8 Terrifying Villains You Didn't Realise Were Played By Great Directors

2. Werner Herzog - Jack Reacher

The casual film-goers who went to see Jack Reacher would in all likelihood have had no idea that the guy playing the film's villain, the Zec, was none other than one of cinema's most renowned, eccentric talents. To many, Werner Herzog was likely just some spooky-sounding name of a German actor they'd never seen before, who also happened to be really good at scaring the crap out of the audience. Those in the know, of course, will be aware Herzog is actually pretty terrifying in real life, a man with eyes so cold and a Bavarian accent so harsh it's a wonder it took until 2012 for someone to cast him as a movie villain. Obviously, Jack Reacher's writer-director, Christopher McQuarrie, noticed the potential - the result was that the Zec was not just the best thing about McQuarrie's film, but one of the most uniquely scary villains in recent times. Herzog's presence in the film is chilling, and he manages to sell the potentially laughable story of the Zec chewing his own fingers off to survive a Siberian gulag as just the product of his sheer, unfathomable madness.