Someone needs to rescue this film from the inexplicable bad opinions on this list

Rating: 10/10 (16 August 2002)

"The Silence of the Lambs" is one of the best films of the 1990s. A police procedural that shapeshifts nightmarishly into gothic horror, it is one of the most intense, brutal and elegant thrillers of all time.

Those who claim the film is boring probably first saw it on video, where much of its impact is lost due to the tinny sound and the tiny screen. This film derives its power from the intricate use of sound effects and the masterful evocation of clausrophobia, which is best appreciated when the screen is 20 feet across and you are trapped in a theatre. The cinematography is both grittily realistic and otherworldly, not superising since the film was shot by "The Sixth Sense"'s Tak Fujimoto. Jonathan Demme, a comic director, somehow manages to create the only Hitchcockian film that is truly worthy of the name. The wonderfully paced final act, in which we assume the SWAT team are on the way, but... is one of the greatest hoodwinks I have ever seen. Ted Tally's script is phenomenal, outclassing even the novel on which it is based.
But ultimately, this film belongs to its actors. Not just Hopkins, who of course creates the greatest screen monster in history, or even to Foster, who delivers the performance of her career (and seems to have had a talent-ectomy shortly afterwards), but to Ted Lavine, for his courageous performance as a killer transvestite, and to the world weary Scott Glenn.