For a thriller made in the nineties, this movie is GOOD! I thought this movie was going to be too much for me, but it wasn't, and what's more, it opened up a whole new genre to me.
A classic masterpiece of a thriller! the born of the new type of pscyophat. Meet Dr. Hannibal Lecter....just looking at his face already freaks me out!!!
Anthony Hopkins has successfully portrayed the frigtening Dr Hannibal Lecter including inventing unique voice and how he moves his mouth.
Jodie Foster is absolutely professional. The ending scene when she was in the dark, you can see her hand shaking like very naturally fear of dark.
This film is really freaking out. You must see this classic!
Ranked at #26 on imdb.com Top 250 Films of all-time to date.
The film originally was going to be released in the fall of 1990. However, Orion pictures, which distributed the film, decided instead to delay its release until January 1991 so that it could concentrate all their efforts in promoting Dances with Wolves (1990) for Oscar consideration.
This is one of only three films (the others being It Happened One Night (1934) and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)) to win the top five Oscars - Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, Best Picture and Best Screenplay (Adapted) [Quoted from imdb.com]
Rated 4 stars by Roger Ebrt in 1991, later being his Great Movie ten years later in 2001.
Roger Ebert states, "It is remarkable that the Academy would remember, let alone single out, a film released 13 months before the Oscarcast; it usually votes for films that are still in theaters, or new on video. But "Silence" was so clearly one of a kind that it could not be ignored."
Simply one of the best,most gripping,classiest thrillers ever made.This movie is perfect from start to finish.Foster,Hopkins and Ted Levine dominate this film with their marvelous performances,while the rest of the cast is flawless.Still,Hopkins steals the show as the most charismatic yet scariest movie vilain of all time.The movie just keeps getting more and more thrilling until the final nailbitting climax.The final frames of the movie still haunts me to this day,with the incredibly effective musical score by Howard Shore.It's the serial killer thriller to end them all.
The first movie to give me nightmares in awhile. It's a pretty freaky movie as far as images that get put in your head, and yes it's realistic. The last 20 minutes of the film is classic thriller with camera and editing tricks. And who can forget Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster's portrayals in this movie? They were outstanding.
This film leaves the audience wondering whether Hannibal (played brilliantly by Anthony Hopkins) is truly crazy or he chose to be evil... unlike Buffalo Bill who certainly had a screw loose...
Who the hell is Jonathan Demme? Doesn't matter cuz this is an amazing film. Anthony Hopkins plays arguably the best villain of all time in this psycho-horror. This movie will creep you out like nothing else. Excellent film making!
This movie is just excellent, the first Jodie Foster horror movie, and a psycho-thriller, with Anthony Hopkins as mad Hannibal Lechter. "I ate his liver with some fava beans and a Chianti." Just don't eat fava beans while watching this. Ha. The ending was kinda ridiculous considering the bad guy had those night goggles and everything, so it doesn't quite get 5 stars.
I really liked this film, I found it very effective, not at all scary as it seems to have been untruthfully labelled with, quite disturbing and a very good film, should definitely be seen if it hasn't been already!
absolutely THE greatest thriller ever made, with a great script, directing, and acting. there are not enough adjectives to describe outstanding performances by jodie foster and Sir Anthony Hopkins. that scene where clarice is telling her story of the "screaming of the lambs" and hopkins face was in a close up was amazing.
A fantastic film. One of tensest of all time and scariest. I thought at first how can a film like this be so famous!! But now I realise that Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster's partnership in the film is probably one of the most famous in film history!! It is better than Hannibal and Red Dragon. Sir Anthony Hopkins is perfect as Hannibal Lecter because he makes Hannibal Lecter his own, by turning in ploished, psychotic turns of bonechilling menace, but we also have a huge regard for Brian Cox's stint in Manhunter; a purring big cat to Hopkins' cold-blooded crocodile. Jodie Foster is better than Julianne Moore as Clarice Starling. Cortesy of Jodie Fosters beguiling turn in Silence Of The Lambs, Starling is still the film heroine benchmark; a smart FBI recruit who exposes her soul to Lecter to save a womans skin.
The Silence of the Lambs (1991) director: Jonathan Demme starring: Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, Scott Glenn, Ted Levine, Anthony Heald, Brooke Smith, Kasi Lemmons
Horror films have forever been popular in movie-going society, but not until The Silence of the Lambs was released did the genre take a drastic turn. Not only does this film excel at frightening its viewers and giving them nightmares about cannibalistic serial killers, more importantly, it breaks the the old horror film stereotypes and introduces fresh and very brave new film conventions. Horror films have almost always portrayed women as weak and helpless characters. They're always either the damsel in distress, being rescued one way or another by a man or the promiscuous teenager who is naked for half of the film. The Silence of the Lambs takes the weak female character stereotype and completely reverses it. In this film, the main character, Clarice Starling, is a strong, independent woman who holds her own in a male-dominated workplace and solves the mystery without any help from men. This may sound like a feminist rant, but this is a groundbreaking film in terms of female liberation and deserves high recognition.
This film is hardly geared toward women, but it does directly deal with the role of a strong woman in a male-dominated society. This political statement propels the main character into the history books as one of the most important heroines of all-time. However, Clarice Starling isn't the first female heroine in a horror film (even though she may be the most popular). Ellen Ripley from the Alien films made her debut in 1979 in the horror franchise and not only kicked alien ass, but film stereotype's ass into the history books as a strong female heroine in a horror film. Starling is played flawlessly by Jodie Foster, a role she was born to play. Foster shines in all of the scenes, but most evidently in the scenes with Anthony Hopkins. She is brilliant and their eerie chemistry is almost pleasing to watch. Foster was lucky enough to take home the Oscar for her portrayal of Clarice Starling which is, undoubtedly, one of the most deserved Oscars in recent memory.
Aside from the feminism, this film has other groundbreaking elements to it as well. The film's main male character is Dr. Hannibal "The Cannibal" Lecter. Dr. Lecter was once a psychiatrist, but was arrested for murder and found to be a serial killing cannibal, hence the nickname he acquired. What's shocking about Lecter is his tone and diction. He's a very intelligent man, but uses his wisdom and serenity in a way that draws you in as he fools with your mind. What's groundbreaking about this character is that he is a villain, but he isn't the villain the protagonist is looking for. He actually aids the Clarice into finding the "bad guy" from behind his bars. Lecter is portrayed by the fantastic Anthony Hopkins, who also took home an Oscar for his 17-minute performance. Hopkins' performance is the shortest to win an Oscar for Best Actor, but it is far from small in power. Although given such a short amount of screen time, Hopkins steals the film as Hannibal Lecter and creates what has become one of the most popular and recognizable film characters of all time. He is frighteningly chilling and evokes such evil in his eyes that he becomes the character.
In the scene where Starling visits Lecter in prison for the first time and for most of the thrilling conclusion, the cinematography stood out as brilliant and I could not get it out of my mind. Cinematographer Tak Fujimoto has worked on many films (Badlands, Philadelphia and The Sixth Sense to name a few) and has been recognized by many critics and film institutions to be one of the best cinematographers out there. Fujimoto worked with director Jonathan Demme on The Silence of the Lambs so wonderfully and produced some of the most frightening scenes in film history. Fujimoto utilizes so many different camera angles in this film that intensify the scenes and generate such great suspense. He is a master of his craft and he proves this to us through his excellent work in this film.
Recognized as one of the greatest films of all-time by many sources, The Silence of the Lambs was a huge success when it was released in 1991 and has endured time and is still a huge success now. Creating two legendary film characters, one who is one of the most recognized villains of all time and the other who is one of the greatest heroines of all time, staying true to the novel which the film was based on and winning five Oscars in the major categories is only a few of this films' achievements. It's an iconic thriller and has gone down as one of the best. If you have been living under a rock and haven't seen this film, I cannot recommend it more. See it, you won't regret it.
This is it -- the best serial killer movie to date. What's particularly astonishing about it is that the director has never been nearly this good making any other movie. The acting is almost universally solid with, surprisingly, Foster the weak link despite being reasonably strong. Hopkins' work remains a high water mark not only in his career, but in the history of the movie business.
MCT:July 22, 2008
MCT:July 22, 2008
MCT:July 20, 2008
MCT:July 20, 2008
MCT:July 20, 2008
MCT:July 9, 2008
MCT:July 5, 2008
