an unworthy sequel to a great movie

Rating: 5/10 (29 August 2006)

How this flick ended up on the top 30 list OF ALL TIME, is a mystery to me. Anthony Hopkins is in no way scary compared to Brian Cox (Lector in Manhunter 1986), who brilliantly captures the essence of insane, with a great subtle performance that, unlike Hopkins, dosen't try to seem like a deranged cannibalistic lunatic with a funny psycho-killer accent. IMO Hopkins is one big caricature of a serial killer which to me is funny - not scary. The visuals in Silence of the Lambs, is also dull and uninspired compared to those in Manhunter where there is lots of beautiful scenes often in deep marine-blue or other clean cut colors - that's art. Just like the audio. It may be kind of 80s with a lot of syntheziser, but it works perfect. Silence of the Lambs is not art. All it tries to do is tell a story, without trying to stimulate the viewer's senses. The story is all right, but you can't help but thinking it could have been so much better, had Michael Mann directed it.