Hannibal gave Silence Of The Lambs fans a sequel crazier than they expected / The Dissolve October 11, 2013 features / Forgotbusters Hannibal gave Silence Of The Lambs fans a sequel crazier than they expected by Nathan Rabin Forgotbusters re-examines movies that were among the top 25 grossing films the year of their release, but have receded culturally, in order to explore what originally attracted audiences to them, and why they failed to endure. Ridley Scott’s lush 2001 adaptation of Thomas Harris’ Hannibal was both a beneficiary and a victim of its predecessor’s success. The triumph of Jonathan Demme’s Oscar-festooned 1991 adaptation of Harris’ Silence Of The Lambs—and the public’s enduring fascination with its flesh-eating psychiatrist villain, Hannibal Lecter—all but ensured that the film would be a runaway hit. And, sure enough, Hannibal was a smash, grossing more than $165 million domestically and more than $350 million internationally, numbers that don’t include home video, where it also enjoyed substantial popularity.

But Silence Of The Lambs’ phenomenal success also ensured Hannibal would reside in the earlier film’s shadow, a poor relation at best, a crass desecration at worst. I tend to write about movies like that an awful lot here at Forgotbusters: movies based on stars or properties so ubiquitous and popular that the films’ success was preordained, no matter how bad or forgettable they were. In that respect, a better name for this column might be Inevitabusters or Regretbusters, since in many cases, the culture has halfheartedly spent the years since the films’ initial release pretending we didn’t make these films huge hits. Silence Of The Lambs was itself a continuation of an ongoing story, and the second film to prominently feature Hannibal Lecter following 1986’s Manhunter, which cast Brian Cox as the epicurean-minded madman and William Petersen as obsessed FBI agent Will Graham. Manhunter was as inspired and brilliant in its own way as Silence Of The Lambs, but it was such a pronounced commercial failure that Demme didn’t have to worry about competing with audiences’ memories of a film few people had seen at the time.

Cox’s take on Lecter (who was named Hannibal Lecktor in Manhunter for reasons no one seems to understand) was substantially different than Anthony Hopkins’. It was a chillier, more restrained and detached performance. But in the minds of moviegoers, studios, and the public at large, Hopkins essentially originated the role. Hopkins’ Lecter captured the public’s imagination and transformed the doctor into a household name, a legendary monster and a comic figure whose propensity for devouring human flesh “with fava beans and a nice chianti” became the fodder of late-night jokes and even a parody titled Silence Of The Hams, starring Dom DeLuise as the Lecter figure. Silence Of The Lambs made Hannibal Lecter an insanely lucrative name destined to make the money hairs on studio executives’ necks go woo-woo- woo , but it also made him a joke. When Billy Crystal was wheeled out by “orderlies” at the beginning of the Academy Awards in 1992—where the film triumphed in many of the major awards—wearing a replica of Lecter’s famous mask, it was the year’s most obvious joke .

And like most obvious jokes delivered by Crystal, it was rapturously received, even as it pointed out just how defanged and comic the famous villain had become. We live in such an anti-intellectual society that Hannibal Lecter might very well be our most beloved intellectual, with the possible exception of Adlai Stevenson and/or Niles Crane. A character conceived as a terrifying villain was instead embraced as a charismatic antihero, and the popular subject/dispenser of cannibalism-themed jokes. The public loved Lecter more than is probably healthy, and angrily demanded more of his ongoing adventures in fine dining and vivisection. There was such a fever for more Lecter movies that the great Italian vulgarian Dino De Laurentiis bought the film rights for Hannibal, Harris’ 1999 Silence Of The Lambs sequel, for $10 million before the book was even released, and that’s back when $10 million was still a lot of money.

The demand for more Hannibal The Cannibal was so extreme that Stephen King’s glowing New York Times review of Hannibal —which refers to Lecter as “the greatest fictional monster of our time”—includes the sentence, “Were I the book’s editor, I would argue very strongly for flap copy consisting of only three words: HERE IT IS.” There were a few problems, however. The book was long and packed with incident. Also, the book was frothing-at-the-mouth insane. It took the kind of perverse liberties with characters more common to the anything-goes world of fan fiction than the high-stakes world of mass-market publishing and big-budget studio filmmaking, where commercial considerations are paramount, and people have very concrete ideas about how established characters should behave. To give a sense of the novel’s pulpiness, one of its supporting characters is a lesbian bodybuilder named Margot Verger, who works for her grotesquely disfigured, violent pedophile older brother Mason—even though he molested her as a child—because she needs to procure some of his semen so she can impregnate her lover and make her claim on the Verger estate.

Margot ultimately anally violates Mason with a cattle prod, then murders him by shoving his beloved pet eel down his throat. When it comes to the novel’s gauntlet of outrageous characters and lurid subplots, Margot is the rule rather than the exception. This is comic-strip Grand Guignol, a literary giallo that delights in pushing the limits. Understandably, Margot didn’t make it into the film version of Hannibal, but plenty of similarly bizarre stuff did, including a scene where a man eats pieces of his own brain. Bear in mind that this happened in the sequel to a novel whose film adaptation won all five major Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, and Best Screenplay. (Adapted, in this instance.) The Academy said Silence Of The Lambs represented the pinnacle of the art form, and Harris followed up its source material with a novel involving characters like Margot.

Silence Of The Lambs was also fundamentally pulp involving a cannibalistic serial killer and a second serial killer who murdered women and was sewing their skins into a suit, but the filmmaking elevated it to the level of art, and those Academy Awards and the caliber of the cast and crew gave it tremendous prestige. Then Harris took the tony moneymaking franchise in a lurid, hyperbolic direction, daring the filmmakers who threw $10 million his way to follow his strange, jagged, excessive path. In the novel’s most controversial twist, Hannibal Lecter, mass murderer and foodie, and Clarice Starling, straight-arrow FBI agent, become lovers. And that only happens after Lecter unsuccessfully attempts to brainwash Clarice into believing she’s his beloved, long-dead sister. And after the two of them dine on the brain of one of Clarice’s still-living colleagues. (It should be noted that he’s a real jerk, and consequently deserves it.) That’s an awful lot to process, just as an audience member. It’s hard to imagine how Jodie Foster must have felt about Clarice’s curious evolution.

It may have struck her as a bit of an odd turn, and also a bizarre violation of everything the character represented as a strong, independent feminist role model. The novel was so extreme that in a town that worships success, nearly the entire original creative team behind Silence Of The Lambs declined to return. According to a piece in The Guardian, Demme found the novel excessively “lurid,” while original screenwriter Ted Tally just found it excessive. There are conflicting reports as to why Foster said no. De Laurentiis claims she simply demanded too much money, whereas in a 2007 interview with Total Film, she said the character of Clarice meant so much to her and Demme that they didn’t want to do anything that would “trample” on her. So the seemingly plum role was given to another great actress, Julianne Moore; Hopkins recommended her after working on Surviving Picasso with her. Moore and Foster have similar personas. They’re both brilliant at playing damaged, fragile women with tremendous inner strength. That seems to make each of them perfect for the role of the conflicted Clarice Starling. Hannibal claims she holds the world record for the female FBI agent who’s shot and killed the most people.

(Who even knew the Guinness folks were monitoring it that closely?) And yet she radiates anger and uncertainty. She’s all the more heroic for constantly having to overcome her fear. Foster was perfect for the role. The vulnerability she brought to the part was a big part of what made the film so resonant. She defined the character to such an extent that when Moore communicates in clipped, brusque cadences in a Southern drawl, she seems to be imitating Foster’s performance rather than playing the character Harris wrote. Moore’s borrowing of Foster’s mannerisms is distracting in the early going, and then the character essentially disappears from the narrative for long stretches while the focus shifts to male characters, only to reappear in the climax as a damsel in distress who needs Lecter to save her. At one point, Lecter even carries Clarice in his arms in a near-perfect replication of the famous image of Kevin Costner carrying Whitney Houston in The Bodyguard. That’s a pretty twisted, unfortunate fate for one of the greatest, strongest heroines in film.

Foster probably opted out of reprising her career-defining role because she was understandably wary of a sequel to Silence Of The Lambs that doesn’t have much use for Clarice Starling as anything other than a catalyst to get Hannibal Lecter back in action. But while De Laurentiis encountered a level of “nos” seemingly unthinkable for a big-budget, wildly anticipated sequel to a movie that won so many Oscars, he scored the only “yes” that mattered when Anthony Hopkins agreed to return. There would be no Hannibal without Hopkins. Lecter is the film. Hopkins doesn’t make his first appearance until well into the proceedings, but he dominates Hannibal to such an extent that it somehow feels like he’s in every scene; the character’s shadow hangs heavy over every moment, even when he’s completely absent. It’s the Poochie Effect in action: When Hannibal isn’t physically onscreen, everyone has to be talking about him, or at the very least, thinking about him.

Clarice and Hannibal don’t reconnect physically until late into the third act, but in many of her early scenes, she’s seen listening to tapes of Hannibal talking, inserting his legend into scenes where it wouldn’t make sense for him to be present. When Moore stubbornly fails to make the role her own, it’s probably because there’s almost always an invisible heart-shaped thought bubble floating above her character’s head, with a glamour shot of dreamy Hannibal Lecter inside it. At least in her first scene, Clarice has reason to think about things other than that brilliant Hannibal Lecter and her endlessly fascinating student/mentor, father/daughter, deranged cannibalistic serial killer/driven FBI agent bond with him. The film introduces Clarice in a high-stakes, PTSD-inducing raid that goes awry. It climaxes with her fatally shooting a machine-gun-toting drug dealer, splattering her blood and viscera all over the infant she’s carrying. Clarice’s public disgrace over organizing the botched raid attracts the attention of Lecter, who has been hanging out in Europe incognito.

Hannibal and Clarice’s relationship often takes the form of a warped courtship, and when he writes witheringly to Clarice about how the botched raid will lead to her dying useless and unimportant like her white-trash mother, it feels like a love letter, or at least pop-culture’s most extended and elaborate instance of “ negging .” Cruelly exploiting Clarice’s fear of ending up like her parents is simply Hannibal’s way of letting her know he still thinks about her. Hopkins plays Lecter as a man whose incredible contempt for every facet of humanity is only matched by the exquisite, almost sensual pleasure he derives from expressing that hatred. But he’s also a moralist, in that he feels transgressions should be punished in the most extreme manner imaginable. When Hannibal kills people in Hannibal, it’s because they’ve done something wrong—or, in the case of arch-nemesis Mason Verger, done everything wrong. A man of infinite wealth, power, and depravity, Verger (Gary Oldman) also had the misfortune to have Hannibal Lecter assigned as his court-appointed therapist.

Lecter prompted Verger to take a popper one debauched evening, then suggested he carve off his own face with shards of broken glass and feed it to his dogs, which I can’t help but feel violates the Hippocratic Oath. Verger regrettably followed Lecter’s suggestion, leading him to so grotesquely disfigure himself that he now sports what appears to be a small porcelain doll head where his face should be. He’s a hideous ghoul of a man, but he retains a sense of humor about the experience, quipping to insane-asylum attendant Barney Matthews (Frankie Faison, returning from the first film) about his unfortunate exercise in homemade facial surgery, “It seemed like a good idea at the time.” As Verger, Oldman delivers the line with a hilariously incongruous glibness that embodies the film’s approach to its source material. By giving an almost inconceivably grotesque tableau a winking punchline, the film harnesses the nightmare-inducing power of Harris’ novel while maintaining a certain ironic distance. If a dude who carved off his own face with shards of jagged glass in a drug-induced haze can laugh about the experience, why shouldn’t we?

“The public loved Lecter more than is probably healthy, and angrily demanded more of his ongoing adventures in fine dining and vivisection.” Verger uses his connections to get Clarice back on the Lecter case in hopes that her involvement will lure him out of hiding and expose him to Verger’s minions, who want to collect on a $3 million bounty for his capture. Lecter, meanwhile, is hanging out in Florence, where he meets put-upon Rinaldo Pazzi (an entertaining Giancarlo Giannini), a corrupt law-enforcement agent who figures out Lecter’s true identity and sets out to collect the reward for himself, with bleak consequences. Clarice’s sexist, boorish, utterly loathsome colleague Paul Krendler (Ray Liotta) also sets out to collect the bounty and ends up suffering an even more sinister fate for his greed. The luridness of the source material puts the filmmakers in a tough place tonally.

If they play up the craziness to the hilt, they risk making an insane fan-fiction parody of Silence Of The Lambs—kind of like following up a world-beating classic like The Exorcist with a world-class mind-fuck like The Exorcist II: The Heretic. But if they don’t acknowledge the premise’s outrageousness, even in watered-down form, they risk making a stone-faced camp classic where all the laughs are unintentional. So the filmmakers choose a surprisingly effective middle path by approaching the material not as pulp, but as opera, where a certain level of craziness is expected, even demanded. In one of the film’s morbid running jokes, Verger regularly checks in with the folks tending to the farm where his man-eating killer sows are being raised, in order to make sure that they’re sufficiently blood-crazed. Verger wants to make absolutely sure that when he finally succeeds in luring his arch-nemesis into their midst, the psychotic wild sows don’t all start cuddling with Hannibal, assuming he’s their new mommy. That would be a terrible waste of a diligently cultivated evil scheme.

The filmmakers give the film an epic scope, as dueling supervillains Lecter and Verger act out a gory game of revenge in a vast, cruel universe far beyond the petty ministrations of the law or the dictates of conventional morality—a sick, decadent, unmistakably European world where spectacular beauty collides with unthinkable depravity. Hopkins’ Lecter had unmistakably devolved into shtick by this point, but it’s a good shtick, even when the character veers into self-parody. At his weakest, Hannibal Lecter comes off like the thinking man’s version of Jigsaw from Saw, another effete hyper-moralist in a madman’s garb, given to windy proclamations about the fundamental nature of the world and its inhabitants, delivered from a place of wholly unearned moral superiority. At other times, he comes off like a homicidal J.D. Salinger, a famed recluse whose every appearance and utterance is a source of enduring fascination to a world that imagines he possesses some strange, secret knowledge beyond the comprehension of lesser souls.

It’s a testament to how deeply, thoroughly insane Hannibal is that Verger wanting Hannibal to be devoured by man-eating sows isn’t even its pulpiest element. No, that curious distinction belongs to a scene where Hannibal lobotomizes Krendler and serves him parts of his own brain. It’s astonishing that an ending where Verger is devoured by the very pigs he bred to eat Lecter, and an FBI agent eats bits of his own brain, actually represents a dramatically watered-down version of the book’s ending, which entailed hot Lecter-on-Starling action, brainwashing, and cattle-prod sodomy. Hannibal didn’t repeat its predecessor’s triumph at the Academy Awards, but making a movie based on Harris’ novel that was both palatable to a mainstream audience and surprisingly entertaining is an impressive accomplishment in its own right. Harris’ Hannibal took beloved characters further than even the Oscar-winning likes of Foster, Tally, and Demme were willing to go. Scott’s version pulled back from its source material’s delirious extremes, but it’s still strangely affecting, even unnerving.

Perhaps that’s why the film doesn’t tend to get talked about too much these days, even as the Hannibal Lecter money train kept rolling happily right along, first with Brett Ratner’s Red Dragon, then with the film prequel Hannibal Rising, and now with NBC’s Hannibal TV series. Even for fans of a book, film, and now television series about a cannibalistic serial killer, Hannibal was a bit much. That isn’t the kind of thing that wins Oscars, but in our jaded day and age, it’s certainly something. Up next: Jack Why was a sequel of Silence of the Lambs not made? - Quora Quora A sequel to the film was made: Hannibal (2001) There were also three prequels: Written Apr 13, 2015 Silence of the lamb had two sequels Hannibal (2001)AND Hannibal Rising (2007) film and prequel Red Dragon (2002)made out. No other film in this series was able to match the level set by Silence of the lamb. But Red dragon and Hannibal have enough to satisfy the needs of lector fans.

I feel once Jonathan Demme moved away from the Hannibal project, it went in another direction. Compared to Silence of the lamb, Hannibal is more violent and grotesque. I think whatever wrong with the film came from the book and Ridly Scott did a good job in holding it together considering the fact Jonathan refused the project for being too violent. Red Dragon was a decent job. It does give us a sense of déjà vu, But never the less a neat film. The other one I don't even want to talk about. The Silence of the Lambs (1991) - FAQ The content of this page was created directly by users and has not been screened or verified by IMDb staff. Visit our FAQ Help to learn more FAQ How much sex, violence, and profanity are in this movie? For detailed information about the amounts and types of (a) sex and nudity, (b) violence and gore, (c) profanity, (d) alcohol, drugs, and smoking, and (e) frightening and intense scenes in this movie, consult the IMDb Parents Guide for this movie. The Parents Guide for The Silence of the Lambs can be found here . What is 'The Silence of the Lambs' about?

When Catherine Martin ( Brooke Smith ), the daughter of Tennessee Senator Ruth Martin ( Diane Baker ), is kidnapped by a serial killer known only as Buffalo Bill ( Ted Levine ), F.B.I. agent-in-training Clarice Starling ( Jodie Foster ) is called upon to interact with psychopathic, cannibalistic killer psychiatrist Doctor Hannibal Lecter ( Anthony Hopkins ) who may have insights into the identity of Buffalo Bill. Is "The Silence of the Lambs" based on a book? The movie is based on The Silence of the Lambs, a 1988 novel by American writer Thomas Harris. The novel was adapted for the movie by American screenwriter Ted Tally. The Silence of the Lambs won the 1992 Academy Award for Best Motion Picture. There have since been two movie sequels, Hannibal (2001) and Hannibal Rising (2007) and one prequel Red Dragon (2002), also based on novels by Thomas Harris. Prior to The Silence of the Lambs, there was another Hannibal Lecter movie, Manhunter (1986), which was based on Harris' 1981 novel, Red Dragon. What does the title mean?

Clarice tells Lecter how she was orphaned at 10 years of age and sent to live on a sheep and horse ranch in Montana. One night she awoke to a terrible screaming and discovered the rancher was slaughtering the spring lambs. She grabbed a lamb and tried to rescue it. When she was found the next day, the rancher sent her away to live in an orphanage. The experience had a traumatic psychological effect on Clarice that haunts her for life. Lecter concludes that Clarice's fervent desire to save Catherine Martin will ultimately help her to silence the sound of the lambs screaming in her mind. When does the story take place? A picture of one of Buffalo Bill's victims has the year 1989 on it, so it must be either 1989 or the beginning of 1990. This is also implied when Chilton mentions the date of Hannibal's attack on a nurse (July 8th, 1981), and his remark that Hannibal has not seen a woman in 8 years.

This presumes that the nurse was indeed the last woman Hannibal came into contact with, which is a reasonable assumption, given that Hannibal was locked up in a dungeon with only male orderlies. What does 'quid pro quo' mean? Quid pro quo is Latin for "what for what" or "something for something." It refers to a reciprocal exchange. In the context of the movie, Lecter promises to feed information about Buffalo Bill to Clarice but only if she will tell him things about herself in return. What kind of moths was Buffalo Bill raising? Roden ( Dan Butler ) and Dr Pilcher ( Paul Lazar ) identify the one taken from the victim's throat as a Death's-Head moth (Acherontia styx), a species found only in Asia. In reality, the cocoon was made from Tootsie-Rolls and gummy bears, in case the actress swallowed it. Photos of a real Death's Head moth can be seen here . Why did Lecter make such a point of telling Starling about the census taker he ate?

The infamous line where Lecter tells Starling that he ate a census taker's liver with fava beans and a "nice Chianti" has a few meanings: On the one hand, it's a grotesque display of power. By mentioning that he did something like this to Starling, he's reminding her of what he is and, more so, of what he's capable of and how he regards selected people or people in general. On the other hand, apart from containing alcohol, a Chianti is likely to be rich in tyramine - especially the more so when aged, whereas fava beans also contain a considerable amount of tyramine. Liver that is usually eaten from animals can also be high in tyramine. For obvious reasons, less is known about how a human liver differs in its constituents from that of an animal in regards to diet, potential poisoning and specific interactions. This may either be mere coincidence, simply reflect Hannibal's cannibalistic taste, or could possibly be an attempt to confuse, mock or provoke students of psychiatry or the psychology of criminalistic behavior, such as Clarice.

Anything beyond that is speculative and elusive to investigations, as is probably intended, considering the context and the manner in which the statement was made as well as the nature of the individual it came from. How was Hannibal able to use the pen tip as a key for the handcuffs? Often in film, when a prisoner escapes from handcuffs without a key, a small, thin metal object is used. Until the release of this film, it'd been done many times by other characters in other movies. So it wasn't too hard for the writers to convince us that Hannibal could do the same thing. Also, he's an inventive genius, which makes it even more believable. In Thomas Harris' novel, the escape is almost exactly the same. Hannibal does steal a pen, though it wasn't Chilton's, it belonged to an attendant who had carelessly left it behind. Hannibal spends weeks cutting the shaft of the ink cartridge using only a small burr on a bolt that holds his bunk bed against the wall of his cell. When he has a length of the shaft cut to the right size, he cuts 2 small grooves in it lengthwise.

He hides it in his cheek, and a scan with a metal detecting wand misses it. In his new cell, while guarded by Pembry and Boyle, he uses the pen tip to bend the section of the shaft outward, making a key that he uses to undo the cuffs. The movie makes the scene a bit simpler, probably to save time and control the pacing. How could Hannibal possibly overpower both Pembry and Boyle? It was two armed men against one prisoner. Aside from the obvious answers like Hannibal undoing his cuffs with a piece of the pen he stole from Chilton, the bigger issue is that Boyle and Pembry didn't have the kind of respect for Hannibal's inventive genius that Barney did at the institution in Baltimore. Essentially, they considered Hannibal to be merely a prisoner to babysit. Hannibal's plan from the beginning was to get himself transferred away from Chilton (who he considered a tormentor).

If you watch the beginning of the escape scene, you can easily see the mistakes Boyle and Pembry make: Boyle puts the tray on the floor near Hannibal when he rolls up the sketches (with the sketches placed on the table that Hannibal eats from, this may have also been part of Hannibal's plan; Boyle probably should've handed the tray to Pembry.) Pembry, when removing the key from the lock, is standing around much too casually, not watching Hannibal closely enough, and even turns his back on him and begins to walk out of the cage.) Additionally, Boyle probably should not have been allowed to carry a pocket knife as a personal item when working with so dangerous a prisoner. In the end, Hannibal, over the course of a few days or so that he was incarcerated in Memphis, had ample enough time to observe both men and to discern the weaknesses in their procedures. Why does Clarice believe that "Jack Gordon" is actually Buffalo Bill? Her suspicions are aroused when "Gordon" asks if Frederika Bimmell was "a great big fat person." Lecter pointed out that all of the victims were larger women, because the killer wants their skins to fit onto a man's body.

That Gumb's first thought of a woman he didn't otherwise recognize was her size was enough to make Starling want to find out more. Once inside his house, Clarice recognizes the Death's Head moth in the living room. Gumb gives his name as "Jack Gordon." Those initials, J.G., are consistent with "Jame Gumb" and "John Grant," both aliases named by Crawford. How does the movie end? From Lecter's advice -- that Bill covets that which he sees every day -- Clarice and Ardelia deduce that the first victim could have been someone who Bill knew personally. Clarice drives to Belvedere, Ohio to talk with the father of the first victim, Frederika Bimmel. In looking over Frederika's bedroom, Clarice finds a music box ballerina, in which she finds a false bottom that contains pictures obviously missed during previous investigations. On the pictures, Frederika is seen posing, wearing only underwear, suggesting that there was indeed an unknown man in her life who took the pictures, most likely her murderer. Clarice goes through a wardrobe and notices the triangular gussets on Frederika's dresses match the pieces of skin Bill cut from one of his victims.

Clarice calls Jack Crawford ( Scott Glenn ) to inform him that Bill is making a "woman suit" of real skin. Crawford is already in route to Chicago, having identified Bill as Jame Gumb, but they find that the house where he's supposedly living has been abandoned. Clarice continues to poke around in Belvedere and interviews one of Frederika's friends, who points to the house of "old Mrs Littman" where she was often hanging around. Mrs Littman doesn't live there any more, but the current resident, who calls himself Jack Gordon, offers to give her Mrs Littman's son's business card and invites Clarice inside to wait. When she notices spools of thread and a Death's-Head moth, she realizes that Jack Gordon is really Jame "Buffalo Bill" Gumb. She pulls her gun on him, but Gumb leads her on a wild goose chase into the basement, where he has Catherine Martin imprisoned in a well. Gumb dons a night vision mask and turns out the lights, leaving Clarice to feel around in the dark. When he makes the mistake of cocking his gun, Clarice shoots him. Catherine is subsequently rescued.

In the final scenes, Clarice is shown graduating from the Academy. At the party that follows, she receives a phone call from Lecter, calling from the airport on the island of Bimini in the Bahamas. He assures her that he's not about to come looking for her and requests that she extend him the same courtesy, which Clarice cannot do, of course. He then says that he must hang up because "I'm having an old friend for dinner," as he watches Dr. Frederick Chilton deplane. What happens to Dr. Chilton? The closing, where Hannibal says: "I'm having an old friend for dinner" as he watches Dr. Chilton deplane, strongly suggests that Chilton ended up as one of Hannibal's meals. A small reference was made in the sequel novel Hannibal, where it was mentioned that Chilton disappeared seven years earlier while on vacation, strongly suggesting Hannibal had gotten his revenge (albeit in the novel, Chilton disappeared in Jamaica, not the Bahamas). However, this is never specifically stated in the sequel movie. The only reference to Dr.

Chilton in Hannibal is made by Barney, when he says that Lecter, when possible, preferred to eat "the rude," and Dr. Chilton "was a bad man," which also strongly implies Chilton became Hannibal's victim. Is Hannibal Lecter sociopathic, psychopathic, or something else? In the novel Red Dragon, Will Graham calls Lecter a "pure sociopath," but makes a point in mentioning that he only calls him this because a more appropriate term doesn't exist, meaning Lecter doesn't actually fit any psychological profile.This is echoed in the film version of The Silence of the Lambs, where Dr. Chilton refers to Lecter as a "pure psychopath," but given Chilton's incompetence, it makes sense that he would term Lecter's pathology so simply. Another reference to Graham's description in Red Dragon is made when Clarice tells a young security guard in the Tennessee asylum that "they don't have a name" for what Lecter is. According to the film's director, Jonathan Demme, Lecter is a good man trapped in an insane mind. Anthony Hopkins plays him as a refined, eloquent and seductive character who is very careful and cunning in his crimes.

This is more in line with a sociopathic pathology, as sociopaths are known to be more organized in their actions. If you consider the prequel novel Hannibal Rising to be canon (which many fans of the Lecter mythology don't), it is suggested that Hannibal's pathology is a result of irreparable trauma he suffered as a child; however, others contest this simple summary of the novel, and maintain that Lecter's childhood trauma is merely one, if not the main event that causes his already sociopathic tendencies to manifest themselves at a young age; this is suggested by Hannibal continuing to murder people, even after dealing with the people responsible for the trauma. In other words, Lecter would have become a serial killer anyway, but events from his childhood simply accelerated the process and provided him with a special focus. Some viewers even maintain that Lecter isn't actually insane at all but does horrific things simply because he wants to and is smart enough to get away with them. They maintain that the people in the novels and films refer to Lecter as insane simply because it's easier to term him as such; it gives them a false sense of security and makes them feel that they know how Lecter's mind works when they actually have no idea.

Simply put, it's possible that Lecter is a sociopath or a psychopath but, considering Graham's description, it's much more likely that Lecter is just pure evil. Why does Hannibal treat Barney Matthews so well? Over the years that Hannibal is incarcerated, Barney develops respect for Lecter's ingenuity and intelligence, not to mention, respects how dangerous Lecter is. Lecter develops respect for Barney's courteous and kind manner, and in the sequel, Barney points out that he never felt in danger after Lecter's jailbreak, as Lecter preferred to eat "the rude". In the novel, Lecter and Barney have a short exchange before Lecter is transferred: Lecter thanks Barney for being decent to him, and Barney accepts and wishes him well. Is this film a sequel to Manhunter? There are two schools of thought on this. One could certainly argue that The Silence of the Lambs is a sequel to Manhunter, since it features three of the same characters from Manhunter, that is, Hannibal Lecter, Jack Crawford, and Dr.

Frederick Chilton (played respectively by Brian Cox , Dennis Farina , and Benjamin Hendrickson in Manhunter and Anthony Hopkins , Scott Glenn , and Anthony Heald in The Silence of the Lambs). On the other hand, Manhunter was not a successful film, which is why Dino De Laurentiis chose not to produce this film. When The Silence of the Lambs was released, it was not marketed as a sequel to Manhunter. All references from the book that mention Will "the Red Dragon" Graham have been excised from the film. The two returning cast members, Frankie Faison and Dan Butler , play different roles. It's also worth noting that in early drafts, when the producers were not sure if they could use the characters from Manhunter, Ted Tally changed those characters' names to cut all ties with Manhunter. They were eventually changed back. However, given that Tally also wrote the screenplay for Red Dragon, which featured three out of four actors returning to their roles, including Faison playing his Silence role, it is more likely that Manhunter is meant to be part of a separate continuity, while Red Dragon is meant to be a direct prequel to The Silence of the Lambs.

What are the differences between the Theatrical Version and the Workprint? There are some differences between the Workprint version and the Theatrical Release. The Workprint is more or less a final cut of the movie. Beside many minor changes, here and there are some scenes, which were removed in the Theatrical Version. The image quality of the Workprint is especially in dark scenes pretty bad. The Workprint got an alternate Soundtrack. In some parts there is no or different music and in other parts the same music compared to the Thatrical Version. For example at the beginning when Starling runs through the wood. The Workprint features a different dark/haunting music with a musical box motive. Furthermore all the Credits and the location names are missing in the Workprint. A detailed comparison between both versions with pictures can be found here. Hounds of ‘Silence’ – EW.com Email Backstage at the March 30 Oscar ceremony, Best Actress Jodie Foster, Best Actor Anthony Hopkins, and Best Director Jonathan Demme all expressed their keen interest in continuing the saga of their audience- and award-winning The Silence of the Lambs. ”I want to make a sequel so bad,” admitted Demme.

With five newly minted Oscars to its name, including the one for Best Picture, plus $130.7 million in domestic box office and an estimated $50 million in sales to video stores, Silence seemed unquestionably destined to spawn a follow-up. Instead, thanks to a growing morass of odd, unexpected entanglements, Lambs 2 is suddenly Lambs stew and might not come along for years. The word within the publishing industry is that novelist Thomas Harris’ new book will once again pit FBI agent Clarice Starling against serial killer Hannibal Lecter in a devilish, sexually charged game of cat and mouse. Harris’ literary agent, Mort Janklow, won’t disclose any details, but he says the press-shy author will deliver his manuscript to his new publisher, Delacorte Press (which reportedly paid $5 to $7 million for Harris’ next two books), ”within 12 to 15 months.” That’s fine with Demme and Co. ”Right now everybody’s waiting for Tom’s book,” says Demme’s producer, Edward Saxon. ”We all respect Tom’s process a lot.

All we know is that when the new book comes out, we’d love to be involved.” Trouble is, financially beleaguered producer Dino De Laurentiis (King Kong, Blue Velvet) would love to be involved too. He contends that when he bought the movie rights to Harris’ Red Dragon, the first novel featuring Lecter (which De Laurentiis produced as the 1986 movie Manhunter), he also acquired the rights to all Lecter sequels. De Laurentiis says he gave permission to use Lecter in one movie only to Orion Pictures, which produced Lambs. Orion might be expected to launch its own bid for a sequel, if the bankrupt company survives; but, one of its few remaining executives admits, ”Orion doesn’t have a claim on very much right now.” Muddying the picture even more is a breach of contract suit De Laurentiis has filed against Universal Pictures. In the suit, De Laurentiis alleges that while renegotiating the budget for his upcoming Army of Darkness, Universal attempted to extort a promise that it be allowed to join the producer in making any Lambs sequel.

Universal’s attorney Bertram Fields says there was no extortion but they do have the promise: ”Anyone who knows Mr. De Laurentiis knows you cannot extort things from him. Universal contends that it has a contract with Mr. De Laurentiis that makes them equal partners in reference to The Silence of the Lambs sequel.” Harris’ representatives refuse to discuss whether or not De Laurentiis’ claim to all Lecter movie rights is valid. ”If Thomas Harris is writing a sequel, he owns the movie rights to that book,” observes one movie-industry ! insider. ”But it’s so complicated that I don’t think you could find your way through it without a lawyer. I promise you it will end up in litigation forever.” Forever is even longer than a life sentence. Hannibal Lecter couldn’t have devised a bigger feeding frenzy if he had cooked it up himself.

Show Full Article 'The Silence of the Lambs' Sequel Comes June 8 Volume 245 Issue 14 04/05/1999 'The Silence of the Lambs' Sequel Comes June 8 Judy Quinn | Apr 05, 1999 Break out the fava beans and chianti: serial killer Hannibal "the Cannibal" Lecter returns in Hannibal, Thomas Harris's long-awaited sequel to The Silence of the Lambs, the blockbuster bestseller that has sold some 10 million copies worldwide since its 1988 publication. On March 30 Delacorte announced it will publish the new book, a 480-page, $27.95 hardcover, on June 8 in a one-day national laydown. Based on just one day's response from accounts, Dell, which holds U.S. and Canadian hard/soft rights to the book, projected that a 500,000-copy first printing is likely and "will probably go up," said president and publisher Carole Baron. The book is a main selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club and an audio version will be published simultaneously by Random Audio.

According to Delacorte, the new novel opens seven years after Dr. Lecter's stunning escape from the authorities, the climax of the earlier book, as one of his earlier victims uses FBI agent Clarice Starling, also featured in Silence, as bait to draw the doctor out in the open to wreak revenge. Baron received Hannibal from the reclusive Harris on March 23. It was quite a wait for Baron; more than a decade ago, she signed Harris to a reported $5,750,000 two-book deal, of which this sequel is the first book (BOMC's deal was also made at that time). Harris's first two books, Black Sunday (1973) and Red Dragon (1981) were published by Putnam in hardcover, then reprinted by Bantam; Baron acquired the paperback rights for these books for Dell at the time of her new deal with Harris. St. Martin's is the U.S.

publisher of Silence both in hardcover and paper; with the news of the sequel delivery, SMP has announced a 300,000-copy re-release of a mass market edition of the book, to feature a new cover, and a yet-undetermined new printing of a trade paperback edition. According to Harris's literary agent, Mort Janklow, all those involved in the Academy Award-winning 1991 film adaptation of The Silence of the Lambs -- director Jonathan Demme, actors Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster -- have been sent copies of Hannibal so that film rights discussions can formally begin. A version of this article appeared in the 04/05/1999 issue of Publishers Weekly under the headline: Hannibal (2001) - IMDb IMDb There was an error trying to load your rating for this title. Some parts of this page won't work property. Please reload or try later. X Beta I'm Watching This! Keep track of everything you watch; tell your friends. Error Living in exile, Hannibal Lecter tries to reconnect with now disgraced FBI agent Clarice Starling and finds himself a target for revenge from a powerful victim.

Director: From $2.99 (SD) on Amazon Video ON DISC a list of 38 titles created 26 Mar 2011 a list of 36 titles created 03 Jul 2012 a list of 45 titles created 07 Oct 2012 a list of 23 titles created 18 Mar 2013 a list of 29 titles created 18 Jul 2014 Search for " Hannibal " on Amazon.com Connect with IMDb Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site? Use the HTML below. You must be a registered user to use the IMDb rating plugin. 8 wins & 16 nominations. See more awards » Videos A retired FBI agent with psychological gifts is assigned to help track down "The Tooth Fairy", a mysterious serial killer; aiding him is imprisoned criminal genius Hannibal "The Cannibal" Lecter. Director: Brett Ratner After the death of his parents during World War II, young Hannibal Lecter moves in with his beautiful aunt and begins plotting revenge on the barbarians responsible for his sister's death. Director: Peter Webber A young F.B.I.

cadet must confide in an incarcerated and manipulative killer to receive his help on catching another serial killer who skins his victims. Director: Jonathan Demme Former FBI profiler Will Graham returns to service to pursue a deranged serial murderer named "the Tooth Fairy" by the media. Director: Michael Mann An American seminary student travels to Italy to take an exorcism course. Director: Mikael Håfström Explores the early relationship between the renowned psychiatrist and his patient, a young FBI criminal profiler, who is haunted by his ability to empathize with serial killers. Stars: Hugh Dancy, Mads Mikkelsen, Caroline Dhavernas An attorney, intent on climbing the career ladder toward success, finds an unlikely opponent in a manipulative criminal he is trying to prosecute. Director: Gregory Hoblit A covert counter-terrorist unit called Black Cell led by Gabriel Shear wants the money to help finance their war against international terrorism, but it's all locked away. Gabriel brings in convicted hacker Stanley Jobson to help him. Director: Dominic Sena Two NYC cops arrest a Yakuza member and must escort him when he's extradited to Japan.

Director: Ridley Scott The vampire comes to England to seduce a visitor's fiancée and inflict havoc in the foreign land. Director: Francis Ford Coppola Teenage boys discover discipline and camaraderie on an ill-fated sailing voyage. Director: Ridley Scott Balian of Ibelin travels to Jerusalem during the crusades of the 12th century, and there he finds himself as the defender of the city and its people. Director: Ridley Scott Edit Storyline The continuing saga of Hannibal Lecter, the murdering cannibal. He is presently in Italy and works as a curator at a museum. Clarice Starling, the FBI agent whom he aided to apprehend a serial killer, was placed in charge of an operation but when one of her men botches it, she's called to the mat by the Bureau. One high ranking official, Paul Krendler has it in for her. But she gets a reprieve because Mason Verger, one of Lecter's victims who is looking to get back at Lecter for what Lecter did to him, wants to use Starling to lure him out. When Lecter sends her a note she learns that he's in Italy so she asks the police to keep an eye out for him.

But a corrupt policeman who wants to get the reward that Verger placed on him, tells Verger where he is. But they fail to get him. Later Verger decides to frame Starling which makes Lecter return to the States. And the race to get Lecter begins. Written by rcs0411@yahoo.com The silence will be broken. See more » Genres: Rated R for strong gruesome violence, some nudity and language | See all certifications » Parents Guide: 9 February 2001 (USA) See more » Also Known As: The Silence of the Lambs 2 See more » Filming Locations: $58,003,121 (USA) (9 February 2001) Gross: Did You Know? Trivia There is a vegetarian cookbook on top of the fridge in the "dinner scene" toward the end of the movie. It's visible when Hannibal pushes Clarice against the fridge.

See more » Goofs In the opening scene, Verger asks Barney questions about Starling's relationship with Lecter that imply it's their first discussion on the subject, yet Verger subsequently tells Barney to "keep all those items from your personal treasure trove coming," implying that they meet on a regular basis. See more » Quotes [apparently about to cut Starling's hand off with a cleaver] Hannibal Lecter : This is really gonna hurt. See more » Crazy Credits After the credits, we hear Lecter say "Ta ta, H.", the closing line of the post-script in his letter to Clarice. See more » Connections Performed by The City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra (as City of Prague Philharmonic) Courtesy of Silva Screen Records (Edinburgh, United Kingdom) – See all my reviews I like this film a lot, but of course it suffers - as all sequels do - by comparison to its predecessor, in this case 'Silence of the Lambs' The main reason for having a sequel at all was to showcase again the character of Hannibal Lecter, a monstrous creation everyone wanted to see more of after the first film.

It could have bombed badly therefore if writer and actor had let us down by failing to catch the magic again. It was after all a decade after the original was made. But they don't, and Anthony Hopkins turns in another delicious performance as the man with the evil intent cloaked in inestimable, menacing charm. Julianne Moore drew the short straw in having to re-create the Clarice Starling role that had been so memorably played by another actress. She does well in my opinion, but inevitably we keep thinking 'where is Jodie Foster?', and this lends her portrayal a lack of credibility which is entirely unfair. Gary Oldman's Mason Verger is suitably loathsome and manages to make Lecter seem almost like the hero in their battle of wits. If there is a weak link, Ray Liotta's Krendler seems a bit misplaced. The direction deserves special mention. The lush, beautiful settings are mocked by the horror of what is happening in them and the perfectly-selected atmospheric music stayed in my mind long after the film had ended. Once again, the film lacks realism, but as with the original, it doesn't matter. Of course things like this don't really happen - but so what? It's a film.

Get over it! I was prompted after seeing it to read the books, and the right decision was made in changing the ending of this story from that written by Thomas Harris. We were subsequently treated to another look at Lecter in a decent prequel movie, 'Red Dragon,' but I will not be alone in hoping that some day we will see yet more of him in a further instalment. Unlikely I suspect - but not impossible. 55 of 81 people found this review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes The Hannibal Lecter Trilogy -- The Silence of the Lambs / Hannibal / Red Dragon DVD 2002: Amazon.co.uk: Anthony Hopkins, Julianne Moore, Edward Norton, Ralph Fiennes, Gary Oldman, Ray Liotta, Frankie Faison, Giancarlo Giannini, Francesca Neri, Zeljko Ivanek, Hazelle Goodman, David Andrews, Brett Ratner, Ridley Scott, Andrew Z. Davis, Branko Lustig, David Mamet, Steven Zaillian, Ted Tally, Thomas Harris: DVD & Blu-ray Product Description Product Description A triple bill of Hannibal Lecter films.

'Red Dragon' (2002) is Hannibal Lecter's (Anthony Hopkins) third film outing but is based on the first Thomas Harris novel which introduced the character. FBI agent Will Graham (Edward Norton) has retired with his family to Florida after a near-death experience when he tracked down and captured Lecter. However, when a new serial killer, 'the tooth fairy' who kills whole families, is discovered, Graham finds himself back on the force and asking for Lecter's help. But the tooth fairy has been writing to Lecter and Lecter cannot resist playing each side off each other, to such an extent that Graham's family are to be the next victims. In 'The Silence of the Lambs' (1990) FBI officer Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) is investigating a bizarre and gruesome series of murders, carried out by 'Buffalo Bill'. The investigation steps up a gear when the mayor's daughter is abducted. Starling turns for help to incarcerated psychopath Lecter (Hopkins), who has a penchant for chewing people's faces off. Given special privileges in exchange for information, Lecter escapes, leaving two twisted killers on the loose.

Whilst in 'Hannibal' (2001) it is ten years since the events of the previous film and FBI agent Clarice Starling (Julianne Moore), recently in trouble with her superiors over a bungled shoot-out, suddenly receives a letter from the escaped Hannibal. It does not reveal his whereabouts, but after many years of inactivity, it does announce his interest in returning to the public domain. Clarice has the letter analysed and begins scanning the internet, desperately searching for any clues which will help her reach him before he strikes again. Meanwhile, one of Hannibal's previous victims, the horribly disfigured multi-millionaire Mason Verger, is also on the trail of his tormentor, eager for revenge and the chance to introduce the good doctor to his herd of specially-cultivated carnivorous pigs. From Amazon.co.uk Based on Thomas Harris's novel, Jonathan Demme's terrifying adaptation of Silence of the Lambs contains only a couple of genuinely shocking moments (one involving an autopsy, the other a prison break). The rest of the film is a splatter-free visual and psychological descent into the hell of madness, redeemed astonishingly by an unlikely connection between a monster and a haunted young woman.

Anthony Hopkins is extraordinary as the cannibalistic psychiatrist Dr Hannibal Lecter; Jodie Foster is equally memorable as the vulnerable FBI agent-in-training Clarice Starling. --Tom Keogh Hannibal is set 10 years after Silence of the Lambs, as Dr Hannibal "the Cannibal" Lecter (Anthony Hopkins, reprising his Oscar-winning role) is living the good life in Italy, studying art and sipping espresso. FBI agent Clarice Starling (Julianne Moore replaces Jodie Foster), on the other hand, hasn't had it so good. The film is so stylistically different from its predecessor that it forces you to take it on its own terms. Director Ridley Scott gives the film a sleek, almost European look that lets you know that, unlike the first film (which was about the quintessentially American Clarice), this movie is all Hannibal. Hopkins and Moore are both first-rate, but the film contrives to keep them as far apart as possible. When they do connect it's quite thrilling but it's unfortunately too little too late.

--Mark Englehart Anthony Hopkins returns as Hannibal Lecter in Red Dragon, a prequel to The Silence of the Lambs and a remake of 1986's Manhunter, Michael Mann's fine film of Thomas Harris's terrific book, in which Brian Cox carved the ham thinner as a more menacing, less hokey cannibal. This film beefs up Lecter's role, as FBI agent Will Graham (Edward Norton) consults Lecter on the Tooth Fairy case, which means some pointed and familiar conversations, and the film then shifts focus from the investigation to the life and troubles of the mad and murderous but also abused and sympathetic Francis Dolarhyde (Ralph Fiennes, with a major tattoo and a harelip). It's hard not to compare the current cast with Mann's excellent players. Still, Red Dragon is a solid film of great material, with all the sudden shocks and disturbing whispers in places. --Kim Newman Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought Page 1 of 1 Start over Page 1 of 1 This shopping feature will continue to load items. In order to navigate out of this carousel please use your heading shortcut key to navigate to the next or previous heading.

Thomas Harris hands in the sequel book to THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS' Thomas Harris hands in the sequel book to THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS' Published at: March 31, 1999, 2:22 a.m. CST by staff A few years ago one of the major magazines (TIME, NEWSWEEK, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY or someone else) had a poll on what sequel to what movie they craved the most, and if memory serves (which it often doesn't) I seem to recall that after STAR WARS, the next most wanted sequel was to SILENCE OF THE LAMBS... For quite some time now we've heard that Jonathon Demme, Ted Tally, Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins were all a sitting back and a waiting on Thomas Harris to hand in the manuscript, which has long been rumored to be entitled.... MORBIDITY OF THE SOUL... We've had quotes from Hopkins, Foster, Demme and even Harris himself pop up in the media as well as to our spies. But, finally this report seems to say... well... the book is done... Now we'll see if everyone bites...

I hope I hope I hope I hope... Here's Mr Blinky with the report... Honorable Harry-San: Here's a brief item about the sequel to "The Silence of the Lambs." I'd say it was a lead-pipe cinch to become an ass-kicking movie, except for the fact that the dead, clammy hand of Dino De Laurentiis is involved. Call me Mr.. Blinky.... PW Daily for Booksellers, (March 30, 1999) Silence of the Lambs Author Makes Some Noise Break out the fava beans and Chianti:. Serial killer Hannibal "the Cannibal" Lecter returns in Hannibal, Thomas Harris' finally delivered, long-awaited sequel to The Silence of the Lambs, his blockbuster bestseller that has sold some 10 million copies worldwide since its 1988 publication. Today, Delacorte announced it will publish the new book, a 480-page, $27.95 hardcover, on June 8 in a one-day national laydown. Based on just one day's response from accounts, Dell, which holds U.S.

and Canada hard/soft rights to the book, projected that a 500,000-copy first printing is looking likely and "will probably go up," said president and publisher Carole Baron. The book is also a Main Selection of the Book of the Month Club with an audio version to be published simultaneously by Random Audio. According to Delacorte, the new novel opens seven years after Dr. Lecter's stunning escape from the authorities, the climax of the earlier book, as one of his earlier victims uses FBI Agent Clarice Starling, also featured in Silence, as bait to draw the doctor out in the open to wreak revenge. Baron wouldn't divulge much more of the plot, but did note that a scene of the book takes place in Florence, which brings to mind the rumors that popped up in 1994 when Harris attended the Milan-based trial of Pietro Pacciani, a farmer accused of being a serial killer. Harris was seen chatting extensively with the detective who launched the investigation, fueling speculation that Pacciani might be the subject of his next book.

Baron would only say that "none of what you've read about the plot before in the papers is true," and that Harris "has written the kind of rich, complex book that booksellers will love to sell." Baron, who said she knew for the last six months or so that the manuscript might be coming this year, received Hannibal from the reclusive Harris on March 23. It has been quite a wait; over a decade ago, she signed Harris to a reported $5,750,000 two-book deal, of which this sequel is the first book (BOMC's deal was also at this time). Harris's first two books, Black Sunday (1973) and Red Dragon (1981) were published by Putnam in hardcover, then reprinted by Bantam; Baron acquired the paperback rights for these books for Dell at the time of her deal. St. Martin's is the U.S.

publisher of The Silence of the Lambs; after the news of the sequel delivery, SMP announced a 300,000 re-release of a mass market edition of the book, to feature a new cover, as well as a yetundetermined new printing of a trade paperback edition of the book, which had been issued last year at the book's tenth anniversary. According to Harris's literary agent, Mort Janklow, all those involved in the Academy Award winning 1991 film adaptation of The Silence of the Lambs--director Jonathan Demme, actors Anthony Hopkins (Lecter) and Jodie Foster (Starling)--have just been sent a copy of Hannibal. The rights background for this book, even for Hollywood, is particularly complex. Dino De Laurentiis has some claim on the Lecter character since he produced Manhunter, the film adaptation of the Red Dragon, in which the character of Lecter first appears. De Laurentiis previously hammered out a one-picture agreement with Orion for its release of its The Silence of the Lambs adaptation.

Additionally, due to a 1992 out-of-court settlement, De Laurentiis must give Universal to first negotiation/last refusal opportunity to bid on domestic rights to this sequel; if De Laurentiis chooses not to exercise his rights to produce the sequel, Universal will have right to take its place.--Judy Quinn Mindhole Blowers: 20 Facts About The Silence of the Lambs That Might Make You Crave a Nice Chianti Mindhole Blowers: 20 Facts About The Silence of the Lambs That Might Make You Crave a Nice Chianti By Cindy Davis | Seriously Random Lists | February 27, 2012 | Comments ( ) 4. Foster said she knew she was second choice when she went to see Demme. He asked her why she wanted the part so much and she went into an "unnecessary diatribe" on how it fit into her personal agenda and career, and the mythology of a female hero like Clarice Starling. Foster thought it was almost unheard of in cinematic history to have a woman saving other women.

Of Clarice's story about the lambs, the actress said everyone was expecting to hear about some big, horrific thing that had happened to her but instead, "Clarice's story was a small event that instead of shaping her life--it told her who she already was. The idea was, the hero was the hero before he was born and it's just a question of fate--there will be instances that will challenge the heroism and it will show itself to them. [sic] Even when the hero was eight or nine years old it was there." 5. The original opening sequence was to have Clarice bursting into a room of terrorists...chaos, a woman being held captive and then everyone yelling, "Just kidding!" (An FBI training exercise.) 6. The director said he saw "many terrific actors" for the role of Jame Gumb, but no one was really scary.

Ted Levine (Shutter Island, American Gangster) came in and he was "terrifying." FBI Expert and Profiler, John Douglas explained that the Buffalo Bill character was actually a composite of three (real-life) killers rolled into one: Ted Bundy, who wore a cast on his arm and waited outside a library; as soon as he saw a victim, he'd drop the books and wait for the "good samaritan," then smack her over the head with the cast. Gary Heidnik would go on a hunt to pick up women and held several captive at a time. Heidnik had the pit, which he would fill with water. He would put a victim in the pit and touch electrified wire to her handcuffs to torture her. He also put a victim in freezer, ground up the body, mixed it with dog food and fed to the rest of his victims. Ed Gein, after his mother died, tried to dig up graves of elderly women and killed two others. Gein took the women's bodies back to his farm, peeled off their faces and preserved the skin by putting oil on them. Gein would wear the faces and stare at himself, dressing up with wigs jewelry and fake breasts. 7.

Jack Crawford (played by Scott Glenn) is based on John Douglas, as is the character in Harris' Red Dragon and The Silence of the Lambs. Thomas Harris did extensive research for his novels at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia--as did Jodie Foster and Scott Glenn. The FBI was interested in getting women into the bureau and allowed Foster to train with Special Agent Mary Ann Krause and filming at the Academy. Douglas noted that a third of agents are women; one woman of a dozen agents is a profiler. The signs on a tree at Quantico reading "Hurt. Agony. Pain. Love--It" were there already, not set dressing. John Douglas said that Scott Glenn was very liberal and didn't believe in the death penalty--it really bothered the agent. Douglas played him an audio tape of two killers whose goal was to pick a teenager for every year, starting at 13, and torture the kids; they made tapes of kids screaming and yelling and begging to be killed, to put them out of their misery. Douglas said he played the audio less than one minute and Glenn had tears in his eyes. Douglas, who is "all for the death penalty," spoke of being asked to witness executions.

Before he does so, he always looks at the crime scene photos because he doesn't want to lose sight that the victims come first. Demme, who several times spoke of his mixed feelings about the FBI (he felt the agency did as much harm as possible good) didn't think he needed to listen to or view anything at Behavioral Sciences. 8. Brooke Smith ("Grey's Anatomy," In Her Shoes), who gained 25 pounds to play Catherine Martin, had only done one previous acting role. Demme said her inexperience helped. He wanted to honor real life victims by not having someone "acting." The director said for him, Catherine begging in the pit was the hardest scene for him to do. He felt he had to "...lean on Smith a lot to dramatically honor people who have been confined thusly." 9. To save money, extensive location scouting was done (keeping as close to Quantico as possible). The Soldiers and Sailor's Museum in Pittsburgh, PA held Lecter in his cage, a nearby GE Turbine plant that had just closed was huge and Lecter's cell area was built within, as was the Gumb home and pit.

Demme said the cell was a challenge--in the book there was netting, but that would have been impossible to film through. Production Designer Kristi Zea came up with the plexiglass idea and each day of shooting, Anthony Hopkins had to be bolted in behind the glass. Foster said he'd stay in there and that it was strange because the two actors never got to spend time together or talk to each other (outside of filming). 10. While Demme was worried about Jodie Foster being right for Clarice, so was Foster concerned about Demme, who up to that point had been known more for his comedies. The actress thought he might make the FBI look silly, but she was quickly reassured. During Foster's first scene, Demme said his worst fears were realized ("his heart sank") when she spoke and all he heard was "California." The director asked Foster where Clarice's accent was and she told him she was doing it very subtly, so that only Lecter could hear it. Demme asked Foster to try again and he was bowled over by the change--suddenly she was Clarice. Anthony Hopkins also felt intimidated and wasn't sure how he would be received.

Hopkins said he prepared by going over the script in sections, "Twenty times, thirty times, two hundred fifty times." It was Hopkins' idea to have Lecter dressed all in white, because people already have a fear of dentists and doctors; people in white. 11. Demme wanted Lecter's cell to seem like it was down in the bowels of hell; "Lecter is so dangerous, he is kept as far away from the rest of us as he can be." The sound effects when Clarice is taken down include submarine noises. Because going to meet Lecter was done from Clarice's point of view, a crewmember wheeled (on a dolly) cinematographer Tak Fujimoto (Gladiator, The Sixth Sense, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Pretty in Pink, Badlands) and his handheld camera down the hallway, panning over to Lecter. Demme asked Hopkins how he saw the first scene; did he think Lecter should be sitting, reading a book, lying down? Hopkins said he'd like to be standing at attention. He thought it was terrifying that when Clarice first sees him, Lecter is staring right at her.

Hopkins commented that the line when he says to Clarice, "You know what you look like to me, with your good bag and your cheap shoes? You look like a rube..." is what he latched his whole performance on. He didn't think too much about the voice or the accent, rather he "concentrated on the spine of the part." He also saw the character of Lecter as Hal from 2001: A Space Odyssey, locked in a brilliant, genius, evil mind. Hopkins felt the best moment from Jodie was when he finished that speech--it destroyed her. "There were five different looks on her face and she's trying not to cry." Foster also talked about Hopkins making fun of her accent off camera--she said it made her mad and that it added something to the mix. 12. Jodie Foster said that because half the film was done with her directly in camera, it was very intense. If she moved even an inch forward, she'd be out of focus and so had to stay very still. She was exhausted by the end of every day. But the actress also said that Clarice is her most favorite character, that she admired and respected Clarice.

Though she hadn't done much theater, Foster felt she could do The Silence of the Lambs for the rest of her life because of the dialogue. 13. Demme was in awe of the sucking noise that Hopkins made when he said "I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti." Hopkins explained that he thought he remembered the sound from the Dracula film Bela Lugosi did--but he wasn't sure if it actually heard Lugosi make it or if he (Hopkins) just dreamed it. 14. The severed head that Clarice discovers in the storage garage is Producer Ed Saxon, wearing a face mask. Saxon has cameos in all Demme's films. Producer Kenny Utt played a doctor, Director Roger Corman (who told Demme the most terrifying shot is approaching a closed door-- Demme incorporated several times) is the FBI Director and Director George Romero, an FBI agent. Character actor Charles Napier who played a police lieutenant has also been in every Demme movie since 1978. Napier, who most recently voiced Dr. Spelts on "Archer," died October 5, 2011.

Lauren Roselli (who plays Stacy Hubka, friend of the first victim) was part of 80s band, Book of Love and Demme's friend--she also appeared in Philadelphia. 15. The Death's-head Hawkmoths that were first brought in got too cold and died immediately. The moth wranglers (Leanore G. Drogin, Raymond A. Mendez) had to order lookalike moths and put them in costume, made of painted fake nails cut into shapes and crazy-glued on. Unfortunately, the moths couldn't fly because the glue was too stiff, but eventually, a flexible glue was found. The moths were also attached with special string to sticks so they could be controlled and to make it look like the moths were flying. The skull on the moth that appears on the film poster is a copy from a photograph entitled In Voluptas Mors by Philippe Halsman. The original photo features Salvador Dalí with seven women posing to make a skull, itself inspired by a Dalí drawing--Human Skull Consisting of Seven Naked Women's Bodies. 16. For the scene when Clarice tells Lecter about the lambs, Demme wanted visuals.

Ted Tally wrote a long scene with young Clarice, the climax of which was the lambs being slaughtered by a cowboy; when he turns around to face Clarice--it's Lecter. But in the end Demme felt "nothing could match the power of Jodie's face as she was telling the story. 17. Ted Levine improvised Gumb's dance--it wasn't in the script. Demme asked Levine if he wanted to get naked and dance in front of a mirror. The director never felt Gumb was a gay character, but rather a person who hated himself so much that he just wanted to make himself as far away from what he was, as he possibly could. After the film came out, there were public protests by the gay and lesbian community, who didn't like the portrayal of what they assumed was a gay or transsexual character. Demme said it was his one regret about the film, that the Gumb character wasn't better clarified. 18. Demme called Thomas Harris asking him to give criticism, the director wanted the film to be pure.

"Tom told him his feelings shouldn't be hurt if he didn't see cuts, or even see the movie for a long time." The author was concerned that the actors would steal his characters from him, referencing John le Carré. After seeing Alec Guinness in "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy," le Carré said could no longer write Smiley because the character belonged to Guinness. 19. The last day of shooting (22 hours) was the basement scene. Foster laughed when she says everyone asks how they did the scene in the dark--which of course they didn't. The clue to that (and goof) is that when Gumb raises his gun, its shadow can be seen on Clarice's back. Demme remarked on how Foster had to take out the bullets and reload the pistol, while being completely terrified; he called Jodie a tremendous physical actor. 20. The film was supposed to have been released in the fall of 1990, but being a small studio, Orion Pictures was already pushing Dances with Wolves, a film they considered a good Oscar contender.

Because they didn't think it could command enough theaters for both films, The Silence of the Lambs was shelved until February, 1991. Demme chose Valentine's Day because he thought it would be a great date movie. The movie earned the big five Academy Awards: Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Director and Best Picture, and it earned $273 million at the box office. Nonetheless, Orion Pictures went bankrupt. Though the acting/directing team was expected to return for the sequel, both Jonathan Demme and Jodie Foster bowed out, feeling Hannibal distorted the relationship between Clarice and Dr. Lecter.

Question: What was the sequel of the book The Silence of the Lambs
Answer: Hannibal