The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Directed by Jonathan Demme
I review a lot of shitty or obscure movies, that are still kind of shitty but I love them, but I felt like it was time to review a widely loved and award-winning movie. It has been a while since I’ve seen this, a few years probably. This is the only Best Picture winner to be considered in the horror genre, and rightfully so. Only six horror movies have even been nominated: The Exorcist, Jaws, The Sixth Sense, Black Swan and Get Out are the others.
The Silence of the Lambs is about an FBI trainee in charge of talking to a murder and former psychiatrist to help track down a serial killer nicknamed “Buffalo Bill”. Agent Clarice Starling is played by Jodie Foster and she talks to Dr. Hannibal Lecter played by Anthony Hopkins. Lecter is known for being highly intelligent and eloquent but a sadistic cannibal murderer. Lecter has refused to help in the past but his genius is needed to help the FBI see inside the mind of Buffalo Bill and hopefully stop him before he kills again. Starling is able to get Lecter to speak, but mostly in metaphors and riddles, which Clarice has to decipher to learn more about the case. As the movie progresses Lecter and Clarice develop somewhat of an unlikely relationship built on respect and admiration. Clarice treats Lecter like a human and Lecter respects Clarice’s intelligence and resourcefulness. Along the way Buffalo Bill claims a few victims in which he kills, skins and leaves in different locations. We soon find that Bill is taking the victims skin to make a bodysuit to wear, because he wishes to be a woman. Ted Levine plays the psychotic Buffalo Bill. He gives a chilling performance and makes your skin crawl. His deep voice is unnerving and creepy to say the least. The ending of the movie is gut wrenching and tense. I won’t give anything away; it is really a movie everyone should watch.
The acting in this movie is incredible. Anthony Hopkins gives a once in a lifetime performance as Hannibal Lecter and won the Academy Award for best Actor. He’s cold, commanding and insanely intelligent. Jodie Foster also gives a great performance as Clarice, she’s strong and driven to succeed. Foster won the Academy Award for best Actress for her role. The two actors really play well off one another, and become an unlikely team helping to bring in a dangerous serial killer. Ted Levine as Buffalo Bill is so damn creepy. This movie really did rake in the Academy Awards, grabbing five awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Actress, Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay.
The special effects were fairly good, there wasn’t really much they had to do. You see a few corpses that are rather realistic and the skin suit is disgusting. This movie doesn’t need to rely on effects to make it what it is, the acting and atmosphere transcend this movie to the great level it reached. The scenes of Lecter’s escape are graphic and bloody but simple and straight to the point which just adds to the atmosphere.
There really isn’t much I can say about this that hasn’t already been said. The acting is amazing, the atmosphere and suspense is riveting and the story is awesome. At nearly two hours it is a little longer for a horror movie but the pacing is perfect and it doesn’t really drag at all. If you haven’t seen this, you really should, it is truly a classic in cinema let alone horror cinema. I give The Silence of the Lambs a hard A+. I can’t rate this anything lower.
