He would consider that rude

Rating: 10/10 (1 October 2015)

"People will say we're in love," jokes Lecter, as he tantalisingly squares up young FBI trainee Clarice Starling in the tense first meeting. The excellence in Demme's direction comes from knowing what to linger on and what to hint at. He milks that first encounter of the two leads to its extremes, leading a young Foster down into the underground cells, past a room flooded in frantic red light (along with strict instruction and warning) and finally along that long corridor. The other prisoners leer and jeer as expected, but arriving at the end is a glass cell and that still and unblinking monster in Lecter. This very first conversation is impeccably shot; they trade blows and tight POVs immerse us into their mind's inner sanctums, and as Clarice's thin facade and accent is shattered by a few choice words, she is pushed off centre, disorientated and vulnerable. The plexiglass walls augment the atmosphere of unnerving intimacy between the unconventional pair. Like several other figures throughout the film, Lecter's male gaze seeps into the frame from front on and in extreme close-up, hungrily eating up Clarice's insecure psyche and exposing the screaming of the lambs in her dreams. Foster plays this part magnificently, not with acts of bravado, but in the nervous addressing of a room full of male police officers questioning her authority, in the low-class accent she tries desperately to mask, and in her sense of honesty and goodness that sets her apart and convinces Lecter to take a liking to her. "Don't you feel eyes moving over your body, Clarice?" We experience this in the rather nervous way her POV is presented to us, gazing absent-mindedly in every new scene, scanning the surroundings, and trying to avoid the sexualising and trivialising gazes of the male dominated law enforcement agency, which she must navigate with self awareness and a casual, tactful disposition despite it evidently worrying her. Lecter's eyes are also fixated intensely, but not on her body.
Apart from the harrowing monologues of the screaming of the lambs from Foster, there are other ways that Demme increasingly notes her state of mind. Her introduction has her determined in the midst of male power and domination, no better expressed than when she enters an elevator full of male agents a good head taller than her. Mid investigation, she creeps over to the slightly ajar door, and with a smooth edit, we are transported to her youth, her father's funeral that began the terrifying downward spiral of her life. She makes the initial breakthrough with Lecter and expresses her frustration at being used by her superior, Jack Crawford, and the fading light within the tunnel is forced back into the frame via the car mirror, opposite Clarice's increasingly independence and wariness. And in that brilliant misdirection just before the climax, two operations are crosscut with the utmost precision, the complex man power of the SWAT take-down, and the pleasant but curious face of Clarice, not yet aware that she has stumbled onto Buffalo Bill.
Opposite her is the demented yet strangely eloquent and intelligent Hannibal Lecter, a character which Anthony Hopkins lifts into classic film territory with his performance. When a golden pen is cast wayward in the holding cell, we are given a moment's glance, like Lecter and his eyes light up behind that grotesque and terrifying mask, Hopkins immediately conveying his intentions. We fear him so much more for the things unseen, our imagination going haywire as we witness him pull off a bloodied mask of skin in the ambulance, or as we stumble into the third floor with a officer hung up like a gory tapestry, or in that final haunting credits sequence, as he plots the meal of his former nemesis. Yet he remains staunchly interested in Clarice; in a fleeting close-up where they exchange files, their fingers touch for the only time in the film, yet we don't flinch, because strangely like Clarice, we know that he means her no harm. It's a sort of agitated confidence, after the brutality of Lecter's escape that flashes with terrifying aggressiveness and disregard for human life.
His advice and assistance steers Clarice into the terrifying climax in the basement, the tensest sequence in the film. Shore's score simmers menacingly beneath the surface as Clarice prepares to enter each room of uncharted territory, the sound design magnifying each heavy breath and gasp, as well as the faint cries of the kidnapped daughter and the poodle's frenzied barking. As she kicks open each door, the camera doesn't immediately peer in and reveal its empty non-threatening contents, but holds onto Foster's panicked sweeping glance and brief window of relief. This forbids us from gaining a foothold onto the scene, and like Clarice we are constantly looking over our shoulder, even more so when the lights are switched off and she is forced to fumble around while the eerie night vision places us right in those slimy hands of Bill. The dread is perhaps a little cheapened by the slow-motion reaction and gunshot, but all the same, a film shows its excellence in sustaining tension when you are forced to back away a little. Here is the only horror film to win Best Picture, one which drives the audience and the horrors of imagination along the edge, brimming with nervous apprehension and fear. Best served with some fava beans and a nice Chianti.