Last night, with a mild hangover and feeling tired, I decided to finally watch Silence of the Lambs. Obviously it’s famous, winning Best Picture in 1991, but aside from “Hello Clarice”, Fava beans, Hannibal being a cannibal, and “it’s rubs the lotion on it’s skin“, I generally knew nothing about the movie.
With high expectations, this one came up short. From the start most things fell flat with the twists and outcomes feeling pretty predictable.
The acting from Foster was very good. The theme of her being a woman in a man’s profession was well done. The back story of silencing the lamb was meh.
They built up the Hannibal character so much that it was impossible to live up to. Hopkins does his best to embody the spirit, but it felt over the top at times. The creepy staring, no blinking, etc. it barely worked. His “I always have the upper hand in the conversation” attitude was forced at times.
Buffalo Bill I actually enjoyed. The nuanced is he transexual or is he gay or is he just crazy was interesting and the scenes at his house were entertaining. The bugs were… odd.
For the actual movie, it was slow. Just not enough going on for two hours worth of material.
The mystery part of it, with the anagrams, who’s Bill, etc. felt insignificant based on how they were shown in the movie but were clearly important! I barely understood what was happening there. That could’ve been done way better as I just never felt that compelled by any of it.
Lastly, I know it’s a movie, but the two most absurd parts were Hannibal killing the two guards and Clarice killing Bill. There’s suspension of belief then there’s whatever those two are. I wouldn’t say unwatchable, but how is that the best they came up with?
Overall: 6.6 / 10
Worth watching? Barely? I liked the acting but I just wasn’t bought in.
Reading recent Rotten Tomato reviews, it definitely didn’t feel like it’s “the stuff that nightmares are made of” (absolutely not), or “A masterpiece in crime-drama“.
I’m not a sophisticated movie reviewer. I’m not going to fake say this was genius. Maybe it was, but I certainly didn’t think so.
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