evil protagonists?

Randall_Oelerich

Randall_Oelerich

Veteran
Can horror stories have an evil protagonist, one that kills off victims, walks away at the end of the story without getting caught? Examples from film?
 
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You have seen the Saw movies, haven't you?...I guess that's not really a protagonist...Maybe the showtime series Dexter?
 
Saw one Saw, one Dexter, was not my cup of tea. But I get the point, a protagonist can be villainous, especially Dexter in that he killed bad guys.

Batutta said:
You have seen the Saw movies, haven't you?...I guess that's not really a protagonist...Maybe the showtime series Dexter?
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Maybe "Let the Right One In"?
Or "Interview with a Vampire"?
It almost seems to me that the profile you are describing suits best as a vampire or maybe a frankenstein story. Reason could be that they were in fact a victim and can't help what they have become or do so the audience can relate in some way and be forgiving. Not sure just thinking here.
 
The protagonist doesn't need to be a "hero" -- the protagonist is the one whose story we're following, the one we're invested in seeing whether they accomplish their goals. Those goals don't have to be "heroic" by some objective standard, they just have to be the culmination of the protagonist's quest.

Example: let's take a story about a hiker in the woods, stumbles through some bushes, and runs into a bear, and the bear eats him.

From the hiker's perspective, this could be a tragedy and the bear is a villain. The hiker was on a hunting trip and got lost in the woods, his cell phone battery is dead, he's stumbling and scratched up and lonely and desperate, he sees daylight and he makes a desperate dash for it and bursts through some bushes and runs into a bear... and then he gets mauled and dies.

But tell the story from the bear's perspective: mama bear's husband has been shot and killed by a hunter. She tries to stay in the den to protect her cubs, but she's starving and so are they. Driven to desperation by starvation, she goes foraging, leaving her cubs unprotected and in danger. She fails to find anything. She decides to go back and die with her cubs, curled up in their den. On the way back, some prey comes stumbling through the bushes and lands pretty much in her lap -- and, get this, it's the same rotten hunter who shot her husband! Salvation is delivered, she drags the food back to her cubs and all is saved.

It's all a matter of perspective, and which character you're invested in, and whether you understand and convey why they want what they want, in such a way as that the audience cares whether they get it or not.
 
Barry_Green said:
The protagonist doesn't need to be a "hero" -- the protagonist is the one whose story we're following, the one we're invested in seeing whether they accomplish their goals. Those goals don't have to be "heroic" by some objective standard, they just have to be the culmination of the protagonist's quest.
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Hmm well I've always understood this description as the pivotal character and the protagonist is the good guy or hero, while the antagonist is the bad guy.

So having a central character as the antagonist has been done. In The Ladykillers the Professor is our pivotal character while being the antagonist. So a horror movies I think the approach of a false protagonist is used more often. But having the antagonist being the central character from the start I think of vampires for some reason but there is of course Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, and Jason which could be argued as the central character.

EDIT: But of course you were asking if there is an evil protagonist so that might just depend on the view of the audience and the world the central character is in. Usually it is just the false protagonist trick done in movies that I can think of. I'd be interested to see if there are any examples too.
 
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I think J.R. Hudson's example of Hannibal is right. He was evil but he was also helping Clarice.
 
The only movie I can think of that truly has an evil person as the protagonist and is told from his point of view is Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer.
 
Nitsuj said:
Hmm well I've always understood this description as the pivotal character and the protagonist is the good guy or hero, while the antagonist is the bad guy.

So having a central character as the antagonist has been done. In The Ladykillers the Professor is our pivotal character while being the antagonist. So a horror movies I think the approach of a false protagonist is used more often. But having the antagonist being the central character from the start I think of vampires for some reason but there is of course Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, and Jason which could be argued as the central character.
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I think the equation of 'protagonist == hero == good guy (white hat and all)' is not correct.

This leads to all kinds of 'problems'.

For example, any film about 'Hitler', "Stalin", and other similar types, necessarily have the 'good guys' as the antagonist(s).

Hence the 'protagonist' is the central figure who has goals, and for whom there are oppositional forces. If those oppositional forces are in the form of humans, those are 'antagonists'... if those oppositional forces are 'things of nature, not human', well they are 'things of nature in opposition'...

In addition, there may be a condition of agency. Both protagonist and antagonist have some sense of 'agency', that is they have the ability to choose to act, and as the film unfolds, they make that choice for action one way or another. Even 'not opposing' is an action... and requires a choice.

In the case of 'things of nature', generally speaking, unless one is talking about polytheistic gods incorporated into 'things' (or poltergeist...), things of nature typically do not have the quality of 'choose to act'.

So in determining who is the "protagonist", who is the "antagonist", one has to ask, who is the film about.

In a rom-com it is perhaps difficult to determin who is the protagonist, who is the antagonist... the couple aren't married yet, so definitely the antagonist hasn't been identified...

In old style westerns... it was easy... the guy in the white hat... then there's Paladin... black outfitted good guy... in "Have Gun -- Will Travel" (always wanted one of those Paladin holsters with the little Knight chess piece when I was a kid... no stinking white hat and Red Ryder for me...)

BooneAsPaladin.jpg
 
Okay sure but just for terms I was taught in my screenwriting classes that protagonists were the good guys/hero and antagonists where the bad guys/villians or evil. Usually the protagonist was the central character but not always. When somebody asks if there is an evil protagonist movie I immediately think in those terms because of the word evil. But they are just terms to describe the idea so others will know what you are talking about. So the term protagonist can mean central character and antagonist opposing character but it can also mean bad and good. Least that is how I remember it. But then again the Professor was always talking about the battle between good vs evil, loved classical film, and thought Pulp Fiction wasn't good.
 
Nitsuj said:
Okay sure but just for terms I was taught in my screenwriting classes that protagonists were the good guys/hero and antagonists where the bad guys/villians or evil. Usually the protagonist was the central character but not always. When somebody asks if there is an evil protagonist movie I immediately think in those terms because of the word evil. But they are just terms to describe the idea so others will know what you are talking about. So the term protagonist can mean central character and antagonist opposing character but it can also mean bad and good. Least that is how I remember it. But then again the Professor was always talking about the battle between good vs evil, loved classical film, and thought Pulp Fiction wasn't good.
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Of course the words derive from ancient origins, and so, have changed/adapted over the millennia... While in the development of the theater the 'first on stage', may have been the hero/goodguy/maincharacter, in the modern era 'who the film is about', determines who a critic would call 'the protagonist'.

In the classic case, "Psycho"(1960) initially everthing points to Marion as 'the Protagonist'... then she's dispatched... and the real protagonist comes forward... and not a very nice, nor heroic one at that... so the film wasn't about Marion, the money she absconded with... Marion was a McGuffin at best... towards the end of the film, you didn't give a hoot about Marion, the money, the other victims... what was the focus was who the hell was in the upstairs bedroom...

Given that example, I don't know how a Film professor would come to a conclusion that Bates is something other than the film's central character, and as such, is the film's protagonist.
 
The protagonist is the person you're following, the one who moves the story forward. The antagonist is the one who opposes the protagonist.

Good and evil are relative, as in the bear example -- it depends on whose interests we are invested in.

Star Wars 4-6, for example, has Luke Skywalker as its protagonist, and Darth Vader as its villain. But in Star Wars 1-3, Darth Vader (Anakin) is the protagonist.
 
Be careful to tread these waters because you have to be able to pull it off. It's not easy to make a spiteful character the one we want to watch.

"Psycho" is the protag because once he kills the blonde in the shower, we have no one else we are invested in. We are left to follow him.
 
Okay I went in to look at some old books of mine and it looks like we are all right about the protagonist definition. But that is getting off topic now.

Yeah I agree about a spiteful character not being appealing to watch. I for one hated American Psycho. I just didn't want to go there with that character but I guess some people did. I can see the desire to go that way but it's almost to me like killing the dog. You never kill the dog. Any movie that kills the dog I am one of those that gets turned off. I hate downer endings. I watched a movie recently with a downer ending, what was it... Will Smith... Oh 7 Pounds. Hated it. Just my personal taste I guess. So going the route of the evil protagonist could easily turn off your audience.
 
Charli said:
Be careful to tread these waters because you have to be able to pull it off. It's not easy to make a spiteful character the one we want to watch.

"Psycho" is the protag because once he kills the blonde in the shower, we have no one else we are invested in. We are left to follow him.
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In the case of "Psych"(1960) reading the IMDB trivia, apparently Hitchcock did a certain amount of 'disinformation' media campaigning, trying to keep the viewing public away from who was doing what, including apparently fake announcements of casting for the Mrs. Bates role, as well as a fake chair for her on set.

In the case of Marion, apparently he had wardrobe changes to match her 'descent' from grace, so as to prep the audience for her dispatch, or at least not to garner any sympathy for her, such that she could be dispatched. The trivia (I'll have to watch it again to confirm these...) indicated that she appears in 'white' before stealing the money, and has 'black' accessories after the theft.

As a totally off-topic note that... the scriptwriter for "Psycho" was Joseph Stefano... an italian man... his mannerisms and vocal intonation were used by Jim Carrey in "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events"(2004) during the "Snake House" sequence, including using a large knife to keep the door from being slammed in his face, and at the same time threatening the children.
 
Nitsuj said:
Okay I went in to look at some old books of mine and it looks like we are all right about the protagonist definition. But that is getting off topic now.

Yeah I agree about a spiteful character not being appealing to watch. I for one hated American Psycho. I just didn't want to go there with that character but I guess some people did. I can see the desire to go that way but it's almost to me like killing the dog. You never kill the dog. Any movie that kills the dog I am one of those that gets turned off.
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"Old Yeller"(1957)...

I'd recommend "What Just Happened"(2008)... 'the 'film in a film'' has the dog being shot, the 'studio demanding a recut of the film', etc...
 
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