Selected for preservation by the National Film Registry in 2011, Katherine Perrington takes time off from Game of Thrones to tell us why The Silence of the Lambs remains king.
This psychological thriller is a work of genius, and if you only see one horror film before you graduate I can think of none that surpass it.
Directed by Jonathan Demme, it picked up Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay – proving its critical success and commercial success.
Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) is an F.B.I trainee who is recruited by Jack Crawford (Scott Glenn) to interview former psychiatrist turned cannibalistic serial killer Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) to gain information on a serial killer who skins women, nicknamed Buffalo Bill (Ted Levine).
At first Lecter is dismissive of Clarice, however, he has something to gain from cooperating as he desires a transfer away from the detestable Frederick Chilton (Anthony Heald) who runs the facility where Lecter is kept.
When senator’s daughter Catherine Martin (Brooke Smith) is kidnapped, Lecter offers further information in return for details on Clarice’s personal life. A “quid pro quo” is established, and Lecter delves into Clarice’s hopes and fears; placing her utterly in his power.
As an audience we like Clarice because she is intelligent and we are able to identify with her along with fearing for her. Lecter achieves his transfer and under his new relaxed security he is able to free himself by cutting off a guards face and placing it over his own to confuse the police and escape without notice.
This is one of the most violent and tense scenes, as the audience finally gets to see Lecter in action rather than a caged animal.
Clarice makes a break in the Buffalo Bill case, realising he is making a suit out of the girls skin. Bill has been keeping girls in an old well shaft beneath his house and we see his true demented nature when he makes taunts Catherine, “It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again!” This is an irredeemable psychopath using these women as if they are no more than raw materials, worthless apart from their skin.
Clarice tracks him down in a chilling chase as he hunts her in his pitch black basement with night vision goggles. She shoots him and rescues the senator’s daughter, however Lecter is still at large and in a call to Clarice he assures her she is safe but that he will be “having an old friend for dinner.” The credits begin to appear as Lecter walks behind Frederick Chilton and we guess at his fate.
Though he has significantly less screen time than his fellow actors, Anthony Hopkins’s scenes are among the most riveting and disturbing scenes of the entire horror genre.
Foster gives a wonderful performance as Clarice but Hopkins steals away the spotlight with his malevolent and mesmeric interpretation of Lecter. Lecter shocks us and scares us with his deadly charisma – not to mention his enjoyment in violently slaughtering and eating innocent people.
To put it simply, this film is a horror masterpiece that proves that truly exceptional thrillers do not age as they can capture and thrill audiences of every generation.
Katherine Perrington
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