Beyond Gabbar’ Singh's laugh and Mogambo’s calm: The reinvention of evil in Bollywood

In the 70s and 80s Bollywood villains were portrayed as outsized, larger-than-life characters with personalities that were sometimes similarly flamboyant. The menace evoked by Amjad Khan's Gabbar Singh in 'Sholay' was literally terrifying, given his creepy laughter and unpredictable sadism. The Mogambo in ‘Mr. India’, played by Amrish Puri, was sinister because of his calmness and control, made terrifying through the phrase " Mogambo khush hua." These were villains that could literally exist only as pure embodiments of evil, in the same way that superhuman heroes can exist only as pure embodiments of good.

In the 1990s, Bollywood villains began to move to a mode based on realism, forcing the audience to see how the villain's "evil" actually creeps inside. Ashutosh Rana's portrayal of Gokul Pandit in 'Dushman' is perhaps one of the most rhythmic serial killer performances in Hindi cinema that the medium has ever produced. The worst part is the fact that Rana delivered a calculated silence with riveting intent, whose initial unflinching brutality made him terrifying compared to the very theatrical Bollywood villains before him.

The 1990s also introduced the anti-hero, as audiences were shocked by Shah Rukh Khan's dark and obsessive role in 'Baazigar'. A superstar who did not play the savior but the manipulative killer, erasing the lines between hero and villain. This created space for mainstream actors to start to explore darker shades and broaden the narrative horizons of Bollywood, if only a little bit.

As Bollywood transitioned into the 2000s, villains became more glamorous, stylized. Arjun Rampal created a distinct character from what they had become - sleek, sinister, and cool as a villain; either flamboyant in ‘Om Shanti Om’, or a tech-driven antagonist in ‘Ra.One’, his presence elevated and added glamour to the role, which displayed how villains could indeed be sophisticated, with a hint of menace. This was an era when there was an equal amount of style and substance in a villain to equal the lead.

Now villains are more nuanced, alien, and unbelievably human. R. Madhavan personified menacing evil in ‘Shaitaan’, portraying evil as something that can hide in the face of someone ordinary, who can lie and manipulate, and destroy perfectly with chilling precision. Arjun Kapoor as Danger in ‘Singham Again’ channelled a visceral and violent menace that felt unstructured, gritty, and horrifyingly real. Contemporary villains are representative of consistently shifting social anxieties- power and corruption, betrayal, obsession, etc. - they are much more relatable and, for that reason, terrifying.