Great question!

My favorite would without a doubt be Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs. NO ONE else could play that part.

Of course, he's good in all his movies. :)

Pinhead?

Arb: Pinhead was an agent of Hell who had to do his job. If anything he must be the most bored villain in movie history.

Oh yeah, and for Dean's Q I say Elle Driver. You gotts to watch the movie, Dean. I'm pretty much Kill Bill crazy right now, but Elle beats Bill in the compelling factor.

I hate to spark up an old debate, but I gotta say Magneto was pretty kickin'.
Also, if you haven't had a chance to see the Michael Mann flick Heat, do so - I like the character studies of the protagonist AND antagonist... they even sit down and talk to each other "I have my job, and you have yours"

Most enjoyable villian, any Vincent Price bad guy.
Most frightening, but NOT likable Peter Lorre in M.
Most fascinating, Hannibal Lecter.

Well, for that affront, I can only paraphrase pinhead himself: "Your suffering will be legendary... even in Hell."
But if I had to pick another movie villian, it would be Hugh Grant in any movie he ever appeared in... either him or the hybrid alien/human baby in aliens 4.

Ed Norton in Primal Fear.

Whassat?! The bad guy from The Patriot? Jeez, he was a caricature of a bad guy. He would have been the one tying the woman to the railroad tracks in another movie.

My vote would go for Bester (played by Walter Koenig) from Babylon 5. Okay, so it's not a movie, but he was one of the best bad guys I've ever watched. (Of course, Morden, and in his own way, Londo, both come to mind too... heh)

Hi.

I'll give you my whole top ten.

(1) "Before Medea sailed away on the Helios she killed king Creon and the princess, with what? A: A rock. B: Spear-gun or C: a bit of Poison."
This one blew me away. When I understood who and what she was, my thought for eveeryone else was: "just shoot yourself now." Perfect, like a dragon. And I /liked/ her.

(2) "You aren't too bright. I like that in a man."
"Compelling" for sure.

(3) "Rome is an eternal thought in the mind of God."
The actor had difficulty playing this guy he was so evil.

(4) "Well, don't fear God, Senator, and certainly don't fear me. Not any more."
A great villan should have a master plan.

(5) "That is good, for believing what you do, we confer upon you a rare gift, these days - a martyr's death."
I've got to admit: true believers with good intentions and good manners really work for me.

(6) "Do you see any Teletubbies in here? Do you see a slender plastic tag clipped to my shirt with my name printed on it? Do you see a little Asian child with a blank expression on his face sitting outside on a mechanical helicopter that shakes when you put quarters in it?"
Someone who overcomes great adversity with dignity and courage is a sympathetic character.

(7) " ... if only you could see what I've seen with your eyes ."
Almost innocent. But as Maxwell Smart might of said, he missed the edge by /that much/.

(8) "I couldn't do that. Could you do that? Why can they do it? Who are those guys?"
You don't think he's evil? Count the bodies.

(9) "Please let go of my arm."
An agent so charmingly polite you might thoughtlessly grant he request to let him stab you to death - if you weren't so sleep-deprived that by the time you registered what he was asking for the moment had passed.

(10) And Bing Crosby as Dr. Leonard Cook in _Dr. Cook's Garden_ (TV, 1971) I couldn't remember a good quote, which confirms that he's last. Still, a lovely man in a nice, nice setting.

Not a movie, but I'd nominate Tony Soprano any day.

Definately Robert De Niro in "Heat." Here was a bad guy that you were actually rooting for. Pacino in GF II displayed one of the most evil transformations of any character I've seen in movies. Of course, the murder of his first wife in Sicily brought that on, nonetheless, I don't think he's supposed to be a "liked" villian. He's pure evil.

Hi.

On second thoughts, I don't really think TV movies should count. I'm a BIG SCREEN kind of guy. And anyway, there's a much worthier candidate I forgot. Debuting at number three:

(3) "Now get out of the car and shoot him in the head!"
I mean, we all believe in motherhood, right? I do.

I should also add that my number four, now number five, is really an ensemble award, including:
"... people like you are the reason I was afraid to go to school as a child."

How cool is it to be a great villain with another worthy master villain backing you up and deferring to you? That's status!

Hans Gruber
"I am going to count to three....there will not be a four..."

Messalla

"The emperor is God! He has real power here on earth...not that Judah (pointing at the sky)...not that.."

Longshanks

"Who is this that speaks to me as if I needed his advice..."

Jack D. Ripper

"Have you ever heard of flouridation of water, Mandrake?"

And finally from the I Claudius series,

Livia

"They won't let you in the senate because you are a fool...they won't let me in because I am a woman...which is odd since it is full of nothing but old women and fools..."

I liked John Travolta in Broken Arrow. He does a great villain. I understand he's a bad guy in the Punisher. I haven't seen it yet.

Bruce Dern was an excellent western villain.

Is Khan in from Star Trek II too over the top for the list?

Michael Corleone was the bad guy :) ? I thought Hyman Roth was the bad guy. Roth would be up there as an all-time villian with his "playing with guns" speech and the facile way he discusses corrupting Cuba.

Hitler was pretty good in Triumph of the Will ... oh wait.

And Samuel Jackson's character in Pulp Fiction.

I HAD HIS LIVER FOR DINNER, WITH FAVA
BEANS AND A NICE CHIANTI...
-Hannibal Lector

I second Hans Gruber and Bruce Dern.

I don't think you can consider him a villain, but Nightlinger in The Cowboys had that nice evil streak:
"Above all, forgive me for the men I've killed in anger, and those I am about to..."

Great villains, Carl!

"I am going to count to three....there will not be a four..."
Yes, that's the sort of line you remember not because it is so great in itself (though it is good) but because it is spoken with purpose by a true master villain.

And Livia, though a TV series and not a movie villain, is one of the all-time legends.

Quality villains from Ralph Stefan too.

IB Bill, I think Khan maybe is too over the top. That's not bad, he's a superb villain, But it's a question of what kind of villain we're looking for this time. (I admit that I have picks that can be challenged on the same ground.) Hyman Roth is more the sort of villain I think we're after.

If we were allowing all kinds of villains, I would nominate the One Ring, just because it's such a strange feat that Peter Jackson brought off, to make a (usually) plain gold ring a threatening, subversive, evil force.

First one to come to my mind is Jeremy Irons as Claus von Bulow in Reversal of Fortune.

Favorite line?

"What do you get for the woman who has everything?
A vile of insulin."

Second villain that comes to my mind is Bruce Dern in "The Cowboys." Dern said that role affected his career for years, and he would get hateful looks from people walking by him on the sidewalk. He said he never got over being labeled "the guy who shot John Wayne in the back."

Dean, you shouldn't have gotten me started....I may be at this all day....

Then there's Laurence Olivier as the Nazi dentist on the run in MARATHON MAN.

For those of you who think Ian McKellan's Magneto is good, I suggest you go rent the modern version of "Richard III" in which he played the title role...the World War II like setting was very cool, and McKellan's Richard makes Magneto look like a beautician...

Richard III may be the best villain ever created, period...chalk that one up to the ol' Bard...

The quiet SS guy in "Raiders of the Lost Ark." Understated menace is so powerful...the scene where he slowly assembles the coathanger is a clasiic of anticipatory terror.

I's also nominate the Queen from Disney's "Snow White"---scared the pants offa me when I was four---and Roger Smith from "Roger and Me."

Don, that's interesting about you finding Roger Smith from "Roger and Me" to be the villain...I came away from that movie believe the villain to be Michael Moore...his subsequent movies have proven my first impression to be the correct one...

"Is it safe?"

I forgot about Marathon Man.

David Blue: Yeah, except you know I really didn't like Hyman Roth. Or Hitler.

The classic in literature is supposed to be Mistah Kurtz from Heart of Darkness. Col. Kurtz from Apocalypse Now, then?

Chris, you are soooooo right about McKellan in "Richard III." Thanks for reminding me.

Also, Rick DeMent just reminded me of Goldfinger: "No, Mr. Bond. I expect you to die."

(and since Magneto comes from comics, let me quickly cite two other great villians: Sir William Gull in Moore & Campbell's "From Hell" and the Joker in Moore & Davis' "The Killing Joke.")

Chris, I admit that it's been awhile since I last saw "Roger and Me," so please refresh my memory. Which one devastated Flint Michigan and flushed half of Gennesee County down an economic sewer: Was it Roger, or Michael?

Anyway, the guy who fired thousands of workers and moved his plants to the third world so he could pay his workers slave wages? THAT'S the villian.

Good villains, particularly Lawrence Olivier in Marathon Man ("is it safe yet"? - creepiest part of that scene was at the end when Olivier looked at the other spy and said "he really doesn't know". Probably set back dentistry 50 years too.

What about Henry Fonda in Once Upon a Time in the West? I remember audiences hated it, cause Fonda always played good guys. I think he was totally believable (particularly when the kid had seen their faces), and overcame the type casting quite successfully.

ID Bill: "David Blue: Yeah, except you know I really didn't like Hyman Roth. Or Hitler."

(nods) Me either.

Though (raising storm shields) the young Leni Reifenstahl was /hot/. And nutty enough to think that perhaps she wasn't really evil, she just didn't quite know what she was "saying" with her art. A bit like Jen (from _Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon_): you keep wanting her to be OK, even though she never gets around to /doing/ anything that would support the idea she's a good person.

(If the idiocy allowed artists is not an excuse, you can pretty much cart the whole of Hollywood away right now.)

Best quote from a villain:

"The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist." -Keyser Soze

Travolta was a great villian in Swordfish.

How about all the bad guys in Fargo?

And Hans Gruber. Definitely Hans Gruber.

Creepiest villain: Robert Mitchum, as the preacher in "Night of the Hunter." Or, alternatively, Robert Mitchum in the original "Cape Fear."

Mr. Frost: "It used to be simple: good on one hand, evil on the other. There was a strugle. And then you people came along - the scientists."

Jeff Goldblum as Mr. Frost, a mass murderer who has video taped himself torturing and killing 24 men, women and children. He's committed to a psychiatric institution because he's obviously criminally insane, yet that's what he wants. The goal of Mr. Frost, who is actually Satan in human form, is to convince the attending psychatrist that he is in fact Satan, that evil is real and exists as something more than a psychosis or mental disorder. The movie is fairly cerebral and Goldblum portrays Satan quite well, much better than Pachino in Devil's Advocate.

Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal the Cannibal, hands down.

Close runners up are the Emperor from RotJ and The Devil in Oh Brother. If we are counting TV, I think Vicious from Cowboy Bebop might be neck and neck with Hannibal Lector.

robert walker as bruno anthony in "Strangers on a Train," hands down. i just love the tennis match, when all the heads are turning to watch the ball, and you just see Bruno's head stone-still watching Guy.

Best B-movie villain. Ernest Borgnine as Shack in "Emperor of the North Pole". This is one of the most underrated movies I have ever seen. Not only is it an excellent piece of Americana, it is a powerful political statement. Set in the great depression, we get a real taste of the psychosis of unfettered capitalism. Unfortunately, to many of the rabid "compassionate conservatives" who visit this blog, old Shack is probably a hero to you guys.

Anyway, the guy who fired thousands of workers and moved his plants to the third world so he could pay his workers slave wages? THAT'S the villian.

Did you buy any of the awful cars they produced? I didn't either. I guess maybe you and I are the real villians. Except maybe we're just consumers, trying to get a good deal, and the former Flint employees need to find jobs they're better at, and the Third World needs a chance to raise their living standards, too. That would all make more sense to me, personally.

I'm surprised no one's mentioned Gary Oldman or Alan Rickman.

Also, Lena Olin was excellent in "Romeo is Bleeding."

Jonathan, Alan Rickman played Hans Gruber in Die Hard, so he has been mentioned. He gets my vote, although there are plenty of good bad ones. Bad good ones?

Romeo is Bleeding was a great movie. Sad ending, even if the poor bastard deserved what he got.

I can't agree on the Roger Smith / Michael Moore debate. One was a bastard greedhead, and the other was a fat bastard greedhead. If you ship jobs overseas, don't be surprised if your head winds up on a pike someday. Ask the Bourbons.
A billionaire is just another head in a basket.

What is this facination of Rosemary's with the Brits? WTF, over?

Another one for ya: Terrence Stamp in Superman II as Commander Zod.

And one for the QOAE: Gary Oldman in True Romance, or the 5th Element.

Like others have said, Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lector never ceases to give me the serious creeps.

The most wickedly funny villain has to be Kevin Kline in "A Fish Called Wanda."

If we are going to nominate Gary Oldman, why not Agent Norman Stansfield from The Professional:

Stansfield: Do you like life, sweetheart?
Mathilda: Yes.
Stansfield: That's good, because I take no pleasure in taking life if it's from a person who doesn't care about it.

Here's a few opinions from my office:

Gerry says: The Blob in "The Blob" It brought tears to his eyes when they freezed it.

Jonesy says: Godzilla in any Godzilla movie - we so want him to win.

Tom Cruise in "Interview the the Vampire."

Godzilla? Godzilla always wins, except in that one stupid American movie. You always fight Godzilla, and you always lose. Them's the rules.
That's worse than rooting for Goliath.

I add a sixth vote for Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter in SOTL.

If you want to talk Star Trek, I submit Christopher Plummer's Shakespeare-quoting Klingon, Chang, from the sixth movie.

I have to disagree with the person who said that the devil from Oh Brother Where Art Thou is a good villan. He's the third best in his movie. Homer Stokes or Big Dan Teague would be a better choice. I find Stokes to be more compelling.

As for my nomination for the Most Compelling Villan I found The Father from The War Zone to be a completly disgusting human being, and about as evil a man as you can find.

Alan Rickmans' Hans Gruber was great, but don't forget his Sheriff of Nottingham (not a great movie, but a great villian turn.

Juliette! Not Christopher Plummer- the man will always be Herr Von Trapp to me! ( I'm sure Rosemary understands).

No one has mentioned Christopher Walken, but from The Deer Hunter, to View to a Kill, to Batman returns, he's a great psychopath. I think it's the blonde, blue-eyed Nazi look that does it.

A look that Herr Von Trapp does not have! Any one care to sing "Edelweiss" with me?

Thought not.

Daniel Day Lewis as Bull "The Butcher" Cutting, he was vastly more compelling than the protagonist.

Give Gary Oldman a part as a villain, and you've got a fantastic villain. His Dr. Smith in "Lost in Space" is what saved that movie from being utter trash.

Also liked the villainous characters in the movie "Shadow of the Vampire" (Willem DaFoe and John Malkovich)

Die Hard 2 had some villains with likable qualities: I liked the line from John Amos (who played the traitrous leader of the Special Forces team sent in to deal with the airport terrorists) before he showed his true colors, when McLain had just apologized to him for thinking he was an a***ole: "Oh, you were right--I'm an a***ole. I'm just *your* kind of a***ole."

Definitely Robert DeNiro in Heat.

Playing a villain, who, frankly, put me in heat.

Thanks David

I thought of some others that I overlooked in my coffee deprived state this morning.

Casper Gutman
"By Gad sir! You are a character!"

Lt. Tom Keefer
"Will you look at the man? He's a Freudian delight; he crawls with clues!"

Angel Eyes
"How's your digestion now?"

Scorpio
"To the City of San Francisco, I will enjoy killing one person every day until you pay me one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000)...."

Don, you got me, Smith did do a lot of crappy things to that town, but the harder question is, what crappy things did that town do to itself? What role did the UAW play in the destruction of Flint? What happened in Flint was a tragedy of the first order, but to simplistically and cynically lay it at the feet of one greedy fool is lying. Roger and Me does not tell the whole story of how things happened the way they happened. Moore saw his opportunity to vilify and crucify one man, and what's worse, he exploited and laughed at the "victims" he said he wanted to help.

Yes, Roger Smith was a small-minded, greedy fool. But I don't know that he was evil.

Don, can you convince me that, after the lies he's told and the mischief he's made, that Michael Moore IS NOT evil?

I can't believe I'm the first to mention three of the all-time great screen villains, and all from the same film:

Charlton Heston as Cardinal Richelieu in The Three Musketeers, followed closely by Faye Dunaway as Milady de Winter and Christopher Lee as Roquefort.

Christopher Walken in Last Man Standing.

"You wouldn't shoot a man in the back, would you?"

Well, Chris, since I'm obviously a fan of Mr. Moore and you think he's a cross between the Antichrist and Himmler I doubt I can convince you he isn't evil. But I will ask you a few questions about him:

How many families has he driven into poverty?
How many children has he denied health care to?
How many of his factories pay slave wages?
How many of his factories leech mercury into the groundwater or pump industrial waste into the air?
How much money does he contribute to the political campaigns of leaders who then eviscerate the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts so he can continue to leech mercury and pump industrial waste without fear of consequences?
Has his products ever been linked to cancer clusters? Or unfair business practices? Has he ever busted a union (or a union member's skull?)

Mr. Moore seeks to "comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable." You see that as evil. I see that as a noble calling.

Plus his jokes are funny. Mostly.

Shocking, No one has mentioned Densel Washington in Training Day. He won an Oscar for that. "King Kong ain't got nothin' on me."

Don Myers,

HA HA HA HA HA Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha. Michael Moore is a good guy. AHAHAHAHAAAAAAaaaaa.

Movie: Prince Humperdinck, The Princess Bride. Duplicitous, slimy, vengeful, short-sighted, cowardly, sneaky, underhanded, and a traitorous bastard.

TV Show: Thanatos, Gargoyles. Controlling, treacherous, and obsessed.

Jack Palance in "Shane"

Kevin Klein in "Wanda"

Linda Blair (while posessed)"The Exorcist"

Robert Shaw in "From Russia With Love"

Oops- here are a few spare eSs- I always seem to leave some out.

SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Although I have to agree with all those who said Hannibal Lector, the one villian I recall on a weekly basis is Hal, the computer, from 2001: Space Oddessy. "Where are you going, Dave?" I think it twice a week. Still get the creeps.

Everytime a seemingly rational person starts whigging out and spouting ridiculous conspiracy theories I hear background music:

"Daisy.....Daisy....."

Again, still get the creeps.

John, excellent call on Robert Mitchum in "Night of the Hunter". I think that was his best film. Remember Shelley Winters, sitting in the car in the river, the water moving her long hair around (and the extra 'smile' in her neck?). Yeesh.

Oh, and good call on HAL Lana.

This was a fun post y'all. Except for the GM bashing crap.

Glen Close - Fatal Attraction.

Ralph Fienes - Schindler's List.

Bette Davis - The Little Foxes.

Jeff Bridges - The Jagged Edge.

Joe Pesci - Good Fellas

How about Robin Williams in One Hour Photo?

That scene where the police find that wall with all the photographs of the husband crossed out was *very* unsettling.

Smeagol/Gollum in The Two Towers and Return of the King

Don't hate me because I'm uncultured:

-Ian McDiarmid as Emperor Palpatine. Ancient evil.

-James Russo as the rapist Joe in Extremities. Craven. Weaselly. Relentless.

-Daveigh Chase as Samara in The Ring. This is probably special effects more than anything, but Samara absolutely creeped me out for days afterward. Even though the story line, etc. made absolutely no sense.

That's right, Michael Moore hasn't put anybody out of work, or denied anyone healthcare, etc.

He also hasn't PRODUCED anything, except for a great deal of hot air. He doesn't create jobs, or wealth.

The policies he stands for and advcates would prevent all of that in the long run.

Aside from all that, Hannibal Lecter was I think more ably portrayed in the Michael Mann version of Red Dragon, "Manhunter," by Brian Cox. The character wasn't as prominent in that film, but his portrayal was totally creepy.

Can't believe no one has mentioned Anthony Perkins' Norman Bates.

Or Paul Reiser in Aliens.

Or Robert Patrick in Terminator 2.

Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange.

DeNiro in Heat was good, but he's been better: Taxi Driver, The Untouchables. His turn as Satan in Angel Heart was fabulous.

Gary Oldman was seriously creepy in Dracula.

Tim Robbins in Arlington Road.

Jeremy Irons in Dead Ringers.

What about women? Sharon Stone was "compelling" in Basic Instinct.

Edward Norton's been pretty villainous in several roles. His first role in Primal Fear set the stage for his later role in The Score.

So many more, no time.

OMG...I can't believe I forgot HAL and Norman Bates! Especially HAL..."I'm sorry, Dave, but I can't do that right now" in that flat monotone always puts a shiver up my timber.

Scanned the entries and saw 2 notable omissions-
1. Longshanks (Patrick McGoohan) in "Braveheart".
2. Amon Goeth (Ralph Fiennes) in "Schindler's List". What a psychopath.

Gene Hackman as Lex Luther

I can't believe I forgot my favorite modern villian - Jet Li in Lethal Weapon 4. That guy kicked ass!

Craig

You didn't notice I posted Ralph Fiennes - I mispelled his name and I could not remember the character's name but nevertheless he wasn't overlooked. A most compelling depiction of evil if I ever saw one. Actually I think he should be ranked number one on any list of really, really horrible evil characters. He lived. He was a real person whether we know his name of not. Unfortunately there was more than one of him in the Nazi era.

Jane: after sending my email, I rescanned and discovered your post- sorry. Fiennes' camp commandant was cold, calculating and aloof... and as you note- was historically based.