Better In Your Head?--THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS

 

Spoiler Alert: faint, soft, subdued, muted...all good alternates, Tom.

THE BOOK-Written by Thomas Harris, released 1988

THE MOVIE-Directed by Ted Demme, written by Ted Tally, released 1991

THE STORY-The FBI is hunting "Buffalo Bill," an Ed Gein/Ted Bundy hybrid plucking and peeling young, zoftig ladies. A six-fingered psychiatrist with a taste for flesh sits in a Baltimore nuthouse, his movements strictly, smartly limited. The Bureau believes the bad doctor can provide crucial insight, and dispatches a trainee to cull whatever helpful information she can.

MIND THE GAP-With cultured malevolence amusing his eyes, and gazpacho thickening his wires, Dr. Hannibal Lecter is a crime fiction all-timer. A deceptively dormant incendiary device. A charmer, a harmer. Al Pacino, Robert DeNiro and Daniel Day-Lewis were all considered for the role, and had any of them accepted, the character would not be an all-timer. That he is, is ascribable to the man who did accept, Anthony Hopkins. 

I shudder pondering how many men DDL would've consumed.

The movie kinda did Special Agent Jack Crawford bad. On the page, he's a kind-hearted widower-to-be, a stalwart champion of justice following the last faint flashes of professional ambition. In the film, Crawford's a basic G-man. I get it, though. Ted Tally's goal--prioritize the journey of trainee Clarice Starling--is attainable only through judicious pruning. 

If the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History isn't the best museum in D.C., it's no lower than third. 

"Buffalo Bill" had no choice, y'all. A misspelled-at-birth first name is one of those misfortunes peculiar to depraved murderers, seems. Least his mom didn't sell him for a pitcher of beer. 

Jodie Foster's turn as Clarice Starling is undeniable. Thomas Harris wrote an intelligent, determined heroine, a country girl learning and earning, not some hyper-entitled wunderkind and Foster embodies her magnificently. I swear some scenes I can hear her pulse.

"Never help a man who is wearing a sling or a cast" is the most impeccable piece of advice a woman can ever receive. 

Whenever a piece of art resists cranking the "Obvious Message" knob up to 11, discourse inevitably ensues. "Show, don't tell" is the number one rule of good-ass storytelling, and remembering no one character represents an entire group of people is the number one rule of good-ass story-listening. 

BETTER IN YOUR HEAD-What happens when a beloved novel's film rights fall in the hands of a creative team who clearly adore the source material? Exit: doubt. Enter: stellar. Whatever the media, The Silence of the Lambs is an intricate and engrossing mix of "unreal" and "too real." Choosing between book and film (ties are never an option) is especially tough. What Demme's work adds--the martyred prison guard, Bill's one-man show--is indelible. Add in my favorite all-time performance from my favorite all-time actress, and this is a win for the movie.