Favorite Movie Villain

[dead0man]

I picked ones everybody should know, but there are many many other perfectly good options. 

Vader is what my gut says, but his turn at the end of RotJ makes him less pure evil than some of the others on the list.  Lecter, Bates and Alex are just sick in the head and thus deserving of at least some sympathy.  The witch is pure cartoon evil and Hans is more clever thief with a cold heart than plain evil.  HAL is just a broken supercomputer and isn't really evil either.  Which leaves Mr Potter and Nurse Ratched as probably the most pure evil, but I don't think they make all that great of villains...kind of boring in their dickishness if anything.  I think I'm going to go with Vader, but haven't made my mind up yet.

[Eraserhead]

Dracula (particularly in The Monster Squad!) or The Joker.

Nurse Ratched and Alex DeLarge are my favorites on your list (although one might debate that DeLarge shouldn't be classified as a villain).

[Oldiesfreak1854]

No clue.

[Jerseyrules]

Emperor Palpatine.  Motivated purely by power, power, and more power

[minionofmidas]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRwW08TbwC0

[Spanish Moss]

Other: The Joker from The Dark Knight

His nihilistic tendencies were so vicious he was quite the disturbing character, and how he was portrayed by Heath Ledger was so insanely immaculate that I don't think any fictional villain, ever, will match up to his version of The Joker.

And, as much as I obviously disagree with his nihilism, violence, etc - he makes you think, because he does make an interesting philosophical point.  When talking to Harvey Dent in the hospital scene, he notes how if things like soldiers dying or a gangbanger getting shot happens... nobody freaks, because it's all part of the plan.  But that he threatened to kill the Mayor, that's not part of the plan - and it freaks everyone out.

I actually find a bit of truth in that observation.  One example, sadly, is the Colorado shooting (where the guy who did it said he was the Joker).  The media (as they should have) freaked out, this wasn't supposed to happen.  Yet I see no reporting on the atrocious conditions in diamond mining, sweatshops, economic destitution at the stranglehold of mega-corporations in the third world... those are all normal, continuing things.  But when out-of-the-ordinaries happen... the Colorado shooting, the Haiti earthquake... that's when people care.  Clearly I disagree with how The Joker chooses to respond to that reality, but he makes an interesting point.

A villain who can come off as so chaotically evil, who can also make you honestly think is a well developed, well rounded character.  He'll truly never be beat in this category.

[Niemeyerite]

Mr. Lecter, by far.

[Comrade Funk]

Nurse Ratched is one of the most underrated villains of all time. Sure, she isn't that evil or anything, but she is still a great antagonist.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Man, I was gonna vote Vader, but then I saw Mr. Potter. Who do I choose!?

[Napoleon]

Write in: The Joker from The Dark Knight.

[Jerseyrules]

Man, I was gonna vote Vader, but then I saw Mr. Potter. Who do I choose!?

Emperor Palpatine.  So much cooler.

[Joe Biden 2020]

Other - Andy Griffith - He played the villain in the late 70s/early 80s comedy-western Rustler's Rhapsody.

[Edu]

Do Robert Duvall and Faye Dunaway characters in the movie "Network" qualify? they were pretty huge bastards

Also, from a movie I've seen recently, the bishop character in Fanny and Alexander.

Many I can think of were already mentioned and Vader is my favorite (at least in the first two movies )

[exopolitician]

Darth Vader

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Hans Landa

[FritzMacKenzie]

I find the hillbillies from deliverance as the creepiest villains.

[Eraserhead]

I'm looking at some of my favorite films and I've found some more villains that deserve some discussion imo. Some are iconic, some should be and some are just (occasionally cheesy) personal favorites.

Listed in no particular order:

William "D-FENS" Foster - Falling Down

Chief Blue Meanie  - Yellow Submarine

Luther - The Warriors

Slick & Ivan - Hobo With A Shotgun

Pazuzu - The Exorcist

Jack Torrance - The Shining

Daniel Plainview (debatable villain status)  - There Will Be Blood

Frank Booth - Blue Velvet

Captain Vidal - Pan's Labyrinth

Bill - Kill Bill

Anton Chigurh - No Country For Old Men

Stuntman Mike - Death Proof

Virgil "The Turk" Sollozzo - The Godfather

Noah Cross - Chinatown

Harry Lime - The Third Man

Magneto - The X-Men films

Shang Tsung - Mortal Kombat

Ozymandias - Watchmen

Ra's Al Ghul, The Scarecrow - Batman Begins

Bane - The Dark Knight Rises

The Castevets - Rosemary's Baby

Jareth the Goblin King - Labyrinth

Loki - Thor

Scar - The Lion King

The Creature - The Creature From The Black Lagoon

Calibos, Medusa, The Kraken - Clash of the Titans (original only!)

Khan Noonien Singh - Star Trek II: the Wrath of Khan

Skeletor - Masters of the Universe

M. Bison - Street Fighter

Henry - Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer

[後援会]

Obviously the best villain ever.



Though pretty snazzy too.

[Boris]

Keyser Soze


(Spoiler alert: Although I watched Silence of the Lambs for the first time recently and the means Hannibal Lecter uses to escape from his cell was pretty badass)

[muon2]

When I hear The Who sing "Behind Blue Eyes", I always think of Angel Eyes from The Good the Bad and the Ugly.

But I'm also longtime fan of the Bond movies, and with a crotch-aimed laser and the line "No Mr Bond ... I expect you to die."  I give my prize in the Bond category to Auric Goldfinger.

[Lambsbread]

M. Bison - Street Fighter

YES!
YES!

[Mr. Morden]

Professor Hess, from The American Astronaut.  Gotta respect any villain who sings and dances through the powdered remains of the people he's killed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4NIF5HuiU4

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The character that comes immediately to mind is Mark Binney/Mark Finney/Ray Binney from The Singing Detective... which (of course) is television. Will have to think about this then.

[Dancing with Myself]

My favorite villain of all time was The Joker from The Dark Knight.  Like someone said earlier, everything he said made sense, it was not all random stuff he was doing.

My two after him are ones that have not been mentioned: Michael Myers and Blofeld from the Bond Films. Myers is the original Halloween is the pure definition of evil, no emotions at all and he just kills. Plus in the original there is a whole perverted/voyeuristic side to him in a way that makes him creepy. He just stares at the girls from the windows and wherever he could find.  The sequels kind of loose that side but he's still a killing machine.

Blofeld was just epic, he and Bond were mirror images of each other in their first two films.  Bond liked being the hero,Blofeld liked causing chaos. Donald Pleasance and Telly Savalas's versions were the two best because they both nailed the role, the other two actors never came close.

[Redalgo]

My favorite is Darth Vader if only because I am convinced there is almost invariably some good left in a bloke no matter how corrupted their character becomes. In terms of which villain is most evil I am still undecided. The Joker and Emperor Palpatine are very compelling contestants. On the other hand, for purely the sake of entertainment value it is a toss-up between Dr. Evil and Dark Helmet.