There have been countless depictions of sociopaths and other predatory personalities in film. Most are pretty bad, incomplete and/or inaccurate. But some have been dead-on.
And so I’ve canvassed my memory for what I regard as several notably excellent portraits of sociopaths in film. I’d be curious what you think of these performances (if you’ve seen them), and eager to discover, through you, new film/television portraits of sociopaths that ring disturbingly true.
In no special order, I’ll start with the original foreign film, The Vanishing, 1986 (not the subsequent and lame Hollywood remake). The Vanishing delivers-up one of the most sinister depictions of a sociopath I’ve ever seen. The fright derives less from graphic violence (there is none) than from the movie’s success at immersing you into the compartmentalized world of its principal character, who is seamlessly managing the presentation of a normal, well-adjusted family man, as he simultaneously and covertly pursues his secret life and morbid agenda.
Next is Unlawful Entry, 1992, a movie starring Ray Liotta as a local cop who smoothly enters the life of a young neighborhood couple (actors Kurt Russell and Anne Archer). Although somewhat formulaic plot-wise, the movie’s performances are impressive. Liotta’s sociopath—glib, charming and seductive—will make the hair on your skin rise. And both Archer and Russell vividly express the tension and alarm arising from their slow awareness that Liotta isn’t who he appeared so convincingly to be.
Richard Gere, in a somewhat unheralded role, nails-down a sociopathic cop in Internal Affairs, 1990. Gere gives a riveting presentation of the sociopathic mentality. Andy Garcia (actor), an Internal Affairs cop in Gere’s department, finds himself in the unenviable position of having to confront the slowly unfolding breadth (and horror) of Gere’s sociopathy. Garcia is also incredible. As in Unlawful Entry, the movie accurately shows how sociopaths can invade, lodge themselves in, and violate innocent, dignified lives.
One of the greatest performances of a sociopath I’ve ever seen can be found in Episode#44 of the former HBO series Six Feet Under. The episode is called, “That’s My Dog.” In it, David (actor Michael C. Hall) extends a random act of help to a road-stranded stranger, Jake (actor Michael Weston). David then finds himself overpowered by Jake, who, in the course of the episode’s hour, manages to embody virtually every relevant, sinister quality for which the sociopath is notorious. Weston’s demonic performance is astonishing. Hall’s as the traumatized victim of a sadistic sociopath is equally amazing.
Great performance, yes. Sociopath? Maybe not.
Dexter
Speaking of actor Michael C. Hall, I wonder what your take is on Dexter, the great Showtime Series in which Hall plays a sociopathic serial killer working, by day, as a Miami crime-scene forensics analyst?
I love this series, which is coming into its third season. But as disturbing a character as Dexter is, I would not characterize him as a sociopath. This is just a fun diagnostic quibble. Ostensibly, Dexter grows up a budding, violent sociopath. His father (or father-figure) recognizes the dark, evil side over which, as a boy and adolescent, Dexter seems to have little, and diminishing, control. The father sees that Dexter is compulsively, inexorably inclined to sadistic violence.
His solution is to somehow train Dexter to direct his sociopathic, homicidal proclivities towards cruel, menacing, destructive individuals. Best, if someone’s got to be snuffed-out by Dexter, it be someone the world will be better without!
And so Dexter becomes skilled, over time, at identifying individuals the world won’t miss; individuals as dangerous and creepy as he.
Why, then, is Dexter not really a sociopath—and indeed, diagnostically speaking, not even necessarily plausible? Because, despite his violent, murderous compulsions, Dexter is, first of all, a fundamentally sincere person. He is also loyal–for instance to his sister and a girlfriend. And while Dexter struggles to “feel” warm feelings, indeed anything—a struggle, incidentally, that he embraces—he knows how to have the backs of others, even where his self-interest may be at risk.
In a word, Dexter strives, against his darkest, most sordid inclinations, for growth. This is precisely what makes him and the series so fascinating, and precisely what rules him out as sociopath.
What do you think?
(This article is copyrighted (c) 2008 by Steve Becker, LCSW.)
one/joy_step_at_a_time
s’okay. mine is one year older. 😉
one/joy_step_at_a_time
…and my eyes are getting bad.
snort.
Stargazer
LMAO! Good thing our eyes start getting bad around the time our body parts head south.
hens
star you mentioned the movie ‘no country for old men’ now that was more than a physcopath – dood’s like that make a physcopath look cuddly…..
KatyDid
Stargazer,
My body looks okay… in the pool!!! Now what to do about my mug….
Stargazer
Katy, I’ll bet you’re a lot better looking than you think you are. Getting victimized by a sociopath tends to have a really really bad effect on the self-esteem. I also think guys don’t see all the flaws in us that we see in ourselves. Hell, they don’t even see their socks lying on the floor or dishes in the sink. I am 50. So depending on my mood, I can look in the mirror and say, “Oh shit, look at my wrinkles and gray hairs” or “Wow, look at that hot 50-y.o. lady”.
Stargazer
Yeah, hens, that dude in that movie was the psychopath’s psychopath!
zimzoomit
Just saw this “mystery” flick last night .. “The Last of Sheila” .. where a bisexual kills his own wife, but before killing her, “projects” his own issues onto her, and convinced her that she killed a man who HE really killed. The spath in the movie admittedly has a fling with a guy who ends up dead (who was searching, among six people, for the culprit who killed his own wife.) Same SPATH also has a fling with another woman (portrayed by Raquel Welch.) Early in the plot, he hints (to his RICH) wife..(who he probably stayed with only b/c of her wealth), when she asks who might be the homosexual among the group of suspects, he asks her something like, “is there any dividing line these days?” .., then later shocks her by admitting, in front of five others, that he had a homosexual fling (which he says to throw everyone else off the trail that he might be a killer or know who the true killer is.) Yep. That’s a SPATH!
zimzoomit
Last night, I watched an “Inspector Lewis” episode on PBS, Series IV: The Mind Has Mountains..about a sociopath. Same night, I also watched a LifeTime movie, “My Family’s Secret” (2010) ..the latter struck home with me about my ex, who I also think is a spath. In My Family’s Secret, one brother of two tries to kill himself. His brother has multiple personalities, is violent..his other personalities control him..he is a serial murderer..a murderer since childhood, but his “exterior” personality, the one he shows to the world, seems “timid”..he is the one who holds the low-paying job. His other personalities “tell” him to keep the family’s secret. He has different handwriting patterns, different signatures, one pattern contains spellings. One of the other personalities he creates, to survive, since childhood, is the “bully”..an alter personality to protect him from his father. In all, the guy has FIVE separate personalities, reads at a 5th grade level. He has moments where he forgets what happened..like total FUGUE moments where he “splits”, does things like forgets his glasses in places, forgets that he left them in places..yes..behaved “completely out of character”; as a kid, HE SUFFOCATED HIS OWN SISTER!
OK..thought that was ONLY A FILM PLOT, watching that film gave me the chills, as, my ex also seemed to have DISASSOCIATIVE IDENTITY DISORDER, did things COMPLETELY out of character, forgot things or forgot he told people things he told them, HAD DYXLEXIA, and I have at least one note in his handwriting that did not make a whole lot of sense..capital letters where small letters should have been, and vice versa,.. as if he was IN ANOTHER WORLD ENTIRELY!
Zim
zimzoomit
Also, in that first movie I watched (the Inspector Lewis episode), about another sociopath (this time, a female one), at some point in the film, someone mentions that one suspect might have “Declarenbohm” or “Declarenbo” Syndrome..I couldn’t really catch how that disorder was spelled, or if it really IS an actual disorder, but it was described, in the plot as someone who IMAGINES that his/her target is “in love” with him/her, when their target is not actually in love. If anyone knows the TRUE title of that disorder, please let us know. Thanks.
Zim