I watched a film called The Silence of the Lambs. Clarice Starling, who is played by Jodie Foster, is an advanced FBI trainee. She is sent to a maximum security asylum to toy with the diseased brain of Dr. Hannibal Lecter, played by Anthony Hopkins, who is an intelligent psychiatrist that becomes a cannibalistic serial killer. She is sent to do this because they need to catch another serial killer at large, who kills and skins his female victims, and Lecter’s insights could help catch him.
I think what I liked most about this movie was the acting. Anthony Hopkins played a phenomenal role of Dr. Hannibal Lecter, and Jodie Foster played a fantastic Clarice Starling. Hopkins executed his monologues flawlessly, and gave the amazing touch of psycho while still being nonchalant. He also takes the cake for one of the most iconic lines in a film, the “I ate his liver” line. In this scene, Lecter looks Starling dead in the eyes, and says, “a census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.” But what he does next makes the entire scene. He makes this strange slurping/hissing noise with his mouth, which was improvised by Hopkins, and it scares both the character of Starling, and Jodie Foster, her actress. Jodie Foster executes her final scene on the phone with an escaped Lecter amazingly, with just the amount of fear to really make the scene. The only thing that I didn’t like was that is was just realistic enough to scare the crap out of me. I only dislike that solely because it actually gave me night terrors, but it was an amazing touch to the film. Usually, horror movies aren’t nearly realistic enough to shake me to my core, but this film definitely was. There are cannibals, serial killers, rapists, etc. That makes it all the more horrifying. As I previously mentioned, the acting was phenomenal. The one on one scenes with Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster are pure gold. You can really see how Hopkins as Lecter stares into one’s soul, can kill without any expression or remorse, and how Foster as Starling can be scared to death, but overcome her fears and be a groundbreaking detective. The sound was great, as was the lighting. Most of the movie was supposed to be dark and eerie, but they executed the darkness flawlessly. I loved how the movie was filmed in particular, very up close and personal with the actors, specifically Lecter.
I would 100% recommend this film, if you have a strong stomach that is. It was absolutely outstanding. The lineup of actors was brilliant. Anthony Hopkins took being a cannibalistic, homicidal psychopath to the next level, and it was incredible. Jodie Foster took ordinary FBI student out of this world, and her acting and expressions were outstanding. The scenes were realistic, detailed, and absolutely horrifying, but in an amazing way. The film really took me into the mind of not just one, but two psychopaths (Ted Levine as Jame Gumb, aka Buffalo Bill, a serial killer who abducts, kills, and skins heavier female victims). After all, there’s nothing worse than a cannibalistic serial killer with a psychiatrist’s degree.