Hughie Warriner

Hughie Warriner is the main antagonist in the 1989 film Dead Calm.

He is portrayed by Billy Zane.

Film
Hughie is a traveller whose boat begins to sink in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, and seeking help, he crosses paths with John Ingram and his wife Rae who are taking a holiday out at sea. Hughie rows over to the Ingrams' boat and claims that not only is his boat sinking, but the six passengers he was sailing with have all died from food poisoning. John becomes suspicious of Hughie and while he is resting, John secretly rows to Hughie's boat to investigate. The boat is indeed sinking but is also full of mangled corpses, and after finding video footage of Hughie with the other crew members, John suspects that Hughie murdered them. As he frantically rows back to his yacht to warn Rae, Hughie awakens, knocks Rae out and sails the yacht away before John can reach it.

When Rae regains consciousness, she insists that Hughie turn the yacht around and go back for her husband. Hughie refuses and instead tries to seduce her. Though Rae continuously rebuffs him, she is eventually forced to sleep with him in order to gain his trust and also to keep him away from the deck. Meanwhile, John returns to Hughie's boat and tries to prevent it from sinking in order to go after them. Rae later succeeds in drugging Hughie with a glass of lemonade filled with sedatives and goes to get a shotgun on board the boat. However, Hughie finds her and they both fight over the weapon. Hughie grabs it and tries to shoot Rae, but the effects of the sedative greatly affect his aim and Rae escapes to the bedroom armed with a harpoon gun. Hughie comes after her and she fires a harpoon at the door, accidentally killing her dog instead. Hughie then begins strangling her but finally passes out from the sedative, allowing Rae to tie him up and sail back to find John. Hughie cuts himself free and goes after Rae once again, but Rae knocks him out and dumps him in the yacht's life raft, letting it drift out to sea.

John manages to set Hughie's sinking boat on fire, allowing Rae to pinpoint his location and rescue him. As they are reunited on board the yacht, they discover the life raft empty and Rae sets it on fire with a flare. The following day, John is washing Rae's hair when he goes below deck to make breakfast. Rae, with her eyes closed, feels a pair of hands massaging her head and assumes it is her husband. However, when she looks up, she is startled to see Hughie standing behind her. He begins strangling her again when John reappears and notices Hughie's silhouette through the yacht's sail. In desperation, he grabs a nearby flare and uses it to shoot Hughie in the mouth, incinerating his head and killing him.