Affably Evil / Live-Action Films

aka: Film

Affably Evil characters in live-action movies.

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Actors

• When not playing the Magical Negro, Morgan Freeman has mastered this in such films as Hard Rain, Nurse Betty, Dreamcatcher, Lucky Number S7evin, Wanted and The Contract.
• Quite a few characters played by Vincent Price (not counting the ones who are Faux Affably Evil).

Films

• 12 Years a Slave: William Ford, whose relationship with Solomon Northup is about as respectful as the relationship between an owner and his slaves possibly can be. He sincerely admires Northup's intelligence, and does his best to protect Northup from the more sadistic Tibeats.
• 21 Jump Street: Eric may be badass drug dealer, but he is actually a very nice guy.
• 22 Jump Street: The Yank twins are rather friendly considering their involvement with the drugs.
• 3:10 to Yuma (2007): Ben Wade is the very definition of affability and charisma, while being an armed robber who has escaped from prison multiple times.
• The 5,000 Fingers Of Dr. T: Dr. Terwilliker even says out loud that he's a villain before he offers refreshments and has a Villain Song with the protagonist's mother and friend.
• Ace High has Cacopulos, who is likable and easygoing despite being a cunning and dangerous criminal. He's pretty much a slightly smarter, more mellow Tuco.
• Max Lozoya from Don't Turn the Other Cheek! is a likable scoundrel who goes along with being mistaken for a revolutionary hero so he can get to treasure easily.
• Agora: There's hardly any completely maleficent villain; the Christians are, after all, still human, and while they were very fanatical and Knight Templar-ish, they still helped the poor and each other. In fact, the only person who was truly villainous was the Bishop, Cyril of Alexandria, who himself is very Affably Evil, caring for his people and all.
• American Gangster: Frank Lucas is a very polite, well-dressed man who cares deeply for his family and takes his mother to church every Sunday. Despite this, he is frequently shown to have no qualms about gunning down people who get in his way in cold blood, or blighting Harlem with heroin for pure profit.
• Most of the cast in Animal Factory are hardened and ruthless convicts, but they're mostly amiable when left to their own devices and spend most of their time just trying to combat the boredom and stress of prison life. The only exception is Buck Rowan.
  • Earl Copen is an unrepentant gang leader who makes no bones about being a selfish piece of shit, but he's a friendly enough guy who tries to prevent unnecessary violence and does his best to look after Ronnie.
  • Jan is friendly, upbeat, witty, and an all-around sweetheart. The only reason she counts as evil is because she's a prisoner, and even then she's one of the only characters not to do anything unethical throughout the film.
  • Earl's right-hand man Vito is fairly laid-back and amiable, but he's still more than willing to resort to violence.
• The A-Team: Lynch is just so adorable about being evil.
  Lynch: We do have laws, they're just cooler than yours.
• Austin Powers: Dr. Evil, much like the villains from 'James Bond', invites Austin into his lair, makes him a meal and designs tailor-made futuristic clothes for him and his love interest to wear. Taken to an even higher level in the third movie where, in the final act, they team up to take on the secondary antagonist of the film.
• Avatar: Most viewers saw Col. Quaritch in as this, probably against James Cameron's intentions. The guy will do everything in his power to keep the people under his charge alive and safe (and his men obviously adore him for that), and he seems to be a fairly nice — if strict — person to have around... as long as you are not a Na'vi or a human who likes the Na'vi. It's telling that he actually got Jake a ticket home and a new set of legs for his efforts. Likely this was originally to be the case in earlier versions of the script that leaned more toward Grey-and-Grey Morality and Both Sides Have a Point rather than the Black-and-White Morality seen in the final version, and these subtle hints that Quaritch may in fact be a decent guy at heart are leftovers from that.
• Axe Murdering with Hackley: All the masked killers at RKS are a rather friendly bunch. They're bloodthirsty killers who will axe anyone they can, but they're still pretty friendly.
• Babysitter Wanted (2008): The villain chats merrily with the Final Girl as he's carving up the body of another girl. His accomplice later gets mad at him for being so friendly.
• Backdraft: Ronald Barlet, a pyromaniac who admits he'd burn the world if he could, is genuinely fond of arson investigator Donald "Shadow" Rimgale, who'd saved his life and caught him at the same time. He's also friendly and polite to Brian. Despite this he remains a depraved and creepy man, naturally.
• Badlands: Kit speaks politely to just about everyone, right up until he shoots them. After he gets caught, he is polite and cooperative to the cops.
• Bedazzled (2000): Satan is out for Elliot's soul, but she generally acts friendly and sympathetic to him most of the time. Even after he nullifies their contract and saves himself, she stays polite and cordial before seeing him off. Actually a subversion, since the end of the film reveals that she's not evil at all.
• Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon: Villain Protagonist Leslie Vernon is jovial, friendly, intelligent, and takes a camera crew with him as he prepares for his night of murder.
• Berlin Syndrome: Andi is usually friendly and polite to Clare even when she's his captive. Only a couple of times does he really lose his cool, such as during her escape attempts or other resistance. Justified as he sees her as his girlfriend, willing or not.
• Casablanca: Pretty much all the characters. The only evil character with no redeeming features is Major Strasser.
  • Ugarte is a thief, assassin and human trafficker, but also earnest and impeccably polite.
  • Chief Renault is a Dirty Cop and not above trading Sex for Services, but is also charming, clever, honest in his business dealings and has a beautifully self-deprecating sense of humour.
  • Ferrari is the head of the Italian outfit, Rick's chief competitor and has his fingers in every illegal pie in Casablanca. He is also a Big Fun-type and prefers honestly trying to buy Rick out over attempting to strong-arm him, and even then, he is more than willing to take "no" for an answer. Rick is also more than fine with leaving the cafe to him as he leaves Casblanca.
• Cash on Demand: Colonel Hepburn from the Hammer Horror film is a friendly and amiable man. When he visits a bank, he is more friendly to the employees, and knows more about them personally, than the bank manager does. The reason he's visiting the bank is to rob it.
• Lester in Cherry 2000 is the most laid-back post-apocalyptic Scavenger World warlord ever.
• Child's Play (2019): Chucky is this in this version, being genuinely protective of Andy and wanting to be his friend. He's Obliviously Evil, only killing because he thinks he's helping Andy.
• The Chronicles of Riddick (2004): Vasilev runs a Hellhole Prison with many blatant human rights abuses, but he is friendly and trusting toward his Properly Paranoid subordinate Anatoli, leaves most of the hands-on cruelty to his subordinates, and invites the Bounty Hunters to drink with him while talking about how the longer they spend as his guests, the less likely they are to run into necromongers elsewhere.
• City of God: Benny is one-half of the crime duo who systematically murdered their way to controlling all the organized crime in the City of God favela. However, he's also a friendly party-boy who reins in the Ax-Crazy tendencies of his partner.
• Con Air:
  • Pinball introduces himself as a "Armed robber, arsonist, dope fiend, and a hell of a nice guy who just got caught", which you'd think would land him in Faux Affably Evil territory, but being played by Dave Chappelle does wonders for a con.
  • Swamp Thing is such a jolly, good-humored sort that you almost forget that he's an integral part in a scheme to bust out a planeload of mass murderers, terrorists, and gangsters. He's a drug smuggler himself, but even his actor defends him, pointing out that he didn't kill anyone or get in their faces...
  • Garland Greene, a cannibal who committed murders that "made the Manson Family look like the Partridge Family", has to be rolled onto the plane in full Hannibal Lector vestements, and even has the other murderers and psychos scared of him, spends the entire film sitting peacefully, chatting with others, having a tea party with a little girl, and singing "He's Got The Whole World In His Hands."
• Conspiracy (2001): This HBO movie is an extremely chilling example of this trope. A group of intelligent, cultivated, soft-spoken men having a secret conference in Germany in 1942 about what to do with the "storage problem" of the Jews in Europe. And it is based on the minutes of the actual meeting.
• Crimson Peak: Sir Thomas Sharpe is friendly to everyone he meets, and unwaveringly loyal to everyone he loves. Unfortunately, the only person he has ever loved is Lucille, and he helps his older sister lure three women to their deaths before he begins to fall in love someone outside of his abusive, incestuous relationship with her and starts to realize that what he's doing is wrong. It's unclear how much he understood their actions were wrong before that, given the nature of his upbringing.
• In Deadly Advice, the ghosts of the murderers are all extremely polite and helpful, offering Jodie all sorts of well-meaning advice. Which usually amounts to Murder Is the Best Solution.
• The Death of Stalin portrays the more sympathetic members of Stalin's inner circle like this. Nikita Khrushchev is a funny, personable man and Vyacheslav Molotov is a cheerful Cool Old Guy seen smiling more often than not. They're both vicious enough to have made it into Stalin's inner circle in the first place, though, and don't mind if their scheming for power gets innocent people killed.
• D.E.B.S.: Lucy is a friendly supervillain who's not actually the murderous psychopath the D.E.B.S. think at first. She really didn't kill any of their agents, the deaths were accidental (however, she does desire to sink Australia). Later she reforms completely, but even prior willingly let Amy live (granted, that was partly due to her attraction for her).
• Demolition Man: Dr. Raymond Cocteau is a kindly old man running the police state of San Angeles and directs its inhabitants' lives completely for what he believes is their own good. Lampshaded by Simon Phoenix, who compares the man to an "evil Mr. Rogers".
• Demon Knight: The Collector is an evil SOB, but boy he is charming and polite to anyone he meets, even as he tries to corrupt them into eternal damnation, murders them horribly, or attempts to trigger the apocalypse.
• Dial M for Murder is a classic thriller featuring Tony Wendice, a man who concocts The Perfect Crime; blackmailing someone to kill his unfaithful wife while Tony is across town, thereby securing both his alibi for her death and the money she's left him in her will. Wendice never loses his charming, upper-class, English politeness, even when he is caught by his wife, her boyfriend, and a Scotland Yard inspector at the end of the movie.
• Simon Gruber from Die Hard with a Vengeance. Like his brother, he is polite and courteous. Even when robbing the Federal Reserve, he only kills guards who try to fight back. Those who don't resist merely get tranquilized with heavy sedatives. Hell, he even honors his fallen henchmen as he and his crew escape with their ill-gotten gold. At the end, it turns out he never was going to blow up any school. Even he thought Hans was an asshole, but that didn't stop him from wanting revenge on McClane. This behavior is evident in his underlings, who actually avoid killing Zeus when they could have, and even take a bomb from him, thinking "a kid could find it."
• District 9: At least initially, Wikus in several ways; he's an amiable, well-liked low-level functionary... who is casually racist and brutal towards the oppressed aliens and laughs and makes jokes when 'aborting' alien eggs.
• Dog Eat Dog:
  • Troy is a polite and charming man who tries to make sure none of his heists cause any unnecessary deaths, but he's still a ruthless criminal who at one point shoots an unarmed woman in cold blood for annoying him.
  • Mad Dog is a friendly, almost dorky guy who genuinely cares about his friends and wants to be a better person. It's almost enough to make you forget that he's an Ax-Crazy junkie who murdered his own family.
• In Drive a Crooked Road, Steve Norris is a genuinely charming and likable fellow, who happens to be gangster and bank robber. He is a gracious host, and has the knack of making friends easily, which is one of the reasons the socially awkward Eddie falls under his sway so easily. Even after the robbery, Steve is perfectly happy to let Eddie walk away with his share of the loot (he earned it after all), unlike his partner Harold. It is only when Eddie gets pushy and won't take the brush-off does he decide to have Harold remove Eddie from the picture. Even then, he still gives the impression that he'd really prefer there was another way.
• John, one of the main antagonists of Drunken Master 2, is some form of this. He's very cheerful for almost the entire film, except when being brow-beaten by the British Ambassador he's working for, and when Fei-hung is beating the crap out of him at the end of the film. He even gives a cheery thumbs-up and a big grin after kicking Fei-hung onto burning coals.
• Juan from Duck, You Sucker! is initially set up as a mean, ruthless, and amoral bandit, then we get to know him and find out that he's just an ordinary guy trying to look out for his family in a world where stealing is the only way to survive.
• Emperor (2020): Lieutenant Colonel Robert E. Lee is unfailing polite to Brown during their negotiations, offers Brown a chance to surrender without further violence, pats one of his soldiers on the back out of appreciation for a shot the soldier made, and says that as a soldier, it isn't his place to decide if slavery is right or wrong (which his future real-life actions contradict). However, he isn't really a Designated Villain either, as he kills Brown's companions without remorse and sounds like he agrees with Thomas Jefferson when saying that he heard the former president didn't view African-Americans as real people.
• Enemy at the Gates: Major Koenig qualifies as this for much of the movie. Sure, he's out to kill his sniper counterpart, but he's polite about it, and when one character, a young boy acting as an informant, hears of his rival's supposed death and is trying not to cry, he tells him that it's understandable since he was one of the boy's countrymen. When he figures out that the kid's been informing on him to the Russians, instead of confronting him, he hands him a chocolate and gives the kid a Mercy Lead, telling him not to come back. The kid comes back, so Koenig hangs him from a telephone pole to use as bait to lure out the Russian sniper.
• Engine Sentai Go-onger: The Three Ministers of Pollution from Gaiark in Go-onger.
• Gangs of New York: Bill The Butcher is polite, has a moral code, a deep sense of honor...but he just hates those bloody Irishmen invading American soil, and God help you if you get into a knife fight with him. To the point where Amsterdam is conflicted because he finds himself liking the man he intends to take revenge on for killing his father. He does have a few Kick the Dog moments where you realize the guy is not merely a Memetic Badass but pretty reprehensible, so the audience is conflicted too.
• Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed:
  • Ghost, at least towards Brigitte. She seems like a sweet, if odd, girl who befriends Brigitte and tries to help her with her lycanthropy. It turns out she's manipulating Brigitte the whole time to kill people however.
  • Tyler the orderly goes back and forth between this and Faux Affably Evil. On the one hand, he trades sexual favors from the girls at the rehab center in exchange for drugs. On the other, he seems legitimately (platonically) affectionate towards Ghost (Ghost having faked his attempt to rape her), and is worried about Brigitte when her transformation becomes noticeable. His quote below to Brigitte is rather telling.
    Tyler: You smile at the world, and the world will smile right back at you.
• The Godfather.:
  • As in the novel on which the film is based, Don Vito Corleone is warmhearted, reasonable, prefers to think of his partners as "friends", and happy to perform the odd favour for his less-than-fortunate neighbors. True, he does inform them that they might have to do a little quid pro quo, but contrary to Amerigo Bonasera's worries, all he usually asks for is a free service from their business. He even adopted Tom Hagen and eventually allowed him to become his personal advisor - even though he knew that none of the other Mafia bosses would approve. Vito's still in charge of one of the most powerful Mafia families in America, and he's not above the occasional murder or extortion to back up the usual income from gambling and union racketeering. However, Even Evil Has Standards, which Vito demonstrates in his refusal to deal in drugs and prostitution (the most contemptuous line in the film is when he says, "Tattaglia's a pimp"). And, to his credit, he does his best to keep his children and his civilian friends as far away from crime as possible.
  • Having learned from his father, it's unsurprising that when Michael takes over the business, he also fits this trope; however, though well-mannered and gracious, he lacks Vito's degree of warmth - which, combined with his ruthlessness, eventually begins to distance him from his friends and family.
• GoodFellas:
  • Tommy DeVito. Despite being an Ax-Crazy Psycho for Hire, he acts like this to his comrades and his mother, showing a lot of respect to them. It helps that, for all his faults, Tommy genuinely cares about his friends ("I didn't want to get blood on your floor") and is emphatically loyal to them in a life where loyalty and covering for each other is everything.
  • Jimmy can be very civil and is a caring father. Towards the end, Henry and Karen perceive the Faux Affably Evil vibes from Jimmy, who is up to no good with the Hills by then.
    Henry: Your murderers come with smiles. They come as your friends. People who cared for you all your life.
• The Great Escape: Colonel von Luger, the commandant of the POW camp is certainly more affable than the Big Good, being a Luftwaffe soldier who sees his enemies as Worthy Opponents and is only obeying his superior's commands out of duty rather than ideology. He's always polite towards his prisoners and was adamently opposed to the execution of the recaptured escapees. This was Truth in Television.
• The Green Hornet: Benjamin Chudnofsky. He has a politeness and an inferiority complex that's pretty disarming, and he tries too hard to seem intimidating in the end, but is dangerous when people point out that he isn't 'scary'. This character is played by Christoph Waltz, the same actor who portrayed Hans Landa. Waltz rather excels at playing Affably Evil characters.
• Gremlins 2: The New Batch: The Brain Gremlin is an erudite, genetically-altered gremlin who merely wants what everyone wants, and what you tropers have: Civilization! The Geneva Convention, chamber music, Susan Sontag...
  The Brain: We want to be civilized. I mean, you take a look at this fellow here...
  (Shoots a nearby, annoying Gremlin in the face)
  The Brain: Now, was that civilized? No, clearly not. Fun, but in no sense civilized!
• Throughout all three films of The Hangover, Leslie Chow only wants to be friends with The Wolfpack.
• The Scorpion from Keeping Up with the Joneses is a casual, friendly guy and a Benevolent Boss who just so happens to be a ruthless international arms dealer.
• The Mask: The Mask is a gangster who has indeed committed crimes such as robbing a bank but other than that he is friendly, sweet, polite and compared to the Big Bad The Mask is a saint as he is capable of being kind to people like Tina even falls in love with her, is harmless as he likes having fun and can be reasonable as well while Dorian is willing to hurt people like Tina if they get in the way of his plans.
• Uncle Hoi in Hard Boiled may be a high level gangster and arms dealer but that doesn't keep him from maintaining a grandfatherly demeanor to his men.
• Home Alone: Harry and Marv are very friendly towards Kevin despite their menacing attempts to kill him, most notably in the first film where they almost hit him with their van and warned him to watch out next time.
• Hot Fuzz: Almost all of the NWA members - especially Skinner.
• The Human Factor: Dr. Percival (Robert Morley) is a jolly, friendly man who enjoys fly fishing and a drink with his friends. He also finds creative ways to poison MI6 employees who are suspected of leaking documents to the enemy. When he discovers that he murdered the wrong MI6 agent, he shrugs it off by saying that the agent's death is no great loss even if he was innocent of leaking secrets to the Soviets.
• The Iceman: Richard Kuklinski (Michael Shannon) is a good husband a loving father and a ruthless contract killer with a rumored tally of over 100 kills. Even creepier: the film is based on a true story.
• The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus: The plot of the movie is set in motion when Mr. Nick (Tom Waits), having already won the soul of the Parnassus's daughter in a wager made decades before she was born, agrees to allow Parnassus to try to win it back on the eve of its forfeiture (even though Parnassus has absolutely nothing to offer to sweeten the pot). Throughout the course of the story, it becomes clear that Nick is deliberately trying to lose this wager to avoid ruining his Friendly Enemy status with Parnassus, to the point that he tries to physically restrain the daughter from deliberately damning herself to Hell just to spite her father and, when that fails and he wins the bet, he immediately offers Parnassus a new wager so he can try to win her back again. This leads to one of the film's best lines: "Damn. I won."
• In the Name of the Father: Benbay the prisoner. While he wears a high security prison outfit, meaning that he was convicted of a serious crime like murder or rape, he's quite nice to Gerry while the rest of the prison despise the Irish prisoners. Benbay is also friendly to the tougher criminals like Ronnie Smalls and Joe McAndrew.
• Into the Storm (2009): Josef Stalin is shown as this. While he is a tyranic despot, one can't deny the man has manners. Lampshaded by Churchill's butler, Sawyers:
  Sawyers: "I drink to marshal Stalin, a much nicer man I thought he'd be."
• I, Robot: VIKI and the NS-5's are polite and calm while trying to take over the world.
  (The normally loyal robot blocks Susan's way)
  Robot: Please remain calm.
  Robot: Please refrain from going to your windows or doors.
  Susan: Deactivate!
  Susan: Commence emergency shutdown!
  Robot: We are attempting to avoid human losses during this transition.

  And later, before attempting to kill people

  Robot: You have been deemed hazardous. Will you comply?
• James Bond:
  • Dr. No treats James Bond to dinner and shows him around his evil lair!
  • So does Scaramanga in The Man with the Golden Gun.
  • The books take this to a whole new level with characters like Marc-Ange Draco. Apparently, you can be guilty of drug-running, extortion, and murder, and effectively be a good guy as long as you're really, really nice and charismatic in personality.
  • Never Say Never Again is an independently-produced remake of Thunderball featuring Klaus Maria Brandauer as an utterly charming version of Maximilian Largo. Shame about the psychosis lurking just under the easy-going, good-humoured facade...
  • Tomorrow Never Dies has Dr. Kaufman, a One-Scene Wonder who is unfailingly polite and respectful to Mr. Bond. Too bad about his protege, the Faux Affably Evil, Mr. Stamper.
• The Jungle Book (2016) portrays Kaa in this light, partly due to her having only one brief appearance in the whole film. While it's true that she jives Mowgli with false promises of keeping him safe, hypnotizes him into immobility and nearly eats him whole, she speaks to him in a nearly motherly way for the entire time and truthfully tells him how he came to live in the jungle. Her intention is to merely eat the boy, which is the way any hungry predator would proceed with such a vulnerable prey when it walks right into their territory. That kind of intention seems less drastic when compared to Shere Khan — who wants to kill Mowgli simply for existing — and King Louie — who wants to make Mowgli teach him the secret of creating fire as a means to gain more power.
• Jurassic World has Vic Hoskins. He treats everybody like an old buddy and is polite constantly. Even after he is disrespected to his face by Owen he doesn't retaliate or sic his men on Owen but continues being friendly. When he tries this on a raptor Delta it does not end well.
• Kaamelott: Premier Volet:
  • Alzagar the Bounty Hunter kills the captain of the boat he boards with a multishot crossbow, then politely talks to the crew in order to find what they hide onboard.
  • Despite overtaxing and oppressing the peasants on Lancelot's orders, Wulfstan remains polite to them and even gives condolences to Guethenoc for the loss of his wife.
• Kill Bill: Bill is very friendly and likable, as well as a loving father, despite being a self-proclaimed "murdering bastard," and helps the Bride reach an epiphany about herself at the end of the duology. He also genuinely cares for, and loves, The Bride. He's only trying to kill her because she broke his heart.
• Killshot: Mickey Rourke's character Blackbird is a Professional Killer. When he's not on duty he's a somewhat easy fellow to get along with. Even when he has a reason to kill he's fairly conservative and is typically courteous to his victims.
• Kind Hearts and Coronets: The Villain Protagonist, Louis D'Ascoyne Mazzini, is trying to get a duchy he's in line to inherit. By killing the other eight D'Ascoynes between him and the title. He's also a charming First-Person Smartass, capable of feigning friendliness with his victims, and genuinely friendly to anyone who isn't between him and what he wants.
• The King of Comedy: While the film's premise centers around him premeditatedly committing a major felony against an innocent person, Rupert Pupkin is nonetheless a mild-mannered, sympathetic underdog. He displays several traits in pursuit of his dream - persistence, levelheadedness, and an aptitude for thinking outside the box - that would be considered admirable in countless other contexts. Contrary to audience expectations, he never experiences any sort of meltdown during the film and never tries to actually hurt anyone. After he and his girlfriend watch his monologue on Jerry Langford's show, he even considerately switches the television back to the movie that the other bar patron was watching!
• Kingsman: The Secret Service: Valentine is a down-to-earth, genial fellow who's mildly adorable, doesn't care at all about his billions and is primarily concerned with saving the world so much that he's willing to kill most of humanity to do it. He shows a dislike of politicians who "stand for nothing but re-election", he's genuinely charming, makes friends easily and absolutely believes he is doing the right thing. It's little wonder so many of his co-conspirators come over to his side willingly. He even mourns the death of his previous kidnap victim, Dr. Arnold. He's also appalled when he shoots Harry in the head, as this was actually the first time he had ever killed someone, and he's Afraid of Blood.
• The Lady Vanishes: Dr. Hartz is quite a nice guy, which is shocking to modern audiences considering he turns out to be an assassin, and a Nazi at that. (The film was made in 1938, before the world was aware of the Nazis' atrocities.)
• Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels: Big Chris is a hitman and debt collector, but is overall a nice guy. He does his best to be a good dad to his son, Little Chris, asks about the protagonists' health with genuine concern when they get into a fender-bender, and takes the time at the end of the film to let them know what their haul is actually worth in spite of having no reason beyond courtesy to do so. Lay as much as a finger on Little Chris, though, and the affable part goes out the window immediately.
• Lord of War:
  • Andre Baptiste, a brutal African warlord, is friendly and welcoming to Yuri. Andre Junior, who is a renowned cannibal, is even worse but no less affable, if only around Yuri.
  • Yuri himself, who is the protagonist but is frankly an amoral (at best) arms dealer.
• The Lost Boys: David is a murderous vampire and all-round delinquent, yet he's very friendly and fun-loving. Most of his victims tend to be whoever goes out of their way to piss him off.
  • As well as his father, Max (Edward Herrman).
• Lucky Number Slevin: Both villains were Affably Evil, but The Rabbi especially. He even, ultimately, seems to genuinely believe the main character's assurances that he is not the person they think he is, and sympathizes with his plight.
• Man Bites Dog: The main character Ben is a Serial Killer who kills randomly, but he really is nice to his friends, inviting them to the restaurant and offering to help cover the costs of the movie.
• Don Javier from The Cartel in Maria Full of Grace is a smiling middle-aged man with a cane. The latter smiles as he explains to Maria what the gig as a drug mule will consist of, and even gives her money before she accepts the job, no strings attached. But later, he tells her clearly albeit politely that if any of the drug pellets she has swallowed don't turn up or any go missing, her family will be killed.
• Masterminds (1997): Mr. Bentley (played by Patrick Stewart), the villain, is charming, polite, levelheaded, and witty. He also equips his men with Instant Sedation dart guns during the initial takeover of the school and orders them not to injure anyone while repelling the cops' attempts to retake it.
• Mean Girls: Evil is a massive stretch, but Regina's mother, June, is very pleasant, lenient, laid-back, and harmless (if somewhat embarrassing to be around due to her wanting to be a "cool" mother), even as the mother of a girl who's basically the Alpha Bitch head of the school's student body.
  Mrs. George: I just want you to know, if you ever need anything, don't be shy, OK? There are NO rules in the house. I'm not like a regular mom, I'm a cool mom.
• The Minus Man: Vann Siegert is a serial killer, but he uses a painless poison to kill his victims. He seems to genuinely sympathize with the Durwins, tries to reciprocate Ferrin's feelings for him (although this ends poorly for both of them), and seems extremely disturbed by Jane's apparent murder at the hands of Doug.
• Mission: Impossible (1996): Max the Arms Dealer is quite a friendly sort. She's not very evil or greedy.
• Motel Hell: The brother and sister duo, Vincent and Ida, are a hospitable couple who run a nice little motel and provide some great meat pastries which are made out of people.
• Muppet Treasure Island: Long John Silver seems to genuinely care for Jim even as he's threatening to strangle him, and has a boatload of charisma (although being played by Tim Curry may be a factor here).
• Murphy's War: Vought, the U-boat captain, gleefully has his men murder dozens of helpless enemy sailors and destroys quite a bit of vital supplies and buildings at the missionary hospital but has two soft spots. However, he is quite chummy with his men, lets them engage in Screw the War, We're Partying behavior, and Wouldn't Hit a Girl, as he repeatedly spares the life of Dr. Hayden and her companions even though they could testify against him and have clearly been giving aid to his enemies.* Night of the Demon: Julian Karswell is charming, charismatic, pleasant, loves his mother, hosts parties for local children... and is a Satan-worshiping cult leader who uses black magic to kill casual acquaintances.
• Notorious (1946): The villain is about the nicest, most debonair Nazi you'll ever meet.
• Once Upon a Time in the West: Cheyenne is a cheerful, friendly fellow who seems perpetually amused by the events in which he is caught up. He's also a confessed murderer and bandit leader. It helps that A) he's not the villain of the film, just the local badman whose territory the villain trespasses on, and B) all of his crimes take place off-screen (just outside the door in the case of his slaughter of his prison escort).
• In Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre, Greg Simmonds is an Arms Dealer with little patience with people that betray him, but he's also quite personable and eager, and shows Hidden Depths when dealing with Danny.
• The Parallax View: Sheriff L.D. Wicker may be a Dirty Cop who's in on the conspiracy, but he's also a friendly, down-to-earth guy who disapproves of some of his deputy Red's Small-Town Tyrant antics and is perfectly willing to accommodate Frady until he learns he's investigating the conspiracy.
• Parents: Lily Laemle is perfectly affable toward her son Michael after he finds out she is a cannibal; she sits him down at the dinner table without restraining him and calmly assuring him that he will come to like the taste of human flesh. Lily immediately comes to Michael's aid and stabs Nick to save him. While Nick kills Lily after this, he kisses her corpse afterwards. The ending of the film implies that Nick got his cannibalism from his parents, who are extremely loving toward Michael after they become his guardians.
• Percy Jackson and the Olympians: Medusa in the film adaptation of The Lightning Thief, more or less.
• Pirates of the Caribbean:
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. Captain Barbossa is quite friendly, and quite vicious. He later gets a Heel–Face Turn.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides: Angelica shows signs of friendliness towards Jack.
• The President's Analyst: Dr. Schaefer ends up abducted by The Phone Company. Arlington Hewes, its president, is unfailingly pleasant and polite while he explains to Dr. Schaefer why he needs his professional knowledge for his world-domination plan — and while he inflicts high-tech torture on Schaefer when he refuses to help.
• Psycho: Norman Bates may be a psychotic murderer, but he's also rather personable and endearing when the "mother" side of his personality isn't in control.
• Pulp Fiction: Jules Winnfield is actually a pretty nice guy, for a mob hitman. Just don't say "What?" to his questions. In fact, all of the gangsters in the film are affable and friendly, even when they're casually waving a gun in your general direction.
• Raiders of the Lost Ark.: The dapper, charming treasure hunter and Nazi collaborator Rene Belloq.
• Reefer Madness: Sure, Jack Perry is perfectly willing to give marijuana to teens, but he's probably the most charming drug dealer ever.
• Red Rocket: Mikey can be funny and charming, talking his way into Lexi's house after she refuses to let him in. It's not a lie, exactly, but he also turns on Lexi the minute he becomes convinced he has better prospects with Strawberry and shows no concern for anybody but himself after Lonnie's car accident.
• Red Rock West: To some extent, Lyle From Dallas. Protagonist Michael Williams first meets Lyle after nearly being run over by him - Lyle is very apologetic about it, makes sure he's okay, gives him a ride back to town, bonds with him over their shared past with the Marine Corps, and buys him a drink. Since this is the first we see him, his turning out to be the bad guy would almost be a twist, were it not for him getting very angry about Michael initially refusing his offer to buy him a drink, as well as the fact that he's played by Dennis Hopper.
• Rustlers' Rhapsody: The villains realize that the hero, Tom Berenger, always beats "bad guys," so they hire a "good guy" to fight him. The "good guy" appears to be an even nicer person than Berenger and gains the upper hand, but Berenger soon learns that he's actually a lawyer, and is then able to defeat him.
• Saboteur: All the villains in this Alfred Hitchcock movie. In between planning and executing acts of sabotage against military installations, we see a kindly grand-father playing with his grand-child, a rich socialite who hosts a charity-dinner, a father who ponders whether he should let his son have long hair, a man who gives their hostage a milkshake, and a man who frets that the confrontation with the hero will make him unable to go to the philharmonica with his niece later that evening.
• Saw: John Kramer of the films is fairly approachable, polite, and truthful to the victims whom he tests and places in life-threatening, yet, escapable traps. Unlike his apprentices, John appears to genuinely want his victims to pass their tests and survive his traps. He is also honest at all times.
• Scott Pilgrim vs. The World:
  • Gideon Graves, at least when he's first introduced. After the final act begins, not so much.
  • Lucas Lee may be one of the Evil Exes, but he chats in a friendly way with Ramona and there seem to be no hard feelings from him. He even tells her Scott is a pretty nice guy (while proceeding to hand Scott his own ass).
• Serenity (2005): The Operative is a man who is convinced of the righteousness of his actions, and holds no particular ill will for his enemies. Indeed, he goes so far as to compliment his foes' tenacity, bravery, or the good work they've done, even when he's impaled them on his sword and watching them die. Even more so is how he kills certain people with the sword. He paralyzes them, then lets them fall on it because he believes it's an honorable way to die. He's also willing to kill innocent civilians (including children and clergy), not because they stood in his way or had something he needed, but just to make sure his target has nobody to hide them. To his credit, despite his sincere belief in the necessity of his evil actions, he knows he is a monster with no place in the paradise he is trying to create.
  The Operative: There is no shame in this. This is a good death, for a man who has done fine works.
• In Seven (1979), Butterfly controls all of the drug traffic in Hawaii. However, he is also a hip and charming man who is shown moving easily through the youth scene of islands, where he is liked and respected.
• In Seven Ways from Sundown, the outlaw Jim Flood is extremely charming, to the point that an entire town is willing to turn out in an attempt to save him. He strikes up an easy friendship with Seven after he is captured.
• Sherlock Holmes (2009): Dredger is an extremely large thug who will wreck the place and crush you (with his bare hands, if necessary) if that's what he's been paid to do... but he's surprisingly personable about it.
• In Shoot the Piano Player, the two gangsters who were betrayed by the titular pianist's brothers are easygoing fellows who have nice Seinfeldian Conversations with anyone they kidnap, and even react somewhat politely when their hostages escape.
• Shutter Island: Subverted, where we are led to believe that Dr. Cawley is like this. As it turns out, his genuine personality is just affable, and, in fact, he has been running a very elaborate simulation in order to snap Teddy Daniels (real name: Andrew Laeddis) out of his self-induced fantasy that he is a federal marshal, in order to make him come to terms with his wife's death.
• The Silence of the Lambs: The cannibalistic Dr. Hannibal Lecter is an interesting example in that nobody can be really sure if his affability is just an act, particularly as he's prone to sniping insults at visitors who displease him. The simple answer is that he is genuinely nice and respectful to people who are genuinely nice and respectful to him, exhibiting this both towards Clarice Starling and an orderly who broke his arm to stop him from attacking a nurse, but was otherwise always respectful and never rude. As the orderly points out at one point, Lecter "prefers to eat the rude".
• Sleepaway Camp: Angela Baker practically becomes some kind of murderous Genki Girl in the second and third films. She also really likes the "Happy Camper" song, and often honestly doesn't seem to understand why her victims are scared of her.
• Smokin' Aces: Hitman Pasquale Acosta epitomizes this trope. He doesn't just kill you, he comforts you and waxes philosophy as you die.
• Solo: The Imperial officer handling Han's enlistment is rather chipper and polite, very unlike the Empire personnel in previous films whose most prominent dialogue are usually variations of "You Rebel Scum!". It makes sense since the Empire has to attract recruits.
• The Standoff At Sparrow Creek Hubbel is the most laidback of the militia members and shows some A Father to His Men feelings while discussing his old construction crew, but he is the only one who unambiguously wants the militia to go to war with the cops and admits that he murdered a man who was going to get him and his crew in trouble for accidentally using bad concrete on a highway and causing a pile-up.
• The Stepfather: The eponymous Serial Killer from this series of films is fond of stuff like dogs, model building, and gardening; he's actually a pretty nice guy, at least, until things stop going his way. There's a scene in the second movie where he sits down to breakfast and only starts eating after his Rice Krispies pop; he looks as giddy as a kid when they make their trademark noise.
• Suicide Kings: Charlie Barrett is about the nicest guy who ever fed anyone to their own dogs.
• S.W.A.T. (2003): Martin is part of an international drug ring and has apparently been stealing from his family. However, he is also a jovial dinner companion who passionately discusses sauce quality and encourages Alex to extend his visit to America so they can spend more time together.
• Two Hands: Pando is plenty affable, but utterly intolerant of anyone who tries to cross him. And when he and his gang grab Jimmy and drag him off to kill him, he is genuinely concerned for Alex's safety and gives her $20 so she can get a cab home.
• Unbreakable: Elijah Price is well spoken, expensively dressed...and is actually a Super Villain, or at least a mass murderer. So affable, in fact, that until the very last scene, you would never guess that he was the villain all along, making this the last truly shocking M. Night Shyamalan twist.
• What We Do in the Shadows:
  • Viago, one of the main vampire flatmates is a vampire who routinely murders people for their blood. He is also a sweet, easygoing guy who tries to be friends with everyone he can and has the philosophy that if he's going to eat someone he'll at least give them a very nice night first.
  • Petyr might be a millenia-old vampire who Looks Like Orlok, but all the other flatmates speak highly of him and he seems to listen to Nick when the latter asks him not to feed on Nick's friend Stu.
• The Wicker Man (1973): Lord Summerisle and the rest of the islanders. Sure, they'll lie and deceive people into being used as human sacrifices. But they'll do it all while singing and dancing and dressing in silly costumes.

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