10 Actors Who Perfectly Played Both Heroes And Villains

5. Hugo Weaving - Lord Of The Rings & The Matrix

There's an almost ethereal quality to Hugo Weaving that makes him a particularly good oddball character actor. Combined with his immediately identifiable voice - which has a quality in its delivery not unlike the quirks of Jeff Goldblum or Christopher Walken - and you've got a strong basis for someone who isn't quite of this world.

It's that quality that makes him so great in most of his more memorable performances. He's haunting as Red Skull and chilling as Megatron (and he even adds an air of necessary menace to Rex in Babe), but it all comes together best in the uneasy twin performances of Elrond in Lord Of The Rings and The Matrix's Agent Smith.

Both characters are clearly not human, with a slight detached and that ethereal quirkiness to them and both take full advantage of their actor's appeal. And it's stunning to see how well both work in convincing us of their central qualities, despite how wildly different they are: one is an agent of good, intent on preserving the Earth, while the other is a monster intent on devouring it.