Hannibal (2001)

I like the movie and the book for separate reasons, but the workaround Mamet and/or Zaillian or whoever found for the movie's ending really works, I think.

 

The book got a famously withering review from Martin Amis (I wish it were online), and I agree with his points, but I still appreciate the book as Harris' fuck-you to a pop culture that turned a cannibal into a sort of hero. The movie with its revised ending is less a fuck-you than an unrequited-love monster movie: Dracula in love with Nancy Drew. I enjoyed it enough to see it twice opening weekend (it was one of those "You haven't seen it yet? I'll see it again with you" deals).

I really enjoy this movie despite all it's problems. Clarice's story  and Puzzi hunting down Lecter in Italy feel like two separate movies edited into one and while Hopkins is having a lot of fun, Lecter has almost gone into latter day Freddy Kruger territory. However, the Italy segment is a fun and stylish take on Giallos by Scott and you have a ton of great actors chewing the scenery. 

 

Plus, Ray Liotta is absolutely hilarious in the infamous dinner scene.

I adore the novel, and it's a shame we didn't get a three and a half hour epic adaptation that kept intact the original ending. With that out of the way though, this is a very strong film that only gets better with time. It's reputation suffers because of its status as a follow up to Silence of the Lambs, but in it's own way it manages to transcend many of its problems and reach heights few films obtain. Gary Oldman's take on Mason Verger is the stuff of nightmares, and is the film's most indellible creation. The make up alone is enough to turn your stomach, but Oldman's unsettlingly giddy mannerisms are what stick with you. The Italy sequence is pitch perfect, and I only wish the deleted scenes having to do with the identity (and back story) of Il Monstro were kept in place for the final cut. Moore can't match Foster's quiet intensity, but she does able work and we're rooting for her in the final unforgettable dinner scene. This movie is stylish, ghoulish and weird, and for those reasons it remains one film I will always have a soft spot for.

I think if Scott had immediately followed it up with Red Dragon (using Ratner's cast) it could have been something really special, instead of the sadly ho hum final film we got.

My favorite sequences in the movie are those between Pazzi and Dr Fell. The scene where Fell makes up his mind about Pazzi, at the opera when he turns around and looks directly at him unsmiling, gives me chills. And the part where Pazzi is trying to have Fell give up his prints, only to have the good doctor don gloves to move luggage, and pose with a cigarette and a hand in his pocket, refusing to pick up a plastic file folder, are moments of wonderful black comedy.

Seriously, whats the story on the writing of this novel? I'd heard Harris put in a first drapht that was a much more straightforward "Clarice Starling teams up with Will Graham to hunt Lector" and it was rejected for some reason so Harris went completely gonzo 'fuck you' with the rewrite.

 

I'd love to know the true story behind that, because the book he gave the world really is kinda nucking futs.

I'd never heard any of that. I'd be interested to learn more myself. The novel is one of my all time favorites though. I think the brazen audacity of the narrative is exciting in it's own right. It's the story no one was expecting.

 I read the book knowing what the ending was. Then I read and reread it and I still didn't buy it.

 

Its one of the greatest middle fingers to a fanbase in the modern literary era.

That would be Hannibal Rising.

 

Nah thats just cynical exploitation, Harris was obviously broken and waaaaaaaay past caring at that point. Hannibal is where he cracked seemingly.

I really dig Hannibal, it has such inexplicable sprawl and grandeur, and it's unrepentantly bizarre and perverse. It may be Harris' best novel featuring the Lecter character, but that is a matter of opinion and I know the book is not for everyone.

The novel is very crazy and would have made a fine exploitation film. The movie as is is fine high class exploitation. Sir Ridley really goes for the gore and doesn't shy away from anything. I liked the changes and put togethers such as Mason's sister and Cordell being put together, but it would have been cool to see Barney have such a large role finally in a film. Having Cordell live and simply push Mason Verger into the pig pen was more satisfying than the whole eel business from the novel.

 

 

Loved the movie when I saw it opening night with my Parents in 2001, and it was certainly one of my favorite movies of that year.

 

I know right?!?!?!

 

It's actually a pretty fucking fun read. Even going full gonzo, Harris can write a great story. It's simply that he took his very well established world of serial killers and the enforcement types who hunt them and turned the whole thing into a bad acid trip.

Yeah, Scott pussying out at the end kind of pissed me off. The book ending was fucking awesome. Tied with The Silence Of The Lambs film as my favorite thing featuring Lecter ever.

 

I remember picking up the novel and slowly watching everything bugging out. By the time brains started getting served I was quietly orgasming while reading it. And when it ended I was ready for more. For a lot, progressively crazier more. Fuck it, have him fight Dracula, I don't care.

Chalk me up as another fan of the novel. It's the only one of the Lecter books I've read, actually - I picked it up during the hype storm of the movie and needed something light and pulpy I could dip in and out of between scenes (I was working on a play at the time, hence needing something stop-start friendly).

 

The novel is indeed fucking mental, and a balls-out pisstake of the character's public image. I read that ending and thought, "...Well why the fuck not? You're mad enough to write it, I'll be man enough to buy it.".

Apparently there's going to be a Clarice spinoff TV Series later. I'll rather watch that than the Hannibal series coming up this year.

Ugh. I'd much rather think of them in the novel's finale than dig up anything else. The resolution (while batshit crazy) was satisfying enough.

 

Brilliant novel, and the movie works too, for different ways. I actually liked Moore's Starling.

And guess who's bringing it to us? The Lifetime Channel.

What I got as the main motivation was complete and utter violent disgust at everyone else around her. Everyone she came in contact with was a completely classless psychopath. She got as much respect as a two dollar crackwhore. Lecter may have been a psychopath too but at least he had some taste and respect.

Harris' book is great. It's a zany, out-there, black comedy horror romp that's a few steps away from being THE ABOMINABLE DR. PHIBES.

It has been a few years since I last read the book so some things may be jumbled. Anyway, all through the book Clarice kept learning about how in her world the line between the good guys and the bad guys may as well not exist. She doesn't have her shining armor anymore. There are no innocent victims to avenge. No lives to save. She repeatedly gets punished for trying to follow a moral code. Funnily enough, the only other person with a "moral" code is Lecter. He's respectful, he's helpful, he has taste and most importantly he follows his "code" unerringly. To the point of preferring to hurt himself rather than her. All the while reminding her that the people she chose to serve do not deserve her. By the time she's eating the asshole's brains and Lecter shares his past with her she's so drugged out she doesn't know half of the things she does.

 

So it's a combination of Clarice being a complete wreck throughout the book, much more so than in the film, Lecter saying all the right things to her, everyone else (and I mean everyone) being a piece of shit and a lot of brainwashing on Lecter's part.

Lecter tends to restrict himself to eating total douchebags as well. Probably easier for Starling to rationalize.

 

Except for the cops when he's escaping, is there anyone else he kills who isn't "Free Range Rude"?

 

Look up a plot synopsis for Hannibal Rising. Or don't, if you don't want his mystery spoiled for you (that's why I'm not directly answering).

 

His past is sketched in the Hannibal novel, and that's all Hannibal Rising is about. As many have said, it puts the lie to his "Nothing happened to me, Officer Starling. I happened. You can’t reduce me to a set of influences" line in Silence of the Lambs (book, not movie). Hannibal Rising reduces him to a set of influences, all right.

By the time she decides to go on the run with him as his lover though, the book goes out of it's way to state that drugs were no longer part of their relationship (except recreationally, if I recall correctly). I think it's a fascinating ending.

 

Quote:

It's worth pointing out though that her roomate was nice to her!

Didn't he feed the board of the Baltimore Philharmonic Orchestra a stew featuring an orchestra member he'd killed for being a poor violinist? I never bought the "free range rude" line. Sometimes it's clear Lecter kills to solve problems, and because he's bored. There isn't always a lesson he's trying to teach, or a principle he's trying to uphold.

 

I'm not saying that she went on being in a perpetual drug induced stupor. But there certainly was some brainwashing going down prior to that. Not entirely successful, I seem to recall, but it did some work. You're right though, for all intents and purposes Clarice joined him of her own accord.

According to my memory, I think he tried to brainwash her into becoming Mischa, and she resisted, called him on what he was trying to do, sort of shaming and impressing him that her personality was too strong to be subsumed into his fantasy, earning his respect in the process. You're right that she was very much out of it when she ate Krendler's brain, I was just filling in some of the larger picture for Ambler's sake so he didn't think that she was simply a unwilling victim.

Yeah, I don't think we're supposed to buy it.

 

But Lecter does. Even as a trained psychologist he's blind to his own motivations and helpless to his habits. The book never stops reminding us that he's a monster who just thinks he's a more evolved being. In the films Hopkins muddies the water a bit with pure charisma, making us root for the guy.

Excellent point. Speaking of that, do you believe Harris' statement that he has never and will never see the films?

Edited by Dr Harford - 5/29/12 at 9:49am

I wasn't aware of that. Seems a shame, since on the whole I think the various people involved have done his work justice.

 

Excepting Rising of course, since that's paycheque dreck in either media.

I should say that as funny as the increasingly de-brained Ray Liotta is in the movie, the book is even funnier and creepier. One line I've never forgotten — this is after Lecter has removed a fair amount of Krendler's brain: "Krendler was reduced to irrelevant observations about things in his immediate vision." Starling, however, under the influence of whatever cocktail Lecter has her on, makes some really lame jokes.

Been going through the "Hannibal" films and enjoying them all from Manhunter to Red Dragon. I've never seen Hannibal Rising and by all accounts it's terrible but is it at least worth watching for the so bad it's good? I'm curious to see a young actor try and ape Hopkins' Lecter. Is there anything interesting about the backstory?

Lecter started drugging her. Twue Wuv!

The hints you get in the Hannibal novel (well worth reading) are all you need. If anything Hannibal Rising tells you far too much, demystifying Lecter in unfortunate ways.

Yeah, in the dictionary next to the entry for "Unnecessary Sequel/Prequel" there's a picture from Hannibal Rising.

 

The book and the movie feel like fanfiction. The movie isn't badly made, and even has an ace performance by Rhys Ifans (not as Lecter, unfortunately), but it just has no reason to exist. The book is a faintly amusing novelization of Harris' script, and reads as such.

 

I have never worked out to my satisfaction why someone with the talent to write Red Dragon and Silence didn't go on to write different stories instead of hitching himself to the Lecter wagon. Yeah, I know: $$$. Still there was a genius at work in those first two Lecter books. As I've said here, Hannibal had its own pleasures but was an entirely different kind of book. Harris wrote two great thrillers, a pretty good misunderstood-monster romance, and fanfiction. He didn't write Black Sunday by himself (two other guys worked with him on the plot, Harris did the novel and split the money with his co-plotters). So really all he's ever done on his own is Lecter stories. Maybe that ended up being all that interested him. Hannibal Rising sure felt like a cash grab, though (or, to speculate generously, Harris' necessary response to "Tom, we're gonna make Hannibal Rising with or without you. You want in or not?").