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Hannibal
Movie Stats & Links |
| Starring: |
Anthony Hopkins,
Julianne Moore, Gary Oldman, Ray Liotta |
| MPAA Rated: |
R |
| Released By: |
MGM
& Universal
Pictures |
| Kiddie Movie: |
Unless you want
them to be a serial killer. |
| Date Movie: |
She might get
grossed out and hold your hand. |
| Gratuitous Sex: |
Nah. |
| Gratuitous
Violence: |
You better believe
it. |
| Action: |
Not really. |
| Laughs: |
There were some
cute lines, although at gruesome times. |
| Memorable
Scene: |
The brain scene. |
| Memorable
Quote: |
"I should tell you
I’m giving serious consideration to eating your wife." |
| Directed By: |
Ridley Scott |
| Produced By: |
Dino De Laurentiis,
Martha De Laurentiis, Ridley Scott |
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Hannibal
A Movie Review |
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I still don’t know if I really liked
"Hannibal" and that is what bothers me about writing this
review. I wanted to separate it from "Silence of the
Lambs" and see if it could stand on its own. I wanted to take
the movie as a whole and see if it was a good thriller. And I wanted
to have more gore like I was told would be. Hmm. I guess I’ll just
say "Let’s go and see where this review leads us."
"Hannibal" picks up our "Silence of the
Lambs" story about ten years later. Clarice (now played by
Julianne Moore) is a kick-ass FBI agent, Hannibal (Anthony Hopkins)
is hanging in Italy, and one man still wants to get Hannibal and he
is Mason Verger (Gary Oldman), one of Hannibal’s victims who didn’t
actually die. Mason has bucks but no face (he cut it off trying to
please Hannibal) and uses his money to find out the whereabouts of
Hannibal. Mason wants to catch Hannibal and torture the crap out of
him, but he knows he needs help. So, with Clarise in a bind, he
knows that Hannibal has feelings for her and will come to her aid,
and with the help of a bad Justice Department dude, Paul (Ray Liotta),
he gets Clarise set up, Hannibal comes to help, and Clarise is put
in a situation of helping Hannibal get away or letting him get
caught.
I think I’ll let the story end at that because there are too
many spoilers in this movie that I don’t want to give away. Maybe
I should give them away because I knew about most of them and was
disappointed, but I’ll be nice and let you see things like
disembowelings and violent pigs and make your own assessment.
There were a couple of challenges "Hannibal" faced and
neither could be achieved. One was could it be true to the book, the
other was could it live up to "Silence of the Lambs?"
"Hannibal" had no chance on either count. It couldn’t
stay true to the book everyone read because it would freak out too
many people who didn’t read the book, and it couldn’t live up to
"Silence of the Lambs" because "Silence…" kept
Hannibal mysterious and behind bars, whereas "Hannibal"
had him on the loose and gruesome. Anthony Hopkins still puts on one
hell of a performance, the disfiguring make-up for Mason was
incredible, and then there was the brain scene that, well, it’s
the brain scene.
Where "Silence of the Lambs" was a great suspense film,
"Hannibal" is really a horror film that takes things to
the level horror films will need to go in order to get away from the
slasher-film mentality – mix minds games with good gore.
I guess in the end I was a little disappointed and I’m still
not sure why. Hopkins was great as Hannibal on the loose, Moore did
the Clarise role well, but even as the credits started to role,
well, something was just missing. I guess it’s just hard to mix
true suspense and great horror and "Hannibal" just didn’t
get there. It’s 2 ½ stars out of 5.
That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!! |
