One thing that makes Hindi Movies stand out is its amazingly eccentric and ironically loveable bad guys. Dark yet funnily endearing is the best way I can describe them... it is not the perfect description but it is hard to put into words why there are so likeable! From KN Singh in the early 50s to Prakash Raj currently, we have had some phenomenal villains who have developed their own entertaining styles. Hindi movies have had a predominant culture of having entertaining and interesting personalities of bad guys - a culture that has only started to crumble recently. Bad guys in Hollywood too have been eccentric and entertaining (Christopher Walken, Jack Nicholson) but not to the dark yet funnily endearing levels of Hindi movie bad guys. It is because their evilness is usually over-the-top.
I have listed my favourite top 15 villains. With them in the movie, you do not need a comedian for comic relief. Their evilness is quite entertaining because of their over-acting and staying within the energetic eccentricity of their characters.
Here's my list of top 15 bad guys:
15. Rehman the passively entitled and 14. Dalip Tahil the actively entitled
I combined these two as they have a similar theme. Rehman always plays a filthy rich guy and has an entitled aura surrounding him. This is best exemplified by how he (Chinai Seth) kills a man in the movie Waqt (1964) and acts as if it is a crime to accuse a reputable (rich) man like him. Dalip Tahil's filthy rich characters are more explicit in this regard. He usually plays characters that boast about being unscrupulous pricks because *THEY CAN* without any consequences.
13. Ajit the patient
Ajit must be on top of the list for many people as his idiosyncracies have been well-documented and joked about for a long time by many comedians. He always has henchmen and even henchwomen who he orders around while sitting patiently in his armchair. His feathers are never ruffled and he has a calm, patient demeanour indicating that he is untouchable by law enforcement which is really fun to watch.
12. Ashish Vidyarthi the overconfident
Very few actors post 2000 can be categorized as endearing villians. Ashish Vidyarthi is one of them. He mostly plays a bad guy in David Dhawan movies which are funny anyway. His trademark style is being cocky, impulsive, overconfident, and throwing tantrums when things do not go his way.
11. Ranjeet the pervert
The characters he plays makes my skin crawl. The way in which he massages his own chest and exhales loudly when looking at a woman sends a creepy current down my spine! This is precisely why he is so good at what he does.
10. Sharat Saxena the self-righteously frustrated
The most stark scene that is in my memory for Sharat Saxena is from Ghulam (1997) where he expresses frustration at people not liking him just because he extorts money from them! Usually plays the henchman of the main bad guy and always has an impatient, frustrated look on his face which I personally find amusing to watch.
9. Jeevan the creep
This guy was creepy to the point of making my hair stand on end and sending a tingle down my spine whenever he appeared on screen. That is exactly what made him so awesome! Also, he was creepy in a non-sexual or a non-perverse way which is difficult to pull off. The backstabbing, manipulative characters he played really suited his nasal laugh and tiny eyes.
8. K.N. Singh the energy conserver
His uniqueness lay in the way he kept a quite demeanor for a majority of the scene being very soft-spoken and then suddenly exploding in rage! Also like the way he kept a skeptical face while thinking through his evil plots and made funny noises with his mouth and nose while he did the thinking.
7. Sudheer the loud
He never played the main villain but always the sidekick henchman. Loved the loud way in which he talked while slurring the 's' sounding syllables. He was so hot-headed and impulsive that he could have easily been the real life version of Yosemite Sam!
6. Prakash Raj the ego-maniac
Sadly after the 90s, very few bad guys have made a mark in the new millennium. Prakash Raj is one of them. Love the way he plays thin-skinned characters who obsess over every little insult thrown at them and then describe in detail how he is going to screw up the life of the good guy. Very entertaining! Reminds me of Dick Dastardly from Hanna Barbera cartoons.
5. Sadashiv Amrapurkar the smug bully
The most underrated villian! His character always took pleasure in hitting raw nerves of people and embellishing how powerful he is vs. how powerless the good guys are. The entertaining part about his personality was how he oscillated his body from left to right while being a smug bully.
4. Pran the whiner
Similar to Sharat Saxena above, Pran too played perennially frustrated bad guy roles. What I liked was his incessant whining and grumbling of how the good guy get in his way and foils his plots and he did it in the most unique way by tightly nodding his head from side to side. The best part of course what his facial expression which was a unique combination of bitter, skeptical, and complaining.
3. Shakti Kapoor the shameless
This man is the love-child of Ranjeet and Jeevan. He practices shamelessness with utmost ease! As examples, watch him belch throughout the movie (Jungbaaz, 1989), roam around in his underwear (Raja Babu, 1994), or make orgasmic sounds all the time in almost all of his movies. He gives his 100% without any reservations for any role he plays. That is why characters like Crime Master Gogo (Andaz Apna Apna, 1994) easily stick out in memory!
2. Gulshan Grover the bad man
This man plays such unapologetically bad characters that it is funny! In fact, he repeatedly calls himself a "Bad Man" in Ram Lakhan (1989). His over-the-top evilness reminds me of Skeletor. I can easily imagine Gulshan Grover making plans to capture Castle Grayskull.
1. Prem Chopra the transparent
My absolute favourite! He plays lowdown characters that lie, cheat, smuggle, and do every bad thing possible and cannot hide their evil, childish excitement while doing those things. This excitement comes in the best way through his throaty, gargly dialogues. Also, his cowardly fear for getting caught is very transparent and fun to watch. It is entertaining to see his facial expressions give away his bad intentions throughout the movie and in the end, it is even more entertaining to see him either run away crying when all seems to be lost or hopelessly apologizing to the good guys!
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