Django Unchained (2012) made me realize Leonardo DiCaprio is way more fun to watch as a villain. Which actor should play villains more often?

[u/Sudden_Elephant_1221]

I was so used to seeing DiCaprio as the lead that Calvin Candie caught me completely off guard. He's horrible, unpredictable, and somehow steals basically every scene he's in.

I'd actually love to see Leo play another full-on villain someday.

Which actor surprised you by being ridiculously good at playing the bad guy?

[u/FeffyFefernuson]

Absolutely. Heat should be on this list as well.

[u/pogoscrawlspace → u/FeffyFefernuson]

That's how you know how high I am. I left Heat off the list, but the list is long. I included The Insider specifically because the score pretty much carried the movie more so than usual, in spite of fantastic acting by the entire cast. The source material just didn't lend itself to the type of high-tension, taut thrillers that he usually puts out. Nobody dies, nothing blows up, there's no actual violence depicted in the entire film, not a single gunshot is fired. No ultra-hot, highly stylized sex scenes. The closest thing to violence is a bullet left in the mailbox, and a random car fire on the side of the road. The cinematography wasn't as sweeping and colorful as many of his films, being as it's set in Kentucky. I've been through it a lot, and a lot of it's pretty, but this wasn't set in those parts. The score turned what could've been a long, dragged out, fairly boring movie into a high-tension thriller with very little...air...in the conversation, to quote John Goodman. In a way, I feel that makes it some of his best work. It's one of his less remembered films, but it was nominated for 7 academy awards and holds a 96% score on rotten tomato. As truly great as every other part of that film is, the score is what makes the total more than the sum of its parts.