The Silence of the Lambs (film)


The Silence of the Lambs is a 1991 American psychological horror film directed by Jonathan Demme from a screenplay written by Ted Tally, adapted from Thomas Harris' 1988 novel of the same name. The film stars Jodie Foster as Clarice Starling, a young FBI trainee who is pulled out from her training to apprehend a serial killer, known only as "Buffalo Bill", who skins his female victims' corpses. For this she has to create a psychological profile and seeks the advice of the imprisoned Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer.
Anthony Hopkins plays Lecter and Ted Levine plays Bill. It also features Scott Glenn, and Anthony Heald. The novel was Harris' first and second respectively to feature the characters of Starling and Lecter, and was the second adaptation of a Harris novel to feature Lecter, preceded by the Michael Mann-directed Manhunter.
The Silence of the Lambs was released on February 14, 1991 and grossed $272.7 million worldwide against its $19 million budget, becoming the fifth-highest-grossing film of 1991 worldwide. The film premiered at the 41st Berlin International Film Festival, where it competed for the Golden Bear, while Demme received the Silver Bear for Best Director.
Critically acclaimed upon release, it became only the third film and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest ) to win Academy Awards in all the top five categories: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Adapted Screenplay. It is also the first, and to date only, Best Picture winner widely considered to be a horror film, and one of only six such films to be nominated in the category.
It is regularly cited by critics, film directors and audiences alike as one of the greatest and most influential films of all time. In 2018 Empire ranked it 48th on their list of the 500 greatest movies of all time. The American Film Institute ranked it as the 5th-greatest and most influential thriller film of all time while the characters Clarice Starling and Hannibal Lecter were ranked as the greatest film heroine and villain, respectively. The film is considered "culturally, historically or aesthetically" significant by the U.S. Library of Congress and was selected to be preserved in the National Film Registry in 2011. A sequel titled Hannibal was released in 2001, in which Hopkins reprised his role. It was followed by two prequels: Red Dragon and Hannibal Rising.

Plot

trainee Clarice Starling is pulled from her training at the FBI Academy at Quantico, Virginia by Jack Crawford of the Bureau's Behavioral Science Unit. He assigns her to interview Hannibal Lecter, a former psychiatrist and incarcerated cannibalistic serial killer, whose insight might prove useful in the pursuit of a psychopath serial killer nicknamed "Buffalo Bill," who kills young women and then removes the skin from their bodies.
Starling travels to the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane, where she is led by Frederick Chilton to Lecter's solitary quarters. Although initially pleasant and courteous, Lecter grows impatient with Starling's attempts at "dissecting" him and rebuffs her. As she is leaving, a prisoner named Miggs flicks semen at her. Lecter, who considers this act "unspeakably ugly," calls Starling back and tells her to seek out an old patient of his. This leads her to a storage shed, where she discovers a man's severed head with a death's head moth lodged in its throat. She returns to Lecter, who tells her that the man is linked to Buffalo Bill. He offers to profile Buffalo Bill on the condition that he may be transferred away from Chilton, whom he detests.
Buffalo Bill abducts a Senator's daughter, Catherine Martin. Crawford authorizes Starling to offer Lecter a fake deal, promising a prison transfer if he provides information that helps them find Buffalo Bill and rescue Catherine. Instead, Lecter demands a quid pro quo from Starling, offering clues about Buffalo Bill in exchange for personal information. Starling tells Lecter about the murder of her father when she was ten years old. Chilton secretly records the conversation and reveals Starling's deceit before offering Lecter a deal of Chilton's own making. Lecter agrees and is flown to Memphis, where he verbally torments Senator Ruth Martin, and gives her misleading information on Buffalo Bill, including the name "Louis Friend."
Starling notices that "Louis Friend" is an anagram of "iron sulfide"—fool's gold. She visits Lecter, who is now being held in a cage-like cell in a Tennessee courthouse, and asks for the truth. Lecter tells her that all the information she needs is contained in the case file. Rather than give her the real name, he insists that they continue their quid pro quo and she recounts a traumatic childhood incident where she was awakened by the sound of spring lambs being slaughtered on a relative's farm in Montana. Starling admits that she still sometimes wakes thinking she can hear lambs screaming, and Lecter speculates that she is motivated to save Catherine in the hope that it will end the nightmares. Lecter gives her back the case files on Buffalo Bill after their conversation is interrupted by Chilton and the police, who escort her from the building. Later that evening, Lecter kills his guards, escapes from his cell, and disappears.
Starling analyzes Lecter's annotations to the case files and realizes that Buffalo Bill knew his first victim personally. Starling travels to the victim's hometown and discovers that Buffalo Bill was a tailor, with dresses and dress patterns identical to the patches of skin removed from each of his victims. She telephones Crawford to inform him that Buffalo Bill is trying to form a "woman suit" out of real skin, but Crawford is already en route to make an arrest, having cross-referenced Lecter's notes with hospital archives and finding an autogynephilic man named Jame Gumb, who once applied unsuccessfully for a sex-change operation, believing himself to be a transsexual. Starling continues interviewing friends of Buffalo Bill's first victim in Ohio, while Crawford leads an FBI HRT team to Gumb's address in Illinois. The house in Illinois is empty, and Starling is led to the house of "Jack Gordon," whom she realizes is actually Jame Gumb, again by finding a death's head moth. She pursues him into his multi-room basement, where she discovers that Catherine is still alive, but trapped in a dry well. After turning off the basement lights, Gumb stalks Starling in the dark with night-vision goggles, but gives his position away when he cocks his revolver. Starling reacts just in time and fires all of her rounds, killing Gumb.
Some time later, at the FBI Academy graduation party, Starling receives a phone call from Lecter, who is at an airport in Bimini. He assures her that he does not plan to pursue her and asks her to return the favor, which she says she cannot do. Lecter then hangs up the phone, saying that he is "having an old friend for dinner," and starts following a newly arrived Chilton before disappearing into the crowd.

Cast

Development

The Silence of the Lambs is based on Thomas Harris's 1988 novel of the same name and is the second film to feature the character Hannibal Lecter following the 1986 film Manhunter. Prior to the novel's release, Orion Pictures partnered with Gene Hackman to bring the novel to the big screen. With Hackman set to direct and possibly star in the role of Crawford, negotiations were made to split the $500,000 cost of rights between Hackman and the studio. In addition to securing the rights to the novel, producers also had to acquire the rights to the name "Hannibal Lecter," which were owned by Manhunter producer Dino De Laurentiis. Owing to the financial failure of the earlier film, De Laurentiis lent the character rights to Orion Pictures for free.
In November 1987, Ted Tally was brought on to write the adaptation; Tally had previously crossed paths with Harris many times, with his interest in adapting The Silence of the Lambs originating from receiving an advance copy of the book from Harris himself. When Tally was about halfway through with the first draft, Hackman withdrew from the project and financing fell through. However, Orion Pictures co-founder Mike Medavoy assured Tally to keep writing as the studio itself took care of financing and searched for a replacement director. As a result, Orion Pictures sought director Jonathan Demme to helm the project. With the screenplay not yet completed, Demme signed on after reading the novel. From there, the project quickly took off, as Tally explained, " read my first draft not long after it was finished, and we met, then I was just startled by the speed of things. We met in May 1989 and were shooting in November. I don't remember any big revisions."

Casting

was interested in playing the role of Clarice Starling immediately after reading the novel. However, in spite of the fact that Foster had just won an Academy Award for her performance in The Accused, Demme was not convinced that she was right for the role. Having just collaborated on Married to the Mob, Demme's first choice for the role of Starling was Michelle Pfeiffer, who turned it down, later saying, "It was a difficult decision, but I got nervous about the subject matter."
Still not convinced, he approached Meg Ryan who turned it down as well for its gruesome themes and then Laura Dern, of whom the studio was skeptical as not being a bankable choice. As a result, Foster was awarded the role due to her passion towards the character.
For the role of Dr. Hannibal Lecter, Demme originally approached Sean Connery. After the actor turned it down, Anthony Hopkins was then offered the role based on his performance in The Elephant Man. Other actors considered for the role included Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Dustin Hoffman, Derek Jacobi and Daniel Day-Lewis. The mask Hopkins wore became an iconic symbol for the film. It was created by Ed Cubberly, of Frenchtown, New Jersey, who had made numerous masks for NHL goalies.
Gene Hackman was originally cast to play Jack Crawford, the Agent-in-Charge of the Behavioral Science Unit of the FBI in Quantico, Virginia but he found the script "too violent." Scott Glenn was then cast in the role. In preparation for the role, Glenn met with John E. Douglas. Douglas gave Glenn a tour of the Quantico facility and also played for him an audio tape containing various recordings that serial killers Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris had made of themselves raping and torturing a 16-year-old girl. According to Douglas, Glenn wept as he experienced the recordings and even changed his liberal stance on the death penalty.

Filming

on The Silence of the Lambs began on November 15, 1989 and wrapped on March 1, 1990. Filming primarily took place in and around Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with some scenes shot in nearby northern West Virginia. The Victorian home in Perryopolis, Pennsylvania used as Buffalo Bill's home in the film went up for sale in August 2015 for $300,000. The home sat on the market for nearly a year, before finally selling for $195,000. The exterior of the Western Center near Canonsburg, Pennsylvania served as the setting for Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. In what was a rare act of cooperation at the time, the FBI allowed scenes to be filmed at the FBI Academy in Quantico; some FBI staff members even acted in bit parts.

Music

The musical score for The Silence of the Lambs was composed by Howard Shore, who would also go on to collaborate with Demme on Philadelphia. Recorded in Munich during the latter half of the summer of 1990, the score was performed by the Munich Symphony Orchestra. "I tried to write in a way that goes right into the fabric of the movie," explained Shore on his approach. "I tried to make the music just fit in. When you watch the movie you are not aware of the music. You get your feelings from all elements simultaneously, lighting, cinematography, costumes, acting, music. Jonathan Demme was very specific about the music." A soundtrack album was released by MCA Records on February 5, 1991. Music from the film was later used in the trailers for its 2001 sequel, Hannibal.

Release

Box office

The Silence of the Lambs was released on February 14, 1991, grossing $14 million during its opening weekend. At the time it closed on October 10, 1991, the film had grossed $131 million domestically with a total worldwide gross of $273 million. It was the fifth-highest-grossing film of 1991 worldwide.

Home media

The film was released on VHS on August 27, 2002 and on DVD on March 6, 2001 by MGM.

Reception

Critical response

The Silence of the Lambs was a sleeper hit that gradually gained widespread success and critical acclaim. Foster, Hopkins, and Levine garnered much acclaim for their performances. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 96% of 97 film critics have given the film a positive review, with an average rating of 8.87/10. The website's critical consensus reads: "Director Jonathan Demme's smart, taut thriller teeters on the edge between psychological study and all-out horror, and benefits greatly from stellar performances by Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster." Metacritic, another review aggregator, assigned the film a weighted average score of 85 out of 100, based on 19 reviews from mainstream critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A–" on an A+ to F scale.
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, specifically mentioned the "terrifying qualities" of Hannibal Lecter. Ebert later added the film to his list of The Great Movies, recognizing the film as a "horror masterpiece" alongside such classics as Nosferatu, Psycho, and Halloween. However, the film is also notable for being one of two multi-Academy Award winners disapproved of by Ebert's colleague, Gene Siskel. Writing for Chicago Tribune, Siskel said, "Foster's character, who is appealing, is dwarfed by the monsters she is after. I'd rather see her work on another case."

Accolades

The film won the Big Five Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Adapted Screenplay, making it only the third film in history to accomplish that feat. It was also nominated for Best Sound and Best Film Editing, but lost to ' and JFK, respectively.
Other awards include being named Best Film by the National Board of Review of Motion Pictures, CHI Awards and PEO Awards. Demme won the Silver Bear for Best Director at the 41st Berlin International Film Festival and was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Director. The film was nominated for the Grand Prix of the Belgian Film Critics Association. It was also nominated for the British Academy Film Award for Best Film. Screenwriter Ted Tally received an Edgar Award for Best Motion Picture Screenplay. The film was awarded Best Horror Film of the Year during the 2nd Horror Hall of Fame telecast, with Vincent Price presenting the award to the film's executive producer Gary Goetzman.
In 1998, the film was listed as one of the 100 greatest films in the past 100 years by the American Film Institute. In 2006, at the Key Art Awards, the original poster for The Silence of the Lambs was named best film poster "of the past 35 years". The Silence of the Lambs placed seventh on Bravo's The 100 Scariest Movie Moments for Lecter's escape scene. The American Film Institute named Hannibal Lecter the number one film villain of all time and Clarice Starling the sixth-greatest film hero of all time. In 2011, ABC aired a prime-time special, ', that counted down the best films chosen by fans based on results of a poll conducted by ABC and People magazine. The Silence of the Lambs was selected as the best suspense/thriller and Dr. Hannibal Lecter was selected as the fourth-greatest film character.
The film and its characters have appeared in the following AFI "100 Years" lists:
In 2015, Entertainment Weeklys 25th anniversary year, it included The Silence of the Lambs in its list of the 25 best movies made since the magazine's beginning.
Organization/AssociationAwardActor/CrewOutcomeRemarks
64th Academy AwardsBest PictureEdward Saxon, Kenneth Utt, Ron Bozman
64th Academy AwardsBest DirectorJonathan Demme
64th Academy AwardsBest ActorAnthony Hopkins
64th Academy AwardsBest ActressJodie Foster
64th Academy AwardsBest Adapted ScreenplayTed TallyAdapted from The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris
64th Academy AwardsBest Film EditingCraig McKay
64th Academy AwardsBest SoundTom Fleischman, Christopher Newman
49th Golden Globe AwardsBest Actress in a Motion Picture – DramaJodie Foster
49th Golden Globe AwardsBest Actor – Motion Picture DramaAnthony Hopkins
49th Golden Globe AwardsBest DirectorJonathan Demme
49th Golden Globe AwardsBest Motion Picture – DramaKenneth Utt
49th Golden Globe AwardsBest ScreenplayTed Tally
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest Actor in a Leading RoleAnthony Hopkins
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest Actress in a Leading RoleJodie Foster
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest Adapted ScreenplayTed Tally
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest CinematographyTak Fujimoto
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest DirectionJonathan Demme
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest EditingCraig McKay
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest FilmRon Bozman, Edward Saxon, Kenneth Utt
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest Film MusicHoward Shore
45th British Academy Film AwardsBest SoundSkip Lievsay, Christopher Newman, Tom Fleischman

Controversy

Upon its release, The Silence of the Lambs was criticized by members of the LGBT community for its portrayal of Buffalo Bill as bisexual and transgender, although Bill's sexual orientation is never explicitly stated and Lecter expressly states Bill is "not really transsexual." In response to the critiques, Demme replied that Buffalo Bill "wasn't a gay character. He was a tormented man who hated himself and wished he was a woman because that would have made him as far away from himself as he possibly could be." Demme added that he "came to realize that there is a tremendous absence of positive gay characters in movies". Much of the criticism was drawn
towards Foster, who critics alleged was herself a lesbian.
In a 1992 interview with Playboy magazine, the feminist and women's rights advocate Betty Friedan stated: "I thought it was absolutely outrageous that The Silence of the Lambs won four Oscars. I'm not saying that the movie shouldn't have been shown. I'm not denying the movie was an artistic triumph, but it was about the evisceration, the skinning alive of women. That is what I find offensive. Not the Playboy centerfold."