10 Movies That Ought to Have a Villain But Don't

After the one-two punch of Hereditary and Midsommar, the last thing anyone expected director Ari Aster to do was put together a modern-day, tragi-comi-horror retelling of Homer's Greek epic poem The Odyssey. But did that stop him?

Eponymous protagonist Beau (Joaquin Phoenix) has every reason to be afraid, living in the most hostile world of all, in which his neighbours blame him for noise he doesn't make, suburbanites blame him for how bad they messed up their own child, his mother blames him for not loving her enough, and society seems to blame him merely for being alive. He suffers - physically, mentally and emotionally - from the film's first scene to its last, but who does he have to blame for it all? 

Beau's journey is bloody, gory, grim and difficult to watch, and yet lacks a clear and discernible villain. While The Odyssey has Poseidon as its arch antagonist, pulling the strings of fate in an attempt to waylay Odysseus on his journey home, Beau is Afraid exists in a world without gods and existential meaning makers. Thus, there is no architect of Beau's trials or destiny; he has been adrift most of his life, from family, friends, community, society, and these are merely the closing days of a fated yet inconsequential life.