Moreover, Guy Pierce is basically playing a Dick Tracy villain while Sprull basically kicks the plot into gear by attempting to commit heterosexual rape. I'd have no problem with more openly gay villains, as well as (as a Jew) more Jewish villains (the overt Jewishness of Albert Brooks and Ron Perlmans' heavies was my favorite part of Drive), and I'd argue it would be progress if more villains (or heroes of course) were simply presented as gay as a matter of course.

And by modern action standards, pretty much everyone in Adventures of Robin Hood is effeminate. The hero runs around in bright green tights.

Hollywood always deals in stereotypes and broad strokes. It makes audiences "get" a character faster or at least that's the theory. The easiest way to make a villain seem "not like us" to most Americans is to make them non-American (depending on the era we're talking about – it's mostly Arabs now, but in the past it was Russians, Asians, Germans, etc) or effeminate. It's a pattern that has a long history in Hollywood, as the authors of this article have pointed out. And yes Virginia, effeminate still means gay to a majority of Americans (gay and straight) and to all of Hollywood. We're not that "post-gay" yet as much as a lot of folks would like to believe. I thought the authors of this article did a great job of laying out the context and giving examples. I'm just surprised at some of the childish, name-calling responses here.

However, with the examples you gave I do think there is a confounding factor both Pierce and Bardem had their big breaks in films where they played gay characters extremely well. So I'd hypothesise if they were given free reign then they would fall into characters they are comfortable with and that have worked well for them. So this might explain these two gay villians.