In Waiting for the Barbarians' Colonel Joll, Johnny Depp has crafted a great movie villain. I would describe him as either a colonial Darth Vader or a proto-Nazi – and concerning the latter, the character is a textbook illustration of Hannah Arendt's 'banality of evil;' perfectly circumspect, not a single hair out of place, not a single wasted motion. Depp plays the Colonel inwardly; his eyes invariably covered by round dark glasses, his face an inscrutable waxen death mask, his demeanor cold and calculating – of Captain Jack Sparrow's drunken buffoonery and shameful overacting not the slig...