17 years later, and still amazing

Rating: 10/10 (18 March 2008)

This movie sets the bar. From the acting to editing, from the score to the cinematography, there isn't an aspect of the movie that I'd change, nor is there an aspect that does not stay with me for hours and days after I watch the film.
Hopkins puts on a clinic. The brilliance of his performance is his ability to captivate the viewer and Agent Starling with his gifts of psychological study and underlying aristocratic being while also delving ever so suddenly into moments of sheer lunacy. He lets the animal out of the cage so flawlessly and so momentarily that its just amazing to realize that its all an act.
Then there are the minute details, and side characters. I love Demme's underlying 'woman in a man's world' theme that he never overtly introduces. Instead, he just puts Foster in these great scenes, the best of which is just before she examines the body found in W. Virginia, where she is left in a room with a dozen W. Virginia state cops. Classic. Then there are the characters, like the moth experts or the latest victim's distraught father who lets Foster into his home to examine the victim's bedroom or the cops who try to catch Hannibal when he escapes in Memphis. All are peripheral characters, but they all resonate, they all somehow fit perfectly. I cant explain it, but nothing takes away, everything just adds to this movie, and it truly will be one of my favorites for as long as I live.