Hannibal ««½
R, 131m. 2001
Cast & Credits: Anthony Hopkins (Dr. Hannibal Lecter), Julianne Moore (Clarice Starling), Ray Liotta (Paul Kendler), Frankie R. Faison (Barney), Giancarlo Giannini (Pazzi), Francesca Neri (Allegra Pazzi), Zeljko Ivanek (Dr. Cordell Doemling). Screenplay by David Mamet and Steven Zaillian based on the novel by Thomas Harris. Directed by Ridley Scott.
When I saw Silence of the Lambs (1991), a friend of mine took note midway through the movie how some people walked out just as a certain, gruesome unsettling scene of violence and gore was about to come up.
The scene was when Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) breaks out of his jail cell and murders two security guards. He bites the face off one and then shortly before the SWAT teams arrive, hangs the guard up in the form of an angel. As for the other poor soul, Lecter cuts the guy’s face off using it as a mask making the paramedics think they’re tending to one of the security guards when it’s actually "Hannibal the Cannibal" himself.
The good Dr. Lecter, not to mention the filmmakers, have outdone themselves this time in Hannibal. I won’t tell you what happens in the last 15-20 minutes of the film that caused both my arms to go limp and my stomach to want to regurgitate my lunch. I don’t think there has ever been a movie I have seen so far in my lifetime that’s ever been this revoltingly sick. I had a hard time trying to keep my eyes glued to the big screen.
Silence of the Lambs was a haunting, psychological mind game played out between Lecter and FBI Special Agent Clarice Starling, then played by Oscar winning actress Jodie Foster. The film was a character study of Clarice who, at the same time, must not only race against time to capture a serial killer but battle her own inner demons, much of which had to do with living under the shadow of her father who was killed in the line of duty when she was a young girl.
Silence of the Lambs ended on a chilling note with Hannibal Lecter phoning Starling from an undisclosed location and on the loose.
“I do wish we can chat more but I am having an old friend over for dinner,” Lecter said in reference to his psychologist that had him under supervision for years. Everyone knows what Lecter did to his shrink though the grisly events occurred off screen.
Whereas Silence of the Lambs sent a suspenseful chill up my spines, Hannibal serves as more of an endurance test to see how much gore one can digest before they head to the toilet. I almost headed there myself.
That’s not to say director Ridley Scott (Gladiator - 2000) and screenwriters David Mamet (The Spanish Prisoner - 1997) and Steven Zaillian (Schindler’s List - 1993) don’t try. They do what they can with the material based on author Thomas Harris’ critically loathed yet widely read bestseller. The film has its share of startlingly beautiful yet frightening images.
Julianne Moore takes over Jodie Foster’s role. Moore’s Starling is not as vulnerable as the Foster character was in Silence of the Lambs (she makes The Guinness Book of World Records list as the FBI agent having killed the most people). She’s probably not the kind of person one would want to go out on a date with. Instead of settling down at home with a relaxing musical compact disc, Starling settles down in a chair with a drink in one hand listening to one of her tape-recorded conversations she had with Lecter while he was incarcerated.
Does she ever think about Hannibal Lecter, asks one character?
“Thirty seconds of every day,” Starling says who soon realizes she is a pawn in a much more sinister game.
Like the Lecter character in Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal has another great villain in the form of a wheelchair bound and convicted pedophile millionaire, Mason Verger; one of the few remaining victims of Dr. Lecter who is still alive. Verger, whose face was horribly disfigured in front of the former psychologist years ago, resides in a mansion that despite looking well furnished with exotic animals and expensive statues could well pass for that dark, underground dungeon Lecter lived in before he escaped. Verger, who feeds Starling information as to Lecter’s whereabouts, wants to capture his nemesis for himself so he can feed him to a hoard of wild hungry boars.
The film is shot in a dreary, ominous way. The sun never shines. Everywhere the characters go the skies are always gray. While at night, especially for those scenes where Hannibal resides in Italy, the atmosphere is a dark, bluish mist, which make such scenes as when the insides of one of the doctor’s enemy splatters to the ground in a puddle seem less graphic.
I could tell how much Hopkins is enjoying himself in this role. I don’t think there has ever been a role in his movie career where he has had this much fun. Lecter relishes his freedom as he teaches historical classes about betrayal under the name “Dr. Fell”, sporting the most expensive wardrobes and enjoying the best wines. I almost thought a tear was about to run down his eye as he was watching an Italian opera. The sad, operatic soundtrack supplied by music composer Hans Zimmer was hauntingly similar to the one he did for Scott’s Gladiator.
The Lecter character here this time is seen more as the hero or should I say antihero. All the villains get just what they deserve from Verger and the greedy Italian police inspector (Giancarlo Giannini) to the crooked FBI director (Ray Liotta) whose interest in Starling is only sexual.
Throughout much of Hannibal, though, my stomach was in twisted knots watching it and I am not talking about the kind one might get watching a scary, suspenseful movie.
I am compelled to ask people who loved the film two questions. They’re the same questions I asked when I saw Silence of the Lambs ten years ago. Did anyone find Hannibal entertaining and why? (I did not.) And two, given that people can build their home video libraries with either their favorite VHS or DVD movies, why would he/she possibly want to see this picture again? (I wouldn’t rent or purchase this title.)
Hannibal will likely generate enough revenue to warrant another sequel (Hopkins has already said he wouldn’t mind doing a third). I have no doubt a lot of moviegoers will be hungry to see Hannibal Lecter “return to public life” again. Fans were apparently so hungry for a Lambs follow-up that some actually thought Instinct (1999) was actually the sequel that featured Hopkins in a similar role.
I admit the picture looked promising just from the previews I saw. The desire to see it was equivalent to the kind of feeling I get when I can’t wait to sink my teeth into a nice big juicy 20-ounce steak.
The problem is once you’ve finished the meal, which in my case was watching the film, I felt as though I had come down with either a slight case of indigestion or stomach flu.
Note: Unlike every other review written in entertainment magazines and newspapers about this film, I did not, nor will I reveal who plays the Mason Verger character in Hannibal.
©2/21/01
R, 131m. 2001
Cast & Credits: Anthony Hopkins (Dr. Hannibal Lecter), Julianne Moore (Clarice Starling), Ray Liotta (Paul Kendler), Frankie R. Faison (Barney), Giancarlo Giannini (Pazzi), Francesca Neri (Allegra Pazzi), Zeljko Ivanek (Dr. Cordell Doemling). Screenplay by David Mamet and Steven Zaillian based on the novel by Thomas Harris. Directed by Ridley Scott.
The scene was when Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) breaks out of his jail cell and murders two security guards. He bites the face off one and then shortly before the SWAT teams arrive, hangs the guard up in the form of an angel. As for the other poor soul, Lecter cuts the guy’s face off using it as a mask making the paramedics think they’re tending to one of the security guards when it’s actually "Hannibal the Cannibal" himself.
The good Dr. Lecter, not to mention the filmmakers, have outdone themselves this time in Hannibal. I won’t tell you what happens in the last 15-20 minutes of the film that caused both my arms to go limp and my stomach to want to regurgitate my lunch. I don’t think there has ever been a movie I have seen so far in my lifetime that’s ever been this revoltingly sick. I had a hard time trying to keep my eyes glued to the big screen.
Silence of the Lambs was a haunting, psychological mind game played out between Lecter and FBI Special Agent Clarice Starling, then played by Oscar winning actress Jodie Foster. The film was a character study of Clarice who, at the same time, must not only race against time to capture a serial killer but battle her own inner demons, much of which had to do with living under the shadow of her father who was killed in the line of duty when she was a young girl.
Silence of the Lambs ended on a chilling note with Hannibal Lecter phoning Starling from an undisclosed location and on the loose.
“I do wish we can chat more but I am having an old friend over for dinner,” Lecter said in reference to his psychologist that had him under supervision for years. Everyone knows what Lecter did to his shrink though the grisly events occurred off screen.
Whereas Silence of the Lambs sent a suspenseful chill up my spines, Hannibal serves as more of an endurance test to see how much gore one can digest before they head to the toilet. I almost headed there myself.
That’s not to say director Ridley Scott (Gladiator - 2000) and screenwriters David Mamet (The Spanish Prisoner - 1997) and Steven Zaillian (Schindler’s List - 1993) don’t try. They do what they can with the material based on author Thomas Harris’ critically loathed yet widely read bestseller. The film has its share of startlingly beautiful yet frightening images.
Julianne Moore takes over Jodie Foster’s role. Moore’s Starling is not as vulnerable as the Foster character was in Silence of the Lambs (she makes The Guinness Book of World Records list as the FBI agent having killed the most people). She’s probably not the kind of person one would want to go out on a date with. Instead of settling down at home with a relaxing musical compact disc, Starling settles down in a chair with a drink in one hand listening to one of her tape-recorded conversations she had with Lecter while he was incarcerated.
Does she ever think about Hannibal Lecter, asks one character?
“Thirty seconds of every day,” Starling says who soon realizes she is a pawn in a much more sinister game.
Like the Lecter character in Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal has another great villain in the form of a wheelchair bound and convicted pedophile millionaire, Mason Verger; one of the few remaining victims of Dr. Lecter who is still alive. Verger, whose face was horribly disfigured in front of the former psychologist years ago, resides in a mansion that despite looking well furnished with exotic animals and expensive statues could well pass for that dark, underground dungeon Lecter lived in before he escaped. Verger, who feeds Starling information as to Lecter’s whereabouts, wants to capture his nemesis for himself so he can feed him to a hoard of wild hungry boars.
The film is shot in a dreary, ominous way. The sun never shines. Everywhere the characters go the skies are always gray. While at night, especially for those scenes where Hannibal resides in Italy, the atmosphere is a dark, bluish mist, which make such scenes as when the insides of one of the doctor’s enemy splatters to the ground in a puddle seem less graphic.
I could tell how much Hopkins is enjoying himself in this role. I don’t think there has ever been a role in his movie career where he has had this much fun. Lecter relishes his freedom as he teaches historical classes about betrayal under the name “Dr. Fell”, sporting the most expensive wardrobes and enjoying the best wines. I almost thought a tear was about to run down his eye as he was watching an Italian opera. The sad, operatic soundtrack supplied by music composer Hans Zimmer was hauntingly similar to the one he did for Scott’s Gladiator.
The Lecter character here this time is seen more as the hero or should I say antihero. All the villains get just what they deserve from Verger and the greedy Italian police inspector (Giancarlo Giannini) to the crooked FBI director (Ray Liotta) whose interest in Starling is only sexual.
Throughout much of Hannibal, though, my stomach was in twisted knots watching it and I am not talking about the kind one might get watching a scary, suspenseful movie.
I am compelled to ask people who loved the film two questions. They’re the same questions I asked when I saw Silence of the Lambs ten years ago. Did anyone find Hannibal entertaining and why? (I did not.) And two, given that people can build their home video libraries with either their favorite VHS or DVD movies, why would he/she possibly want to see this picture again? (I wouldn’t rent or purchase this title.)
Hannibal will likely generate enough revenue to warrant another sequel (Hopkins has already said he wouldn’t mind doing a third). I have no doubt a lot of moviegoers will be hungry to see Hannibal Lecter “return to public life” again. Fans were apparently so hungry for a Lambs follow-up that some actually thought Instinct (1999) was actually the sequel that featured Hopkins in a similar role.
I admit the picture looked promising just from the previews I saw. The desire to see it was equivalent to the kind of feeling I get when I can’t wait to sink my teeth into a nice big juicy 20-ounce steak.
The problem is once you’ve finished the meal, which in my case was watching the film, I felt as though I had come down with either a slight case of indigestion or stomach flu.
Note: Unlike every other review written in entertainment magazines and newspapers about this film, I did not, nor will I reveal who plays the Mason Verger character in Hannibal.
©2/21/01
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