Best Films That Make the Villain the Main Character

Some of the most gripping films place the audience inside the mind of the person causing the chaos. Rather than following a hero who defeats evil, these stories show how ambition, obsession, fear or resentment can turn a character into the villain. Joker follows Arthur Fleck’s painful descent into Gotham’s most notorious criminal. American Psycho uses Patrick Bateman’s double life to satirise wealth and excess, while Nightcrawler shows how Lou Bloom’s ruthless ambition corrupts his pursuit of success. We Need to Talk About Kevin takes a different route by exploring the aftermath of a young man’s disturbing actions through his mother’s eyes. More filmmakers, including those in Nollywood, are also embracing morally complex characters shaped by revenge, corruption and the hunger for power. These films are memorable because they deny viewers an easy moral escape. They make us understand characters we would normally condemn, then leave us unsettled by how human their reasoning can feel.

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