Need help with the look of a villian

[Trevor Trombley]

I'm writing a feature, and I want the main villain to be very 3 dimensional.

But I'm also not sure about his look. I want to be as realistic as possible but at the same time set him apart from other villains.

Think Ralph Feines character in Shindlers List, mixed with the emperor from Star wars. He is a man who has lived for a thousand years, and believes himself to be a self proclaimed god, ruling the land with fear, yet compassion.

Now I'm not sure if i should have him wear elaborate suits with jewels, or have him more subdued. (think the devil as portrayed in Mel Gibsons the passion of the Christ.)

The main thing I'm trying to achieve with this script is to handle it as real as possible.

Trevor.

[Rob Lohman]

First: I moved your thread to the more approriate forum (DV for
the masses is about showcasing your work) and renamed the
thread to indicate your problem. A lot of people do NOT check
threads with "I need help" etc. Use an interesting title to get
their attention!

If you want to be realistic you can't go over the top. Some villians
might always dress up or wear a certain type of cloths. I'd say
the best thing you can do is have an actor that has a certain
radiation or (natural) presense which easily sets him or her asside
from a crowd. I'm not suggesting to cast a cliche "head" look kind
of person.

Just to give you an example. If your main villian is in a pretty old
guy who has been running a crime organization for a long time he
might have the wrinkly face with a few scars on it for example.
This will instantly identify him in a crowd of younger people who
he might have hired to do the "dirty" work. You get the idea?

[Jaime Valles]

I agree with Rob... less is more. He doesn't need yellow cat-eyes and a forked tongue to look evil. Actions speak louder than words. If you have the villain, I don't know, kill a puppy in the first ten minutes, the audience will love to hate him.

I think simple is good (and also less expensive) when it comes to costumes anyways.

Villains are typically well dressed, well groomed, and very suave.

EDIT: Above all else, the villain HAS to think he's doing the right thing. They're rarely just "evil", they're either misguided, or psychotic, but they always think their actions are completely justifiable. Greed, lust, envy... those will make it seem more three-dimensional.

[Rob Belics]

Jaime hit the nail on the head but my question is: is the script done?

As a writer it helps to be able to visualize your character but how he looks can change during the course of writing. Some characters may even get eliminated by the time the script is done!

Make sure your not letting character descriptions get in the way of writing the story or, in my case, let description be used as an excuse not to write.

[Bill Pryor]

I agree about normalcy of the look of the evil dude. Look at modern day serial killers. Jeffry Dahmer looked like neoconservative Republican. Ted Bundy looked like a well dressed IBM salesman. Robinson, the sadomasochistic serial killer in Kansas looked like a chief financial officer of a big company. The onlyl serial killer I can think of who looked like a wacko was Bob Berdella, the Kansas City serial killer who tortured and killed young men. And even he didn't look like he was all that evil, just a bit weird. I think you can the feeling of real evil through a normal look more so than the usual cliches...depending, of course, on the actor and the script.

[Keith Loh]

It would help to know what the story is...

[Imran Zaidi]

You could take a page from Disney and most other animated cartoons - the villains always have English or foreign accents, the comic relief or general idiot characters always have some odd foreign accent, and the purehearted and good characters have plain vanilla American youthful accents. Even if they're of a different ethnicity (i.e., Aladdin, Mulan, Jungle Book, etc).




(Tongue in cheek, in case anyone's wondering - my point is to just avoid cliches and other things that hint to your character's nature - let their actions speak louder than their clothes, or their accent.)

Also, remember, people don't always do what they say they're going to do. A sure-fire way to add depth to a character is to have them react in ways that don't necessarily correspond to what they say, but rather to how they might be on the inside. Real humans are full of contradictions...

[Keith Loh]

Imran, that's one of the things I like about TV's "24". It has all those stereotypes but by the end of the season, they play with your understanding of the cliched tropes to misdirect you.

[Trevor Trombley]

My story is set in a post apocalyptic future world where demons, vampires, werewolves etc... thrive.

It's kinda like Vampire hunter D, or that soon to be released Van helsing, without the cheesy one liners, or other genre cliches that make films of its ilk campy, and unrealistic.

The twist to the story is that none of these supernatural creatures are supernatural. They are a product of hundreds of years of evolution, mutation, and genetic engineering.

Take the vampire for instance. Merely a human engineered to have ever lasting life and rejenerative abilities, but something happened during the Genesis of such a creature, and it was created with an allergy to the sun, and a thirst for blood.

When the world went to hell, and the technologically advanced superstructure fell, mankind reverted back to the dark ages, while the genetically advanced beings, as well as the mutations thrived in this new world. Religion was embraced, and the old myths about vampires, werewolves, and other Incubi, were reastablished.......Have a loved one who is possesed by the devil? Merely a parasite that gives it's host those characteristics. Zombies out in the woods? Just a virus similar to the one in 28 days later that causes men to go crazy.

Will crosses, garlic, holy water stop these creatures of the night? Not likely, but like any religion the faith that these followers have in their use, fuels the myth.

Which brings us to the main antagonist. He's lived for 1000 years, knows what he is, but that madness has made him a self proclaimed god among the humans. But like any god, he can be vengefull, yet compassionate. After all, the shepard must protect his flock before the massacre.

I want to establish that this is a very real world, with real people....no flashy special FX, no snappy one liners. Real people who have family's who can love hate and die.

So what do you think?

[Keith Loh]

Trevor that sounds interesting. If I were you I would push the religious, new society angle. If the antagonist is like a god, then I would make him extemporous. Very used to wielding great power and making decisions of life over death. But every villain needs to have a vulnerable side, a fault or something in their past that cracks their facade of invulnerability. In really bad stories, the only way the hero can defeat such a villain is when the hero quests to find a sacred weapon. Even worse, the hero is a fated "The One" who magically is the only person who can defeat the villain. I hate those stories. Please avoid those cliches. Instead, perhaps the villain has a character flaw or even the briefest humanity that not only makes him vulnerable, but also makes him even somewhat sympathetic. In "Blade II", the main baddie (not the head of the vampire nation, but his son) has a bit of that pathetic nature in that he used to be a pure being but was mutated into something that made him hate himself and those who did the work on him. Perhaps your villain, because of his supreme power, has some kind of self doubt, some kind of need that makes him want to come down from his position of power and therefore puts him within reach of the heroes.

[Trevor Trombley]

One of his faults is that he has lived for a 1000 years, this has given him a complex where he feels invulnerable. The cattle he looks over are but slaves, and could never oppose him, but they rise up, and it is his underestimation of them that is his downfall.

There are other faults, but I have yet to develop them.

Trevor

[Keith Loh]

Hubris certainly is a universal fault with villains. But I think you can go one further. The problem is that almost all villains seem to have that. On TV, "Stargate" makes a lot of fun with that because all of the baddies there are given to making speeches down to the moment when they are gunned down. So, it's quite a cliche.

[Trevor Trombley]

Hey Keith, you seem to know a thing or two about script writing. If you'd like to know more about the plot, I'd be happy to discuss it with you.

Your advice and comments could be a great help.

Trevor T

[Rob Lohman]

I'd just like to say it sounds quite interesting! Nice story Trevor.
Good luck with your efforts!

[Keith Loh]

<<<-- Originally posted by Trevor Trombley : Hey Keith, you seem to know a thing or two about script writing. If you'd like to know more about the plot, I'd be happy to discuss it with you.
Trevor T -->>>

Trevor, I responded to you in an email.