13 Most Iconic Villains in Horror History

"Every puzzle has its pieces."

The directorial debut from filmmaker James Wan, this psychological thriller comes from the first screenplay by actor Leigh Whannell, who also stars. Whannell plays Adam, one of two men chained up in a mysterious chamber. The other, Dr. Gordon (Cary Elwes), like Adam, has no idea how either of them got there. Neither of them are led to feel optimistic by the man lying between them dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Together, Adam and Dr. Gordon attempt to piece together what has happened to them and who the sadistic madman behind their imprisonment is. Also starring Danny Glover and Monica Potter, Saw premiered at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival.

Review
The movie is outstanding in many ways. The concept was just darn good. Its not your average slasher, run-here-scream-there film, it has more sense and they put more meaning to it. The cast, though its the first time that I've seen them, were great too. Adam's agonizing scream at the end has had me sleepless nights and bad dreams. And its also the first time that I felt sympathy to the villain. He don't kill people for nothing. He has a reason. Its not just some big guy who slashes people just because they trespassed his territory or something. Jigsaw kills people who don't appreciate life, the ones who don't deserve it.

"Don't Answer The Phone. Don't Open The Door. Don't Try To Escape."

A psychopathic serial killer is stalking a group of teens just like in the movies!

REVIEW
Sharp, witty horror film is sure to score big points for fans of the genre. In a small California town where nothing ever seems to happen, a brutal serial killer begins to target high school teenagers. Not only are the killings patterned after popular horror movies, but they also seem to center around one student in particular (Campbell) whose mother was tragically killed years earlier. Sharp, effectively-made thriller with violence, suspense, and clever in-jokes for die hard horror movie fans. An attractive young cast, good direction, and a script full of surprises make this one far better than the usual teen slasher nonsense.

"He Came As The Caretaker, But This Hotel Had Its Own Guardians - Who'd Been There A Long Time"



"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" -- or, rather, a homicidal boy in Stanley Kubrick's eerie 1980 adaptation of Stephen King's horror novel. With wife Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and psychic son Danny (Danny Lloyd) in tow, frustrated writer Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) takes a job as the winter caretaker at the opulently ominous, mountain-locked Overlook Hotel so that he can write in peace. Before the Overlook is vacated for the Torrances, the manager (Barry Nelson) informs Jack that a previous caretaker went crazy and slaughtered his family; Jack thinks it's no problem, but Danny's "shining" hints otherwise. Settling into their routine, Danny cruises through the empty corridors on his Big Wheel and plays in the topiary maze with Wendy, while Jack sets up shop in a cavernous lounge with strict orders not to be disturbed. Danny's alter ego, "Tony," however, starts warning of "redrum" as Danny is plagued by more blood-soaked visions of the past, and a blocked Jack starts visiting the hotel bar for a few visions of his own. Frightened by her husband's behavior and Danny's visit to the forbidding Room 237, Wendy soon discovers what Jack has really been doing in his study all day, and what the hotel has done to Jack.



Review

Holy fishpaste. That's all I can say after watching "The Shining". This is perhaps Kubrick's best work ever, even toppling my previous Kubrick fave 'Full Metal Jacket'.

What I liked about the film is that Stanley Kubrick delved in the evil-ness of one man and what isolation can really do to you. Isolation, loneliness, the sense of not failing and doing and achieving what is given to you no matter what the cost is, it is all here.

So, the film is about this family going up in this hotel located in the most isolated of all places and they are given the task of caretaking the hotel during the winter season. Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) is a former schoolteacher turned writer and he brings his family, little Danny boy, his son and his wife Wendy.

As the months pass, strange things starts to happen, ghosts appear here and there, things start to move on its own and the walls starts to bleed (well, not really but you get my point) but the real kicker is, as the months pass in this shithole of a hotel, good olde Jack starts turning into a nuthouse. The Overlook (the hotel) starts talking to him about stuff and whatnot and it made the screws in his head loosen. And as he flies closer and closer into the cuckoo's nest, his wife and kid cannot be more eager to get the hell out of the place. Little Danny boy starts to "shine" (its this ESP thing where you can see shit you're not supposed to see) and he has this vision of two little girls who was murdered by their father in the hotel (who by the way shits on the well-dwelling, long-haired little girl on so many levels, those two girls are the scariest thing I saw. Ever.)

Wife and kid wants to get the fuck outta there but good old Jacky wants to stay. He wants to fulfill the task given to him and that is to take care of the place no matter what. The Overlook tells good old Jack to "correct" his wife and kid and he must accomplish the "correcting" task no matter what. For those of you who still don't know what "correcting" is, it means "kill those bitches".

So, yeah, good old Jack completely turned into an axe-wielding maniac and goes "Here's Johnny!" on his wife and he starts chasing his family all around the hotel. I will not delve deeper into this part because I want you to watch it on your own. Trust me, you wouldn't want me spoiling the best ending ever. Ever. And if I say the best ending ever I mean the most mind twisting, most mind bending and the most shocking ending you will ever see.

I was like "What the shit? Why is he in the picture? HUH?". I didn't get the ending at first but thanks to the wonders of the internet, I researched what really happened in the end. Now, I understand. It was a hidden twist, a metaphorical twist and a twist of all twists.

I gotta give it to Stanley Kubrick, he has created a horror masterpiece of multiple layers. You think you got it all mapped out until the end but then, once you reach the ending, you realize that the director was going in a different way. You can see, but you don't observe. He puts numerical references, intentional continuities and clues that makes Dan Brown run for his money.

Jack Nicholson on the other hand, gives off one of the creepiest performances ever in cinema history. His villainy factor is in par with Anthony Hopkins and Christopher Lee. To be honest, he is even scarier than the ghosts! He has created a creepy character that will not be forgotten.

So I suggest you get off your high horse and if you have not seen this film, you are missing out a lot. Very truly uberly highly recommended.

"I think I must have one of those faces you can't help believing."

A young woman steals $40,000 from her employer's client, and subsequently encounters a young motel proprietor too long under the domination of his mother.

REVIEW
The granddaddy of all slasher films and serial killers, this Alfred Hitchcock classic defined the post-Cold War horror film for generations to come in this rather simple storyline: bank employee Marion Crane (Leigh) absconds with a client's bankroll and winds up the proverbial fly in the spider's parlor when she winds up in the middle-of- nowhere's Bates Motel, and mama's boy Norman Bates (Perkins in his iconic role) proving to be more than meets the eye. The perfectly edited shower scene (the blade never pierces the flesh!) by Geroge Tomasini, Bernard Herrmann's screeching violins score and the all-together ookie finale are American classics in every sense of the word. Best line: "Mother isn't , what's the term? Herself today".

"You're gonna need a bigger boat."

When a gigantic great white shark begins to menace the small island community of Amity, a police chief, a marine scientist and grizzled fisherman set out to stop it.

REVIEW
One of the most successful and terrifying American classics that single-handedly coined the phrase "blockbuster" and did for swimming what "Psycho" did for taking a shower. Picturesque summer resort community Amity Beach is suddenly turned into a great white shark's feeding buffet with only source of reason Sheriff Martin Brody (Scheider) wanting to close down the beach prior to the profitable Fourth of July with the aid of shark scientist Matt Hooper (Dreyfuss) and salty shark hunter Quint (Shaw) on one of cinema's most memorable journeys into fear. Masterfully directed by a young punk named Steven Spielberg in his big-screen sophomoric turn helming the first of many successes in Hollywood. Based on Peter Benchley's best-seller, the storyline hooks you from its horrifying opening moments to its breath-taking finale of pure adrenalined, visceral terror. Oscar-winning and memorable soundtrack ("dumdumdumdum") by John Williams and production design Academy Award recipient for its genuinely scary and realistic shark nicknamed "Bruce" by the film's crew after Spielberg's lawyer. Classic line: "You're gonna need a bigger boat" by Scheider with a Pall-Mall doing a mad, dry-lipped jig on his close encounter for the very first time with the shark.

"The trick was to stay alive."

A psychotic murderer institutionalized since childhood escapes on a mindless rampage while his doctor chases him through the streets.

REVIEW
John Carpenter's 1978 classic is quite possibly the most perfectly crafted horror movie of all time. An evolutionary eating machine, this movie glides along like the shark from Jaws. The plot is simple: An escaped mental patient who murdered his sister when he was six years old returns to his hometown and stalks a teen babysitter and her friends on Halloween night. Mayhem ensues.

The film relies on a sense of creeping dread to disturb and unnerve the audience in a for the first three quarters of the film before embarking on a sudden and thrilling descent into terror. The slow burn tempo of most of the film may seem a bit too wordy for todays MTV audience, accustomed to quick-cut editing and pyrotechnic special effects. But the contrast in flow is exactly what makes the sudden attacks of the killer so much more jarring.

On a specific level, the movie works because of John Carpenter's total mastery of suspense concepts. Alfred Hitchcock was obviously a big influence, as well as some Italian directors like Dario Argento I believe. Dean Cundey's cinematography is fantastic. His use of shadows, and ability to make you focus on one part of the screen while subliminal action takes place in another, is key to the movies effectiveness. And John Carpenter's immortal score goes almost without mentioning, it's influence is engrained in our very pop culture.

The film also works in large part because of it's vague nature. It takes place in any-town USA, basically. The protagonist is meant to be as vulnerable and normal a girl as you can imagine. Even the killer's mask was meant to look like dime-store cheap-o, that theoretically hundreds of people could be wearing; and especially on Halloween (which, incidentally used to be a holiday of some importance..). It's the kind of situation, that with the stars aligned just right, could conceivably happen.

The film taps into our inner fears about reality, fate, and our own mortality. It can hit a nerve with anyone, of any age, living anywhere in the world. And it is still unmatched in it's ability to give you that uneasy feeling of seemingly irrational fear, as you watch it all alone, on a dark and stormy night.

"Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Brilliant. Cunning. Psychotic. In his mind lies the clue to a ruthless killer. - Clarice Starling, FBI. Brilliant. Vulnerable. Alone. She must trust him to stop the killer."

In this multiple Oscar-winning thriller, Jodie Foster stars as Clarice Starling, a top student at the FBI's training academy whose shrewd analyses of serial killers lands her a special assignment: the FBI is investigating a vicious murderer nicknamed Buffalo Bill, who kills young women and then removes the skin from their bodies. Jack Crawford (Scott Glenn) wants Clarice to interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins), a brilliant psychiatrist who is also a violent psychopath, serving life behind bars for various acts of murder and cannibalism. Crawford believes that Lecter may have insight into this case and that Starling, as an attractive young woman, may be just the bait to draw him out. Lecter does indeed know something of Buffalo Bill, but his information comes with a price: in exchange for telling what he knows, he wants to be housed in a more comfortable facility. More important, he wants to speak with Clarice about her past. He skillfully digs into her psyche, forcing her to reveal her innermost traumas and putting her in a position of vulnerability when she can least afford to be weak. The film mingles the horrors of criminal acts with the psychological horrors of Lecter's slow-motion interrogation of Clarice and of her memories that emerge from it.

Review
This movie sets the bar for the genre - intelligent, psychological thrillers. Both Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster give wonderful performances, although Foster's adopted accent can be grating. Definitely a must-see; I consider it a modern classic. The plot isn't terribly complicated, but still engrossing, and the character portrayal is phenomenal. Both Clarice Starling's (Foster) and Hannibal Lecter's (Hopkins) characters are very well developed, and the movie just gets better the more times you see it, as you pick up on the details. It is a little bloody in parts, but not obscenely so. And if you just can't get enough, watch Red Dragon, Hannibal and the prequel too (though they're not quite as good as Silence of the Lambs).