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Anthony Hopkins explains the counterintuitive way he makes villains like Hannibal Lecter terrifying

Anthony Hopkins, who won an Oscar playing Hannibal Lecter, plays a bad guy in the new thriller "Locked." He told BI his secret to playing villains.

Hopkins used this tactic in his new thriller "Locked," in which he plays William, the wealthy, well-mannered owner of a luxury SUV who takes sadistic revenge on Eddie ( Bill Skarsgård), a desperate small-time thief who tried to steal his car. He also thought it sounded like a fun, easy job: William only speaks to Eddie in voiceover for the first half of the movie, meaning Hopkins could record much of his dialogue ahead of time. The Avenue Hopkins was also captivated by his character's complex motivations, telling BI he knew that William was a role he wanted to play because he'd experienced a similar feeling with "The Silence of the Lambs" decades earlier.

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