Great characters certainly know how to make an entrance. First impressions are absurdly important, and some of cinema’s most memorable characters show from moment one that they’re going to sear their way into public consciousness one way or another, especially villains. How many great villains have been introduced doing something horrific? Or even more terrifying, benign? The list of great villain introduction scenes is long, but today we’re going to look at some of the best ones.
6Raoul Silva - Skyfall
James Bond has been captured and tied to a chair in a computer room. An elevator comes down. Out of it steps a man who tells a story about rats infesting a small island and his grandmother’s method of getting rid of them, which involves making a trap with coconut and an oil drum. It’s an effective method, since the rats in the oil drum start to eat each other until there are only two left. So what happens to those last two? They’re released into the wild with their nature completely altered. It’s clear the story about the last two rats is about Silva and Bond.Skyfallhas perhaps thebest cinematography of any James Bond film, and it’s used to great effectiveness here. Silva is dead center in the frame the entire time as he gets closer and closer to Bond, ending with a close-up as he says, “Now they only eat rat.” All of this is done in one take, which is all the more impressive.
5Harry Lime - The Third Man
The Third Manwas ranked by theBritish Film Institute as the Greatest British Film of All Timein 1999, a title it would still hold today. What makes it more impressive is the story is about an American looking for another American in post-World War II Vienna, when the city was still divided among the Allied Powers. One of those Americans is Harry Lime, played by Orson Welles in perhaps his second-best role ever. As the movie begins, the American looking for him, western novelist Holly Martins, assumes Lime is dead. That is soon revealed not to be the case. Lime is alive, stealing penicillin, and selling it on the black market.
While walking through the streets one night, Martins sees someone watching him through a doorway. He calls out to the watcher, demanding he reveal himself. A light reveals the watcher’s face… and it’s Lime, who has a very amused smile, almost as if he finds the whole situation hilarious. The lights go out and Lime disappears. It’s a very quick reveal, but it definitely leaves an impact. The almost jovial score playing when we see Lime just makes it a little better.
Related:Here’s 10 of Quentin Tarantino’s Best Movie Characters, Ranked
4Hans Landa - Inglourious Basterds
Never has a simple chat over a glass of milk been so nerve-wracking.The opening scene ofInglourious Basterdssees SS Colonel Hans Landa visit a French farmer who is suspected of hiding Jewish refugees. Landa’s very pleasant throughout most of the conversation, which makes him an even more unnerving villain. He even compliments the farmer a few times. Starting in French, the conversation quickly turns to English, which there is a very good reason for. The refugees hiding under the floorboards (which Landa probably knew were there before he sat down) can’t understand English. It’s a masterclass of an interrogation scene and shows just how clever and cunning Landa is. Christoph Waltz won a well-deserved Oscar for his performance, and it’s easy to see why when he gets such an incredible opening scene to work with.
3Frank - Once Upon A Time In The West
Admittedly,casting plays a big part in why this introductionis so shockingly effective. Before the reveal of who plays Frank, we see his gang massacre the McBain family at their home, with only their young son surviving to see the gang emerge from the bushes in ominous fashion. The camera pans to reveal the face of Frank, the gang’s leader… and it’s Henry Fonda! To make it more unsettling, when one of the gang members asks “What do we with this one, Frank?” Frank responds, that since the gang member mentioned his name, they have to shoot the child, which Frank does.
What makes this such a powerful reveal is the fact that it’s Henry Fonda, who had played mostly heroic characters before this. To put in context how shocking this was, take everything we just said about Frank, but replace “Henry Fonda” with “Tom Hanks.” Imagine how big a shock it would be if we saw Tom Hanks shoot a child in cold blood. Fonda actually does it with a smile on his face, too. Now that’s how you introduce a terrifying villain.
2The Shark - Jaws
Steven Spielberg wanted to show the shark a lot more than he did, but the legendary mechanical problems of the shark forced him to get creative…and create one of the most memorable and terrifying scenes ever. A young woman named Chrissie goes skinny-dipping in the water, unaware that something is coming right for her. At first, she feels a small jerk, then a bigger one as she’d thrashed around, screaming for help. She’s dragged underwater and… silence. True, we never actually see the shark during this, but that just makes it even more terrifying. No matter how you look at it, this is a great introduction to one of the best movie monsters ever.
Related:How Jaws Established Spielberg as the Future of Filmmaking
1Darth Vader - Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
A vicious battle between two groups of soldiers takes place in the hallway of a spaceship. Blaster fire flies, soldiers fall, smoke fills the halls. Out of the smoke steps… the most iconic villain in sci-fi movie history. With his incredible design, that scary breathing as he walks through the ship, Darth Vader makes one heck of an introduction. We see him a few shots later, interrogating a captured Rebel soldier,where we hear James Earl Jones' booming voice for the first time. Menacing, powerful, intimidating, all of this radiates just from him walking down a hallway. There’s no doubt about it. Darth Vader has one of, if not the best, villain introduction scenes in movie history.
