, it doesn't matter, as long as he succeeds. And in those cruel blue eyes, you can see that he enjoys it - he must do, considering what he does to have Harmonica so in search of revenge. To the very end, he has an overwhelming dark and merciless presence.

4. T-1000 (Robert Patrick), Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

"Get out,"

A villain I often find overlooked isn't one that perhaps many will agree with. Sometimes it's the quietest villains that are the most frightening, though - take Battle Royale's Kazuo Kiriyama for example (he doesn't utter a single word). The perfect example of one of these "types", however, is the T-1000, a villain that strikes fear into the hearts of science-fiction fans everywhere. From the moment we're introduced to this guy, we get the message that he's far superior to Arnie's Terminator model - it's not until the end of the film that we become aware of just how good this machine is. That's the secret to such a simple character's success - the fear. Sometimes it doesn't pay to craft a character with depth and a history, you need a character like the T-1000 to genuinely get the audience jumping out of their seats. His ability to re-generate gives us the impression that he's never going to die - nothing can kill him, it seems, after all. Robert Patrick's performance as the robot-on-a-mission is, actually, very good. I imagine it being quite difficult to play a character with absolutely no emotion, strange as that may sound - it's in those eyes of his and that bland facial expression that makes him such a great bad guy. Though on one level it may seem as though the creators have taken the easy way out when it came to crafting a suitable bad guy, there's nobody I know who can say they weren't terrified when they saw the T-1000 racing after the car, arms pumping away, never getting tired, never wanting to stop. The amount of damage this guy takes is fantastic, too - he's somebody you must defeat over and over again and that really is a frightening concept! T-1000's ability to form ("It can't form complex machines, guns and explosives, it doesn't work that way, but it can form solid metal shapes") is so captivating to watch, you're excited by his transformations. The humanless nature of the T-1000 is what makes it one of the greatest villains - unlike any other, it has a complete and utter sense of dedication that no human can match. It will never stop hunting you.