10 Films Actors Wanted You To Hate
3. Henry: Portrait Of A Serial Killer - Michael Rooker
More than 30 years before Lars von Trier and Matt Dillon unleashed The House That Jack Built upon audiences, Michael Rooker made his haunting debut in John McNaughton's own terrific serial killer movie, aptly named Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer.
Rooker plays the titular murderer, and in a decade defined by cartoonishly over-the-top horror antagonists, his down-to-Earth, subdued Henry was a singularly chilling figure of fear.
Though McNaughton's gritty, documentary-style filmmaking provides a discomfortingly intimate glimpse of both Henry's life and his eventual bursts of violence, it's Rooker's superb performance which truly sells how utterly disgusting the film is to behold.
This is one of those movies that invites you to shower after watching, largely because there's never a moment where it doesn't feel like people such as Henry actually exist.
That Rooker threw himself into the deep end so enthusiastically in his first major acting gig makes it all the more impressive. The result is a truly hateful film and one that won't be quickly forgotten by anyone who has witnessed it.