If you've ever seen Willem Dafoe in a movie, chances are you watched him die. He's been stabbed, shot, blown up, crucified, burned alive and, in one memorable instance, impaled by his own goblin-themed glider. (In another particularly memorable scene, he was even buried alive and then killed with an axe.) "Name a Movie: I'm Dead!" Dafoe once joked. Asked to explain his curious habit of dying, he joked: "They just always want to kill me!"

Defoe certainly has a special talent for dying. His death in a hail of bullets in "Platoon" created such a striking image that it became the film's poster. But while his mastery of death scenes may tempt directors to cast him as characters who die dramatically, Dafoe himself also admitted that he was drawn to such roles.

In a recent interview with Empire MagazineDafoe was asked about Robert Eggers' 2022 film The North Man, in which he plays a jester who is killed (off-screen) early on but continues to act as the protagonist's spiritual guide to his new existence as a decapitated, mummified the head. Dafoe described his character's afterlife as "beautiful" and admitted it was "part of the allure" of the film:

“I mean, I knew it was going to have that little head and… you know, it's nice to have a good entrance and a good exit.

Dying certainly makes for an effective and dramatic farewell, whether it's from a movie or a particularly boring piece of entertainment. But there's more to Dafoe's love of fictional deaths than wanting to go out in style.

Movies are a way for audiences to experience the thrill of adventure, the terror of horror, and the sadness of tragedy without actually putting their own lives at risk. For actors they have a similar appeal. When asked why he loves playing characters who die so much, Dafoe told Empire that "it raises the stakes." He added:

"Everyone, unless he is asleep, has an imagination of his own death." So when you're in a little fiction, you have to play this kind of fantasy about imagining a version of what might happen to you, even in these extreme cases. , something about that experience is heightened, it's not very specific and personal, but it's not you, because the circumstances are not from your life.

Although no living person knows what it feels like to die (at least, not permanently), the fear of dying is innate in us, and it is a very accessible emotion for actors like Dafoe to tap into. Death itself is inevitable, and Defoe sees death scenes in movies as a kind of rehearsal for the real thing and a way to face the fear of our own mortality. "To bring (someone's death), even without real risk or real reality, is a beautiful exercise," he explained. "I'm sure there are some rituals somewhere in different cultures where this is done to help people prepare for their death.

Empire interviewer Alex Godfrey later quoted a 1987 interview in which Dafoe said: "Performing is like a life I trudge through until it's over." When asked if he still feels that way, the actor replied: "Sometimes I feel (...) I'm a different person now, but that sounds fine. I don't mind being labeled that."