10 Actors Who Are Capable Of The Most Terrifying Rage In Fright Films

You couldn't write a list like this without including Jack Nicholson's performance as Jack Torrance in Stanley Kubrick's film The Shining. Torrance's anger is made even more frightening because of its generous portion of sarcastic humor. You know he's in a rage, but he's still making grim jokes. That's when you know you are in the presence of someone who means you harm.

Brad Dourif is one of the scariest villains in Exorcist III, as James Venamun, The Gemini Killer. His performance alternates from seemingly genial storytelling to full-force wrath within seconds. His portrayal of homicidal psychopathy never fails to chill. It's not the shouting; it's what's behind the shouting.

Kathy Bates' work as the nurse Annie Wilkes is more quiet anger until she finally explodes. The most disturbing thing about Annie is the anger that always bubbles within her. It's a resentment that is just under the surface under her fake kindness and concern. She's the bomb waiting to explode.

Terry O'Quinn as The Stepfather is sincerely unnerving. He's not exploding, his character Jerry Blake, is so in control that it hurts to watch. O'Quinn plays Blake as the type that it's easy not to notice. He's a serial killer who operates in plain sight and only kills to keep his fantasy of a perfect life going. Blake is the type of man that all the people who know him say, "But he seemed so nice." after he goes on a killing spree.

Michael Shannon has more than one film where he shows the rage he is capable of. In Man of Steel, he plays General Zod, and his anger is one of the best things in the film. But he has also played men who are moved to anger in Take Shelter and Bug. In Take Shelter, Curtis literally flips a table at a fish fry when pushed to it. In William Friedkin's Bug, Peter Evans goes off the rails and stabs a doctor who comes to help him. In all three films, his frenzy has such an intense menace that he earns a spot on this list.

It might be a little hard to explain. Still, the rage in Brandon Cronenberg's film Possessor, Andrea Riseborough, and Christopher Abbott both show a powerful ferocity that is made all the more troubling by how much they have sought to hold it in and how normal they seem. It's also more mindblowing because they play two people in one body. Most of the time in films, you see the vocal and facial signs of anger, but in Possessor, you see the graphic violence that bursts out of them. It's genuinely shocking.

Nicolas Cage is known for how big the emotions he expresses on screen are, so naturally, he is on this list. In the many films where he has shown his anger, it is perhaps the most heartfelt and vulnerable, which makes his wrath even more powerful. When he loses the love of his life to a cult, his whole life's purpose becomes hunting down the people responsible, and you can see that wild fury in every scene, all over his face.

Dennis Hopper was a journeyman actor who became famous a second time, showing his bizarre sexualized rage to the audience as Frank Booth in David Lynch's masterpiece Blue Velvet. Hopper is known for having a danger to his performances, but in Blue Velvet, he really cut loose. The performance is so iconic the scenes have passed into pop culture like no other film has.