As I was Watching All The Dolph, my husband and I noted something that was very important across all of his action films. There is a need to have a great villain. In many films, the villains were totally lame and unbelievable. We had a lot of discussions about what made a bad villain. In the end we came up with criteria for determining if the character is a terrible villain. We decided to call it The Eric Roberts Rule.
The Role of an Action Villain
Action villains serve one very specific purpose: they stand opposed to the hero you are rooting for, and you can’t wait to see them eat it at the end of the film. Typically, they will have bad one-liners and bad guy machismo charisma. They are the foil to every plan your hero has. They are the roadblock that your hero must breakthrough to win in the end.
An action villain can take many forms. They can be strong and badass like Keefer in Men of War. They can be a crime boss with endless monetary resources and legions of henchmen like O-Ren Ishii in Kill Bill: Vol. 1. They can be criminal masterminds who have thought of every contingency like Neil McCauley in Heat. No matter what their shtick is, they stand between the hero and his objective.
Eric Roberts: The Quintessential Villain
While there are many villains in cinematic history, none of them is perhaps more prolific than Eric Roberts. (For those of you who are somehow unaware, Eric Roberts is the brother of Julia Roberts and father of Emma Roberts.) With a whopping 656 acting credits at the time of writing, Eric Roberts is an extremely recognizable face in modern cinema. While it is statistically probable he has played some good guys, we all know him best for playing a bad guy.
He appears as a foe in everything from TV series to Lifetime movies to action films. Those sparkling eyes and giant smirk typically spell t-r-o-u-b-l-e for our protagonists. Equipped with wealth, mastermind plans, snarky one liners, and well-tailored suits, an Eric Roberts action villain is in the planning rather than muscle class of villain. Other villains in this brainiac class are memorable foes like Hans Gruber in Die Hard, Castor Troy in Face/Off, Howard Payne in Speed, and Eric Quaylen in Cliffhanger. The Eric Roberts villain is who we are using as our standard for a villain in film. All villains from hereon out will be compared to him to determine quality.
The Eric Roberts Rule
It has happened to us all, we are watching a movie thinking “wow, this bad guy is lame.” He is lame because he looks lame, and you don’t believe he can beat up and/or outsmart the good guy. Whether it is the fault of costumers, screenwriters, directors, and/or actors, we as an audience are left underwhelmed and wishing for more. But what would happen if that bad guy was Eric Roberts?
The Eric Roberts Rule is very simple: if Eric Roberts can replace the villain in a film and make the role and film instantly better, that is not a good villain.
This rule originated during and was typically on display in the bad stretch of Dolph movies. The villains were uninspired and lacked the chutzpah of an evil mastermind. From Dalton in Retrograde to David Schulman in The Minion, these bad guys simply weren’t cutting it. While they were truly awful, at least they helped us find a film rule for our analysis. The next time you are watching a movie and think “wow, this bad guy sucks” you too can apply The Eric Roberts Rule!
