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Hannibal (film)
Encyclopedia
Hannibal is a 2001 psychological thriller
film directed by Ridley Scott
, adapted from the Thomas Harris
novel of the same name
. It is a sequel to the 1991 Academy Award-winning film The Silence of the Lambs that returns Anthony Hopkins
to his iconic role as serial killer Hannibal Lecter
. Julianne Moore
co-stars, taking over for Jodie Foster
in the role of FBI Agent Clarice Starling
.
Set ten years after The Silence of the Lambs, the premise is that Verger (a former victim played by Gary Oldman
) is determined to capture, torture
, and kill Lecter. The film's locations alternate between Italy
and the U.S.
The film's development drew a large amount of attention, with The Silence of the Lambs director Jonathan Demme
, screenwriter Ted Tally
and actress Jodie Foster
all eventually declining involvement. Upon release, Hannibal broke box-office records in the United States, Australia, Canada and the UK in February 2001.
Special Agent Clarice Starling
(Julianne Moore
) is unjustly blamed for a bungled drug raid. Starling and her connection to Hannibal Lecter
(Anthony Hopkins
) come to the attention of Lecter's only surviving victim, Mason Verger (Gary Oldman
), a wealthy child molester whom Lecter left horribly disfigured and paralyzed after having been assigned as Verger's court-appointed therapist.
Verger uses his immense wealth and political influence to have Starling reassigned to Lecter's case and meets with her in his mansion. Verger is pursuing an elaborate scheme to capture, torture and kill Lecter, and hopes Starling's involvement will draw him out. Indeed, Lecter sends her a taunting letter after learning of her public disgrace. Though the letter contains no clue to Lecter's whereabouts, Starling detects a strange fragrance that a perfume expert later identifies as a bespoke skin cream whose ingredients are only available to a few shops in the world. She contacts the police departments of the cities where the shops are located, requesting surveillance tapes. One of the cities is Florence, Italy, where Chief Inspector Rinaldo Pazzi (Giancarlo Giannini
) is investigating the disappearance of a library curator. Pazzi questions Lecter, who is masquerading as "Dr. Fell", the assistant curator and now caretaker of the library.
Upon recognizing Dr. Fell in the surveillance tape, Pazzi accesses the FBI's ViCAP database
of wanted fugitives. He learns of Verger's US$3 million reward to anyone turning Lecter over to him rather than to the FBI. Lured by Verger's bounty, Pazzi ignores Starling's warnings against trying to capture Lecter alone. He recruits a pickpocket to obtain a fingerprint of Lecter to show as proof of his whereabouts and thus collect the reward. The pickpocket is mortally wounded by Lecter but manages to get the print and provides them to Pazzi, who in turn contacts Verger. Lecter then baits Pazzi into an isolated room of the library, ties him up with electrical cords, hangs, and disembowels him, before escaping back to the United States.
Verger bribes Justice Department
official Paul Krendler (Ray Liotta
) to accuse Starling of withholding a note from Lecter, leading to her suspension. Lecter lures Starling to Union Station
but Verger's men, who have followed Starling, capture Lecter and transport him to Verger. When her superiors refuse to act, Starling, on her own initiative, infiltrates Verger's estate. Verger means to have Lecter eaten alive by a herd of wild boars bred specifically for this purpose. Starling intervenes to free Lecter but is herself wounded, and Lecter rescues her from the voracious animals. Verger furiously orders his private physician Cordell (Željko Ivanek
) to shoot Lecter, but instead Lecter persuades Cordell to throw his hated employer into the pen, where he is eaten alive by the boars.
Lecter takes a sedated Starling to Krendler's secluded lake house and treats her wounds. When Krendler arrives for the Fourth of July break
, he is subdued and drugged by Lecter. Starling, disoriented by morphine and dressed in a slinky black-velvet evening gown, wakes to find Lecter cooking and Krendler in a wheelchair seated at the table set for an elegant dinner. Weakened by the drugs, she looks on in confusion and horror as Lecter removes the top of Krendler's skull, cuts out part of his prefrontal cortex
, sautees it, and feeds Krendler his own brain before finally killing him.
After the meal, Starling tries to attack Lecter but is quickly overpowered. She manages to handcuff his wrist to hers, and Lecter brandishes a meat cleaver and severs his left hand to escape. Lecter is later seen on a flight with boxed lunch on his pull-down table. As he prepares to eat his meal, including a small cooked portion of Krendler's brain, a young boy seated next to him asks to try some of his food. Lecter lets the boy eat some of his lunch, telling him that "it is important... always to try new things."
was asked in 1994 about a possible sequel in Rolling Stone
. Demme said that Thomas Harris
, author of The Silence of the Lambs
, had been working on the follow-up for "seven or eight years." Demme had an idea even at that time that it would not be a straight follow up. Harris told Demme: "I imagine Doctor Lecter going somewhere in Europe... strolling round the streets of Florence
or Munich
, gazing in the windows of watchmakers..." Demme stated his intention to be involved in the cinematic adaptation of Hannibal in 1998, less than a year before the novel was published.
Dino De Laurentiis
produced Michael Mann's film Manhunter
in 1986, based on Harris' novel Red Dragon, featuring the first appearance of Hannibal Lecter
, played by Brian Cox. De Laurentiis did not like Mann's film: "Manhunter was no good... it was not Red Dragon," he said. De Laurentiis and his wife Martha (also his co-producer) had no direct involvement in The Silence of the Lambs, a decision De Laurentiis came to regret. They did, however, own the rights to the Lecter character and reportedly allowed Orion Pictures
, which produced Silence of the Lambs, to use the character of Lecter for free, not wishing to be "greedy." When The Silence of the Lambs became a commercial and critical success in 1991, winning five Academy Awards, both Dino and Martha De Laurentiis found themselves sitting on a valuable asset and eager for a follow-up novel they could adapt. After a lengthy wait, De Laurentiis finally received a call from Harris telling him he had finished the sequel to The Silence of the Lambs and De Laurentiis purchased the rights
for a record $10 million.
In April 1999, the Los Angeles Times
reported that the budget for an adaptation of Hannibal could cost as much as $100 million. It speculated that both Jodie Foster
and Anthony Hopkins
would receive $15 million each to reprise their roles and "$5 million to $19 million for director Jonathan Demme." The newspaper further reported that, although Silence of the Lambs cost only $22 million, this would not deter the studio from going ahead with Hannibal. Mort Janklow, Harris's agent
at the time, told the Los Angeles Times that Foster, Hopkins, and Demme would soon receive manuscripts of the novel, claiming it would make an unbelievable movie.
The book sold out of its initial 1.6 million print run in the summer of 1999. Hannibal went on to sell millions of copies following its release in mid-1999.
Demme informed the producers of Hannibal that he would pass on directing Hannibal. It has been claimed Demme turned down the project because he found the material "lurid" and was averse to the book's "gore". De Laurentiis said on Demme's decision to decline: "When the pope dies, we create a new pope. Good luck to Jonathan Demme. Good-bye." He has since added that Demme felt he could not make a sequel as good as The Silence of the Lambs.
on the set of Gladiator
and suggested to Ridley he read the novel he had bought the rights to. Scott was in the third week before principal photography
was due to finish on Gladiator. Gladiator became a commercial and critical success, earning 12 Academy Award nominations. De Laurentiis asked Scott if he would like to direct the film version of Hannibal. Scott misunderstood which Hannibal he meant, thinking De Laurentiis was speaking of the general and historical figure from Carthage who nearly brought down the Roman Empire
back around 200 B.C., so he replied: "Basically, Dino, I’m doing a Roman epic right now. I don’t wanna do elephants coming over the Alps
next, old boy." Scott read the manuscript
in four sittings within a week, believing it to be a "symphony
", and expressed his desire to do it. Scott further explains how he got involved: "I was shooting Gladiator in Malta
and one day, for the hell of it, I went for a walk for half a mile down the road to the Malta Film Studio to see my old buddy Dino. I had not seen him since I’d worked on a version of Dune
. This was pre-Blade Runner
. Dino had pursued me to direct Dune and another film. He's always enthusiastic and aggressive and came after me when I did both Blade Runner and Alien
, but I couldn’t do the films. Anyway, we had an espresso together and a few days later, he called me to ask if he could visit the Gladiator set. He arrived with a manuscript of Hannibal, about a month before it was published in book form. He said: ‘Lets make this one.’ I haven’t read anything so fast since The Godfather
. It was so rich in all kind of ways."
Although Scott had accepted the job Demme had rejected, he said: "My first question was: ‘What about Jonathan?’ and they said: ‘The original team said it's too violent.’ I said, 'Okay. I’ll do it.'" Scott did, himself, have some uncertainty with the source material. He had difficulties with the ending of the novel in particular: "I couldn’t take that quantum leap emotionally on behalf of Starling. Certainly, on behalf of Hannibal – I’m sure that's been in the back of his mind for a number of years. But for Starling, no. I think one of the attractions about Starling to Hannibal is what a straight arrow she is." (In the novel Lecter and Starling end up an actual couple on the run together). He also "didn’t buy the book from the opera scene onwards, which became like a vampire
movie." He asked Harris if he was "married to his ending". Harris said he was not, so he changed it.
, the screenwriter for The Silence of the Lambs, was another key member of the original team to decline involvement in Hannibal (he won an Oscar for his Silence adaptation). Tally, like Demme, had problems with the novel's "excesses".
Steven Zaillian
(writer of Schindler's List
) was offered the chance to write the adaptation after Tally passed, but he also declined. He explained that "I was busy. And I wasn’t sure I was interested. You can almost never win when you do a sequel." David Mamet
was the first screenwriter to produce a draft, which, according to Ridley Scott
and the producers, needed major revisions. Stacey Snider, co-chairman of Universal Pictures
(a co-production deal was struck between Universal and MGM) said on the rejection of Mamet's screenplay: "There's no way David was going to read 15 pages of our notes and then be available to work on the script day-to-day." Mamet was preparing to direct his own film. A script review at ScreenwritersUtopia.com describes the Mamet draft as "stunningly bad" but found Zaillian's rewrite to be "gripping entertainment". Zaillian, who had already passed, reconsidered and became involved in the project, saying: "It's hard to say no to Dino once and it's almost impossible to say no to him twice."
This question (regarding the script development) was put to Ridley Scott by Total Film
magazine: "There were lots of rewrites on 'Hannibal' – what was the main problem with the original material?" Scott replied: "That's inaccurate, because there were very few rewrites once I brought in Steve Zaillian. If you were to ask who were the best three screenwriters in the business, Steve Zaillian would be one of them. We discussed Hannibal endlessly." Asked if he had read Mamet's draft, he said: "Yes. He is very fast, very efficient, but he was off doing a film. 'Hannibal' was green lit and his first draft only took about a month. But I was scared that he would not be able to give me enough attention, because that draft needed a lot of work. So I moved on basically." Scott has said there were writing and "structural problems" as to what they would do with parts of the movie. One of Zaillian's key objectives was to revise the script by David Mamet until it pleased all parties, meaning the "love" story would need to be done by suggestion instead of by "assault". Scott worked through the script with Zaillian for 28 days making him "sweat through it with him and discuss every inch of the way with him." After 25 days Scott suddenly realized that Zaillian was "exorcising the 600 pages of the book. He was distilling through discussion what he was gonna finally do...Frankly I could have just made it."
(Clarice Starling
) and Anthony Hopkins
(Hannibal Lecter
) would reprise
their respective roles for which they won Academy Awards in The Silence of the Lambs (best actress/actor). It became apparent that the producers and the studio
could do without one of the original "stars" (and would go on to find a replacement). The withdrawal of both Foster and Hopkins could possibly have been terminal for the project, however. De Laurentiis confirmed this after the film's release: "First and foremost, I knew we had no movie without Anthony Hopkins."
confirmed to Larry King
in 1997 that she "would definitely be part of it". She told Entertainment Weekly
in 1997 that "Anthony Hopkins always talks about it. I mean, everybody wants to do it. Every time I see him, it's like: 'When is it going to happen? When is it going to happen?'" De Laurentiis thought Foster would decline once she read the book, even believing the final movie was better for it. Hopkins also had doubts Foster would be involved, saying he had a "hunch" she would not be. Foster did turn it down, confirming this in late December 1999.
This would cause problems for the studio, Universal
and partner MGM. "The studio is just back from the holiday and is regrouping based on the news, and has no cohesive game plan at the moment," said Kevin Misher, Universal's President of Production. Misher added that, "It was one of those moments when you sit down and think, ‘Can Clarice be looked upon as James Bond
for instance? A character who is replaceable?' Or was Jodie Foster Clarice Starling, and the audience will not accept anyone else?" Foster said in December 1999 that the characterization of Starling in Hannibal had "negative attributes" and "betrayed" the original character.
Foster's spokeswoman said the actress declined because Claire Danes
had become available for Foster's own project, Flora Plum. Salary demands may also have played a part in Foster's non-participation. De Laurentiis said, "I call the agent of Judy Foster. He say to me ‘I have instruction. She no want to read the script if you no give her an offer of $20m and 15% of the gross.’ And I say, ‘Give my love to Judy Foster, goodbye.’" (The article makes clear that "Dino comically mispronounces the actress's name") Entertainment Weekly described the project as becoming "a bloody mess, hemorrhaging talent and money" even despite Hopkins being on-board.
Foster talked about Hannibal in an interview with Total Film
magazine in late 2005. She said: "The official reason I didn’t do Hannibal is I was doing another movie, Flora Plum. So I get to say, in a nice dignified way, that I wasn’t available when that movie was being shot...Clarice meant so much to Jonathan and I, she really did, and I know it sounds kind of strange to say but there was no way that either of us could really trample on her."
considered several different actresses, including Cate Blanchett
, Angelina Jolie
, Gillian Anderson
, Hilary Swank
, Ashley Judd
, Helen Hunt
and Julianne Moore
. Hopkins asked his agent if he had any "power" over casting. He informed De Laurentiis that he knew Julianne Moore, with whom he had worked on Surviving Picasso
, and thought her a "terrific actress". Although Hopkins' agent told him he had no contractual influence on casting, Scott thought it correct to discuss who would be Hopkins' "leading lady". Scott said he was "really surprised to find that I had five of the top actresses in Hollywood wanting it." Moore would eventually secure the part. Scott said his decision was swayed in favor of Moore because: "She is a true chameleon. She can be a lunatic in Magnolia
, a vamp in An Ideal Husband, a porn star in Boogie Nights
and a romantic in The End of the Affair
" "Julianne Moore, once Jodie decided to pass was always top of my list." said Scott on his female lead. Moore talked about stepping into a role made famous by another actress: "The new Clarice would be very different. Of course people are going to compare my interpretation with that of Jodie Foster's...but this film is going to be very different."
by Steven Zaillian
. Hopkins said he had no difficulty moving back into "Lecter's mind". "I just learned the lines and showed up and walked around as Hannibal Lecter. I thought, 'Do I repeat that same performance, or do I vary it?' Ten years had passed so I changed a bit." In the book, Lecter uses bandages to disguise himself as a plastic surgery
patient. This was left out of the film because Scott and Hopkins agreed to leave the face alone. Hopkins explains why: "It's as if he's making a statement – 'catch me if you can'. With his big hat, he's so obvious that nobody thinks he's Hannibal Lecter. I've always thought he's a very elegant man, a renaissance
man." In the film, Lecter is first seen in Florence
"as the classical Lecter, lecturing and being smooth", according to Hopkins. When the film moves to the US, Hopkins changed his appearance by building up muscle and cropping his hair short "to make him like a mercenary
, that he would be so fit and so strong that he could just snap somebody in two if they got... in his way".
as corrupt Justice Department
official Paul Krendler (a character that appeared in Silence of the Lambs, though original actor Ron Vawter
died before the production of Hannibal) and Italian screen legend Giancarlo Giannini
as the opportunistic Detective Rinaldo Pazzi. Francesca Neri
won the role of Pazzi's wife, Allegra. Frankie R. Faison signed on to reprise his role as hospital orderly Barney Matthews. (The actor had appeared in Silence of the Lambs in the same role. He also appeared in the film Manhunter
as another character, Lt. Fisk).
Gary Oldman
was cast as Mason Verger, one of Lecter's two surviving victims. Co-producer Martha De Laurentiis said they had a "funny situation" with Oldman wanting a prominent "credit". She said: "Now how can you have a prominent credit with Hannibal? The characters are Hannibal and Clarice Starling. So we really couldn’t work something out (at first)." Oldman was apparently "out" of the movie for while, but then came back in, asking to go "unbilled". Oldman would become transformed and "unrecognizable as himself" to play the part of Verger. He would have no lips, cheeks or eyelids. Make-up artist Greg Cannom said: "It's really disgusting... I’ve been showing people pictures [of Oldman as Verger], and they all just say ‘Oh my God,’ and walk away, which makes me very happy." Oldman said that having his name completely removed from the billing and credits allowed him to "do it anonymously" under that heavy make-up.
, editor Pietro Scalia
and composer Hans Zimmer
had all worked on Scott's previous film, Gladiator
.
on 8 May 2000 in Florence
. The film visited key locations in Florence and various locations around the United States. Martha De Laurentiis said the movie has almost a hundred locations and that it was a "constant pain of moving and dressing sets. But the locations were beautiful. Who could complain about being allowed to shoot in Palazzo Vecchio in Florence? Or President James Madison
's farm in Montpelier or the amazing Biltmore Estate in Asheville?" Eighty million dollars and a year and a half in production were spent before Scott got his first look at Hannibal in the editing room.
s" and did not reflect the vision Scott had of the character; Scott wanted Verger to look real with hideous scarring, and not something from the "House of Wax". Scott himself would actually call up the help of expert doctors in an effort to get the look of the character as realistic as possible. Scott showed the make-up team pictures of "foetal things", which he thought "touching"; he wanted to make Mason Verger more "touching" than "monstrous", as he thought of Verger as being "someone who hadn’t lost his sense of humour...almost sympathetic." Oldman would spend six hours a day in make-up to prepare for the role.
For one of the final and infamous scenes of the movie an exact "duplicate" was created of the character Paul Krendler, played by Ray Liotta
, a scene which blended make-up, puppet
work and CGI
in a way which Scott called "seamless".
who worked for one of Scott's production companies in London. The sequence
, shot in Florence
by Livesey himself was intended as the second promotional trailer for the film. The studio thought it not "quite right", but it remained on Scott's mind and would eventually end up as the main title sequence
. Livesey would gather footage of pigeons in an empty square in Florence early one morning which, in the final cut, would morph
into the face of Hannibal Lecter
. Scott believed it a good idea, as it fundamentally asked the question: Where is Hannibal Lecter? Scott explains: "And of course this story tells it, with pigeons in the cobblestones of somewhere, where you wonder where that is...and there he is his face appears." The titles are said to have been influenced by the film Se7en
.
, during post-production
on Hannibal. Scott believes the music to a film is as important as dialogue
– "It is the final adjustment to the screenplay, being able to also adjust the performance of the actors in fact." Zimmer and Scott sat in during the editing process with editor
Pietro Scalia
to discuss scenes in the film and "not music". Zimmer used a symphony orchestra for the opera sequence, but would mostly use what he described as a "very odd orchestra...only cellos and basses all playing at the extreme ends of their range." This was done to emphasise the character of Hannibal Lecter. He explains: "Anthony's character is for me somebody at the extreme range of whatever is humanly imaginable somehow." Zimmer also did not want the score to sound like a "modern day orchestra". The character Mason Verger had his own "theme", which become more "perverted" as the movie progressed, according to Zimmer. Dante
's sonnet was put to music by Zimmer and Patrick Cassidy
for the opera scene in Florence
. Tracksounds.com wrote positively of Zimmer's score. "Zimmer truly crafts a score worthy of most fans' full attention...the classical elements, and yes, even the monologue combine to make this an intense listening experience." In a poll by Classic FM (UK)
listeners to find the greatest movie soundtrack of all-time, Hannibal ranked at 59. Strauss's The Blue Danube is also played at several points in the film.
that: "Hannibal was quite a different target, essentially a study between two individuals. Funny enough, it's rather romantic and also quite humorous, but also there's some quite bad behaviour as well." During the opera scene in Florence
, Lecter attends an operatic adaptation of one of Dante
's sonnet
s, and meets with Detective Pazzi and his wife, Allegra. She asks Lecter, "Do you believe a man could become so obsessed by a woman after a single encounter?" Lecter replies: "Yes, I believe he could... but would she see through the bars of his plight and ache for him?" This scene, in the movie, is one which Scott claims most people "missed" the meaning of. It was in reference to Starling – to their encounter in The Silence of the Lambs. The New York Times
in its review
of the film, said Hannibal, "toys" with the idea of "love that dare not speak its name" Composer Hans Zimmer
believes there to be "many" messages and subtext in each scene of the film. He says "I can score this movie truly as a Freudian archetypal beauty and the beast fairy tale
, as a horror movie, as the most elegant piece, on corruption in the American police force, as the loneliest woman on earth, the beauty in renaissance..." Zimmer ultimately believes it to be a dark love story, centering on two people who should never be together – a modern day Romeo and Juliet
. During post-production
of the film, Scott, Zimmer and the editor passionately argued about what a single shot meant, where a tear slides down Starling's cheek during a confrontation with Lecter. They could not agree if it was a tear of "anguish", "loneliness" or "disgust". Scott told the New York Post
that, the affair of the heart between Lecter and Starling is "metaphor
ical". Rolling Stone
even said in their review, "Scott offers a sly parody of relationships – think "When Hannibal met Sally."
"There is something very moral about Lecter in this film," said Scott in his audio commentary. "The behaviour of Hannibal is never insane – didn’t want to use that excuse. Is he insane? No, I think he's as sane as you or I. He just likes it." Scott did say, however, "In our normal terms, he's truly evil
." Scott also brings up the notion of absolution
in reference to Lecter towards the end of the film. Verger has one overriding objective in life: to capture Lecter and subject him to a slow, painful death. In this way, he replaces Lecter as the film's antagonist.
), a Florentine policeman who learns "Dr. Fell"'s true identity and realizes that this knowledge could make him rich. His escalating abandonment of morality allows him to countenance and facilitate the death of a gypsy pickpocket, egged on by the desire to have the best for his much younger wife. There is a moment in the film when Pazzi becomes corrupted, despite being what Scott describes as "very thoughtful". Paul Krendler also succumbs to greed and corruption. Starling does not, however, and perseveres to the end, even refusing to release Lecter when she believes he is about to cut off her hand in order to free himself.
in a 2001 New York Times
article. A poster released in the UK to promote Hannibal, featuring Lecter with a "skin mask" covering the right side of his face, was quickly removed from circulation as it was deemed "too shocking and disturbing for the public."
Upon its release, Hannibal was met with significant media attention, with the film's stars and director making several appearances on television, in newspapers and in magazines. In an article for CBS News
, Jill Serjeant stated that "the long-awaited sequel to the grisly 1991 thriller Silence of the Lambs is cooking up the hottest Internet and media buzz since the 1999 Star Wars 'prequel'." Stars Anthony Hopkins and Julianne Moore made the covers of a number of magazines, including Vanity Fair
, Entertainment Weekly
, Premiere
and Empire
.
and 1999's Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
grossed more in an opening weekend. It was also, when it was released, the biggest opening box office for an R-rated movie ever. Final domestic box office gross (USA) reached $165,092,268 with a worldwide gross of $351,692,268. The film spent three weeks at number one in the US box office chart, and four weeks at number one in the UK. Hannibal was the tenth highest grossing movie of the year worldwide, in a year which also saw the blockbuster releases of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
and The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Hannibal also made over $87,000,000 in US video rentals following release in August 2001.
TIME
wrote: "A banquet of creepy, gory or grotesque incidents is on display in Hannibal. But this superior sequel has romance in its dark heart." Empire
gave it two out of five stars, calling it "...laughable to just plain boring, Hannibal is toothless to the end." David Thomson, writing in the British Film Institute
magazine Sight & Sound
, praised the film. "It works. It's smart, good-looking, sexy, fun...dirty, naughty and knowing." Thomson does make clear, however, he is a great fan of director Ridley Scott's work. He adds: "It is, literally, that Hannibal Lecter has become such a household joke that he can't be dreadful again. It seems clear that Anthony Hopkins and Scott saw that, and planned accordingly. That's how the movie was saved." Variety
in its review said "Hannibal is not as good as Lambs... ultimately more shallow and crass at its heart than its predecessor, Hannibal is nevertheless tantalizing, engrossing and occasionally startling." A negative review in The Guardian
claimed that what was wrong with the film was carried over from the book: "The result is an inflated, good-looking bore of a movie. The Silence of the Lambs was a marvelous thing. This, by contrast is barely okey-dokey." Roger Ebert
gave the film a "Thumbs down" rating on the television program At the Movies with Ebert & Roeper and gave the film a 2.5 out of 4 stars rating in his print review, which he began with the following: "Ridley Scott's Hannibal is a carnival geek show. We must give it credit for the courage of its depravity; if it proves nothing else, it proves that if a man cutting off his face and feeding it to his dogs doesn't get the NC-17 rating for violence, nothing ever will."
Hannibal currently has an overall Metacritic
rating of 57 out of 100 from 36 reviews, an IMDb rating of 6.5 out of 10 and a Rotten Tomatoes
rating of 38 percent, with an average rating of five out of ten from 160 reviews.
by director Ridley Scott
, deleted and alternate scenes, five making-of featurettes and a "marketing gallery" which contains trailers, production stills and unused poster
concepts.
A special "steel-book" edition of Hannibal was released in 2007. There are no significant changes made to the DVD itself; only the package artwork was changed.
The film was originally released as part of The Hannibal Lecter Collection on Blu-ray in 2009. It was then then released as a stand-alone release in 2011.
the script for Hannibal was: "...for better or worse, quite faithful to the Harris blueprint; fans of the tome may regret the perhaps necessary excision of some characters, most notably Mason Verger's muscle-bound macho sister Margot, as well as the considerable fascinating academic detail, but will basically feel the book has been respected (yes, even the climactic dinner party is served up intact, with the only surprise twists saved for its wake)." Time Out in its review of Hannibal noted: "The weight-watchers script sensibly dispenses with several characters to serve a brew that's enjoyably spicy but low on substance. So much story is squeezed into 131 minutes that little time's left for analysis or characterization." Producer Dino De Laurentiis
was asked why some characters were left out of the film: "I think if you get a book which is 600 pages, you have to reduce it to a script
of 100 pages. In two hours of film, you cannot possibly include all the characters. We set ourselves a limit, and cut characters which weren't so vital."
In the book, Mason Verger runs an orphanage, from which he calls children to verbally abuse as a substitute for his no longer being able to molest them. He also has a sister, Margot, whom he raped when they were children and who is a lesbian. When she disclosed her sexual orientation
to her family, their father disowned her. As she herself is sterile due to steroid
abuse, Verger exerts some control over her by promising her a semen
sample with which to impregnate her lover, who could then inherit
the Verger fortune. Also, in the novel, Verger literally has no face and has to be kept in a sterile room at all times to keep bacteria from affecting exposed muscle and tissues. At the end of the book, Margot and Starling both help Lecter escape during a shootout between Starling and Verger's guards. Margot, at Lecter's advice, stimulates her brother to ejaculate with a cattle prod
, and then kills him by ramming his pet Moray eel
down his throat. Following up on Krendler's fate in the book, the crooked FBI
official is killed when Lecter shoots him with an arrow.
The book's controversial ending has Lecter presenting Starling with the exhumed bones of her father, which he "brings to life" by hypnotizing
Starling, allowing her to say goodbye. This forges an odd alliance between Starling and Lecter, culminating in their becoming lovers and escaping to Argentina
. At the end of the novel, Barney (the hospital orderly) sees them at the Teatro Colón of Buenos Aires
.
Also gone from the film were the flashbacks to Lecter's childhood, in which he sees his younger sister, Mischa, eaten by German deserters in 1944. These flashbacks formed the basis for the 2007 film Hannibal Rising
which portrays Lecter as a young man who eventually becomes the killer of the prior films.
The character of Jack Crawford
, while in the book, does not appear in the film.
Hopkins was asked in an interview on the subject of whether or not he believed the idea of Starling and Lecter heading off in to the sunset as lovers (as happens in the book). "Yes, I did. Other people found that preposterous. I suppose there's a moral issue there. I think it would have been a very interesting thing though. I think it would have been very interesting had she gone off, because I suspected that there was that romance, attachment there, that obsession with her. I guessed that a long time ago, at the last phone call to Clarice, at the end of SotL, she said, 'Dr. Lecter, Dr. Lecter...'."
Psychological thriller
Psychological thriller is a specific sub-genre of the broad ranged thriller with heavy focus on characters. However, it often incorporates elements from the mystery and drama genre, along with the typical traits of the thriller genre...
film directed by Ridley Scott
Ridley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
, adapted from the Thomas Harris
Thomas Harris
Thomas Harris is an American author and screenwriter, best known for a series of suspense novels about his most famous character, Hannibal Lecter...
novel of the same name
Hannibal (novel)
Hannibal is a novel written by Thomas Harris, published in 1999. It is the third in his series featuring Dr. Hannibal Lecter and the second to feature FBI Special Agent Clarice Starling. The novel takes place seven years after the events of The Silence of the Lambs and deals with the intended...
. It is a sequel to the 1991 Academy Award-winning film The Silence of the Lambs that returns Anthony Hopkins
Anthony Hopkins
Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins, KBE , best known as Anthony Hopkins, is a Welsh actor of film, stage and television...
to his iconic role as serial killer Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter M.D. is a fictional character in a series of horror novels by Thomas Harris and in the films adapted from them.Lecter was introduced in the 1981 thriller novel Red Dragon as a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer...
. Julianne Moore
Julianne Moore
Julianne Moore is an American actress and a children's book author. Throughout her career, she has been nominated for four Oscars, six Golden Globes, three BAFTAs and nine Screen Actors Guild Awards....
co-stars, taking over for Jodie Foster
Jodie Foster
Alicia Christian "Jodie" Foster is an American actress, film director, producer as well as a former child actress....
in the role of FBI Agent Clarice Starling
Clarice Starling
Clarice M. Starling is a fictional character and the protagonist in the novels The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal by Thomas Harris....
.
Set ten years after The Silence of the Lambs, the premise is that Verger (a former victim played by Gary Oldman
Gary Oldman
Gary Leonard Oldman is an English actor, voice actor, filmmaker and musician.A member of the 1980s Brit Pack, Oldman came to prominence via starring roles in British films Meantime , Sid and Nancy and Prick Up Your Ears , with his performance in the latter bringing him his first BAFTA Award...
) is determined to capture, torture
Torture
Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion...
, and kill Lecter. The film's locations alternate between Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
and the U.S.
The film's development drew a large amount of attention, with The Silence of the Lambs director Jonathan Demme
Jonathan Demme
Robert Jonathan Demme is an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. Best known for directing The Silence of the Lambs, which won him the Academy Award for Best Director, he has also directed the acclaimed movies Philadelphia, Rachel Getting Married, the Talking Heads concert movie Stop...
, screenwriter Ted Tally
Ted Tally
Ted Tally is an American playwright and screenwriter.-Screenwriter:Born William Theodore Tally in North Carolina, Tally was educated at Yale College and the Yale School of Drama, and has also taught at each of them...
and actress Jodie Foster
Jodie Foster
Alicia Christian "Jodie" Foster is an American actress, film director, producer as well as a former child actress....
all eventually declining involvement. Upon release, Hannibal broke box-office records in the United States, Australia, Canada and the UK in February 2001.
Plot
Ten years after tracking down serial killer Jame Gumb, FBIFederal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
Special Agent Clarice Starling
Clarice Starling
Clarice M. Starling is a fictional character and the protagonist in the novels The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal by Thomas Harris....
(Julianne Moore
Julianne Moore
Julianne Moore is an American actress and a children's book author. Throughout her career, she has been nominated for four Oscars, six Golden Globes, three BAFTAs and nine Screen Actors Guild Awards....
) is unjustly blamed for a bungled drug raid. Starling and her connection to Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter M.D. is a fictional character in a series of horror novels by Thomas Harris and in the films adapted from them.Lecter was introduced in the 1981 thriller novel Red Dragon as a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer...
(Anthony Hopkins
Anthony Hopkins
Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins, KBE , best known as Anthony Hopkins, is a Welsh actor of film, stage and television...
) come to the attention of Lecter's only surviving victim, Mason Verger (Gary Oldman
Gary Oldman
Gary Leonard Oldman is an English actor, voice actor, filmmaker and musician.A member of the 1980s Brit Pack, Oldman came to prominence via starring roles in British films Meantime , Sid and Nancy and Prick Up Your Ears , with his performance in the latter bringing him his first BAFTA Award...
), a wealthy child molester whom Lecter left horribly disfigured and paralyzed after having been assigned as Verger's court-appointed therapist.
Verger uses his immense wealth and political influence to have Starling reassigned to Lecter's case and meets with her in his mansion. Verger is pursuing an elaborate scheme to capture, torture and kill Lecter, and hopes Starling's involvement will draw him out. Indeed, Lecter sends her a taunting letter after learning of her public disgrace. Though the letter contains no clue to Lecter's whereabouts, Starling detects a strange fragrance that a perfume expert later identifies as a bespoke skin cream whose ingredients are only available to a few shops in the world. She contacts the police departments of the cities where the shops are located, requesting surveillance tapes. One of the cities is Florence, Italy, where Chief Inspector Rinaldo Pazzi (Giancarlo Giannini
Giancarlo Giannini
Giancarlo Giannini is an Italian actor and dubber.Giannini was born La Spezia, Liguria, Italy. He studied at the Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica in Rome, and made his film debut in a small part in Fango sulla metropoli in 1965...
) is investigating the disappearance of a library curator. Pazzi questions Lecter, who is masquerading as "Dr. Fell", the assistant curator and now caretaker of the library.
Upon recognizing Dr. Fell in the surveillance tape, Pazzi accesses the FBI's ViCAP database
Violent Criminal Apprehension Program
The Violent Criminal Apprehension Program is a unit of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation responsible for the analysis of serial violent and sexual crimes, organizationally situated within the Critical Incident Response Group's National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime...
of wanted fugitives. He learns of Verger's US$3 million reward to anyone turning Lecter over to him rather than to the FBI. Lured by Verger's bounty, Pazzi ignores Starling's warnings against trying to capture Lecter alone. He recruits a pickpocket to obtain a fingerprint of Lecter to show as proof of his whereabouts and thus collect the reward. The pickpocket is mortally wounded by Lecter but manages to get the print and provides them to Pazzi, who in turn contacts Verger. Lecter then baits Pazzi into an isolated room of the library, ties him up with electrical cords, hangs, and disembowels him, before escaping back to the United States.
Verger bribes Justice Department
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
official Paul Krendler (Ray Liotta
Ray Liotta
[File:Ray Liotta is an American actor, best known for his portrayal of Henry Hill in the crime-drama Goodfellas, directed by Martin Scorsese and his role as Shoeless Joe Jackson in Field of Dreams...
) to accuse Starling of withholding a note from Lecter, leading to her suspension. Lecter lures Starling to Union Station
Union Station (Washington, D.C.)
Washington Union Station is a train station and leisure destination visited by 32 million people each year in the center of Washington, D.C. The train station is served by Amtrak, MARC and Virginia Railway Express commuter rail services as well as by Washington Metro subway trains and local buses...
but Verger's men, who have followed Starling, capture Lecter and transport him to Verger. When her superiors refuse to act, Starling, on her own initiative, infiltrates Verger's estate. Verger means to have Lecter eaten alive by a herd of wild boars bred specifically for this purpose. Starling intervenes to free Lecter but is herself wounded, and Lecter rescues her from the voracious animals. Verger furiously orders his private physician Cordell (Željko Ivanek
Željko Ivanek
Željko Ivanek is an Emmy award-winning Slovenian American actor best known for his role as Ray Fiske on Damages. He is also known for playing Blake Sterling on short-lived NBC series The Event and Emile Danko on Heroes....
) to shoot Lecter, but instead Lecter persuades Cordell to throw his hated employer into the pen, where he is eaten alive by the boars.
Lecter takes a sedated Starling to Krendler's secluded lake house and treats her wounds. When Krendler arrives for the Fourth of July break
Independence Day (United States)
Independence Day, commonly known as the Fourth of July, is a federal holiday in the United States commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, declaring independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain...
, he is subdued and drugged by Lecter. Starling, disoriented by morphine and dressed in a slinky black-velvet evening gown, wakes to find Lecter cooking and Krendler in a wheelchair seated at the table set for an elegant dinner. Weakened by the drugs, she looks on in confusion and horror as Lecter removes the top of Krendler's skull, cuts out part of his prefrontal cortex
Prefrontal cortex
The prefrontal cortex is the anterior part of the frontal lobes of the brain, lying in front of the motor and premotor areas.This brain region has been implicated in planning complex cognitive behaviors, personality expression, decision making and moderating correct social behavior...
, sautees it, and feeds Krendler his own brain before finally killing him.
After the meal, Starling tries to attack Lecter but is quickly overpowered. She manages to handcuff his wrist to hers, and Lecter brandishes a meat cleaver and severs his left hand to escape. Lecter is later seen on a flight with boxed lunch on his pull-down table. As he prepares to eat his meal, including a small cooked portion of Krendler's brain, a young boy seated next to him asks to try some of his food. Lecter lets the boy eat some of his lunch, telling him that "it is important... always to try new things."
Cast
- Anthony HopkinsAnthony HopkinsSir Philip Anthony Hopkins, KBE , best known as Anthony Hopkins, is a Welsh actor of film, stage and television...
as Dr. Hannibal LecterHannibal LecterHannibal Lecter M.D. is a fictional character in a series of horror novels by Thomas Harris and in the films adapted from them.Lecter was introduced in the 1981 thriller novel Red Dragon as a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer... - Julianne MooreJulianne MooreJulianne Moore is an American actress and a children's book author. Throughout her career, she has been nominated for four Oscars, six Golden Globes, three BAFTAs and nine Screen Actors Guild Awards....
as Clarice StarlingClarice StarlingClarice M. Starling is a fictional character and the protagonist in the novels The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal by Thomas Harris.... - Gary OldmanGary OldmanGary Leonard Oldman is an English actor, voice actor, filmmaker and musician.A member of the 1980s Brit Pack, Oldman came to prominence via starring roles in British films Meantime , Sid and Nancy and Prick Up Your Ears , with his performance in the latter bringing him his first BAFTA Award...
as Mason Verger - Ray LiottaRay Liotta[File:Ray Liotta is an American actor, best known for his portrayal of Henry Hill in the crime-drama Goodfellas, directed by Martin Scorsese and his role as Shoeless Joe Jackson in Field of Dreams...
as Paul Krendler - Giancarlo GianniniGiancarlo GianniniGiancarlo Giannini is an Italian actor and dubber.Giannini was born La Spezia, Liguria, Italy. He studied at the Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica in Rome, and made his film debut in a small part in Fango sulla metropoli in 1965...
as Chief Inspector Rinaldo Pazzi - Željko IvanekŽeljko IvanekŽeljko Ivanek is an Emmy award-winning Slovenian American actor best known for his role as Ray Fiske on Damages. He is also known for playing Blake Sterling on short-lived NBC series The Event and Emile Danko on Heroes....
as Dr. Cordell Doemling - Hazelle GoodmanHazelle GoodmanHazelle Goodman is an actress from Trinidad and Tobago. As a child she was inspired to become an actress after viewing The Sound of Music, before her family moved to New York where she was raised in the boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn.- Career :After graduating from City College of New York with a...
as Evelda Drumgo - Frankie R. FaisonFrankie FaisonFrankie Russel Faison , often credited as Frankie R. Faison, is an American actor.-Personal life:Faison was born in Newport News, Virginia, the son of Carmena and Edgar Faison. He studied drama at Illinois Wesleyan University in Bloomington, Illinois, where he joined Theta Chi Fraternity...
as Barney Matthews - Ivano Marescotti as Carlo Deogracias
- Francesca NeriFrancesca NeriFrancesca Neri is an Italian actress.Neri was born in Trento, she has twice received the Silver Ribbon Award for Best Actress from the Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists, for Pensavo fosse amore invece era un calesse, directed by Massimo Troisi and Carne trémula .She has also...
as Allegra Pazzi - Danielle de NieseDanielle de NieseDanielle de Niese is a lyric soprano. After success as a young child in singing competitions in Australia, she moved to the USA where she developed an operatic career...
as Beatrice
Background
The Silence of the Lambs director Jonathan DemmeJonathan Demme
Robert Jonathan Demme is an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. Best known for directing The Silence of the Lambs, which won him the Academy Award for Best Director, he has also directed the acclaimed movies Philadelphia, Rachel Getting Married, the Talking Heads concert movie Stop...
was asked in 1994 about a possible sequel in Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
. Demme said that Thomas Harris
Thomas Harris
Thomas Harris is an American author and screenwriter, best known for a series of suspense novels about his most famous character, Hannibal Lecter...
, author of The Silence of the Lambs
The Silence of the Lambs (novel)
The Silence of the Lambs is a novel by Thomas Harris. First published in 1988, it is the sequel to Harris' 1981 novel Red Dragon. Both novels feature the cannibalistic serial killer Dr. Hannibal Lecter, this time pitted against FBI Special Agent Clarice Starling.- Plot summary :The novel takes...
, had been working on the follow-up for "seven or eight years." Demme had an idea even at that time that it would not be a straight follow up. Harris told Demme: "I imagine Doctor Lecter going somewhere in Europe... strolling round the streets of Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
or Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
, gazing in the windows of watchmakers..." Demme stated his intention to be involved in the cinematic adaptation of Hannibal in 1998, less than a year before the novel was published.
Dino De Laurentiis
Dino De Laurentiis
Agostino "Dino" De Laurentiis was an Italian film producer.-Early life:He was born at Torre Annunziata in the province of Naples, and grew up selling spaghetti produced by his father...
produced Michael Mann's film Manhunter
Manhunter (film)
Manhunter is a 1986 American thriller film based on Thomas Harris's novel Red Dragon. Written and directed by Michael Mann, it stars William Petersen as Will Graham and features Brian Cox as Hannibal Lecktor...
in 1986, based on Harris' novel Red Dragon, featuring the first appearance of Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter M.D. is a fictional character in a series of horror novels by Thomas Harris and in the films adapted from them.Lecter was introduced in the 1981 thriller novel Red Dragon as a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer...
, played by Brian Cox. De Laurentiis did not like Mann's film: "Manhunter was no good... it was not Red Dragon," he said. De Laurentiis and his wife Martha (also his co-producer) had no direct involvement in The Silence of the Lambs, a decision De Laurentiis came to regret. They did, however, own the rights to the Lecter character and reportedly allowed Orion Pictures
Orion Pictures
Orion Pictures Corporation was an American independent production company that produced movies from 1978 until 1998. It was formed in 1978 as a joint venture between Warner Bros. and three former top-level executives of United Artists. Although it was never a large motion picture producer, Orion...
, which produced Silence of the Lambs, to use the character of Lecter for free, not wishing to be "greedy." When The Silence of the Lambs became a commercial and critical success in 1991, winning five Academy Awards, both Dino and Martha De Laurentiis found themselves sitting on a valuable asset and eager for a follow-up novel they could adapt. After a lengthy wait, De Laurentiis finally received a call from Harris telling him he had finished the sequel to The Silence of the Lambs and De Laurentiis purchased the rights
Copyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
for a record $10 million.
In April 1999, the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
reported that the budget for an adaptation of Hannibal could cost as much as $100 million. It speculated that both Jodie Foster
Jodie Foster
Alicia Christian "Jodie" Foster is an American actress, film director, producer as well as a former child actress....
and Anthony Hopkins
Anthony Hopkins
Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins, KBE , best known as Anthony Hopkins, is a Welsh actor of film, stage and television...
would receive $15 million each to reprise their roles and "$5 million to $19 million for director Jonathan Demme." The newspaper further reported that, although Silence of the Lambs cost only $22 million, this would not deter the studio from going ahead with Hannibal. Mort Janklow, Harris's agent
Talent agent
A talent agent, or booking agent, is a person who finds jobs for actors, authors, film directors, musicians, models, producers, professional athletes, writers and other people in various entertainment businesses. Having an agent is not required, but does help the artist in getting jobs...
at the time, told the Los Angeles Times that Foster, Hopkins, and Demme would soon receive manuscripts of the novel, claiming it would make an unbelievable movie.
The book sold out of its initial 1.6 million print run in the summer of 1999. Hannibal went on to sell millions of copies following its release in mid-1999.
Demme informed the producers of Hannibal that he would pass on directing Hannibal. It has been claimed Demme turned down the project because he found the material "lurid" and was averse to the book's "gore". De Laurentiis said on Demme's decision to decline: "When the pope dies, we create a new pope. Good luck to Jonathan Demme. Good-bye." He has since added that Demme felt he could not make a sequel as good as The Silence of the Lambs.
Ridley Scott
De Laurentiis visited Ridley ScottRidley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
on the set of Gladiator
Gladiator (2000 film)
Gladiator is a 2000 historical epic film directed by Ridley Scott, starring Russell Crowe, Joaquin Phoenix, Connie Nielsen, Ralf Möller, Oliver Reed, Djimon Hounsou, Derek Jacobi, John Shrapnel and Richard Harris. Crowe portrays the loyal Roman General Maximus Decimus Meridius, who is betrayed...
and suggested to Ridley he read the novel he had bought the rights to. Scott was in the third week before principal photography
Principal photography
thumb|300px|Film production on location in [[Newark, New Jersey]].Principal photography is the phase of film production in which the movie is filmed, with actors on set and cameras rolling, as distinct from pre-production and post-production....
was due to finish on Gladiator. Gladiator became a commercial and critical success, earning 12 Academy Award nominations. De Laurentiis asked Scott if he would like to direct the film version of Hannibal. Scott misunderstood which Hannibal he meant, thinking De Laurentiis was speaking of the general and historical figure from Carthage who nearly brought down the Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
back around 200 B.C., so he replied: "Basically, Dino, I’m doing a Roman epic right now. I don’t wanna do elephants coming over the Alps
Alps
The Alps is one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria and Slovenia in the east through Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany to France in the west....
next, old boy." Scott read the manuscript
Manuscript
A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...
in four sittings within a week, believing it to be a "symphony
Symphony
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, scored almost always for orchestra. A symphony usually contains at least one movement or episode composed according to the sonata principle...
", and expressed his desire to do it. Scott further explains how he got involved: "I was shooting Gladiator in Malta
Malta
Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...
and one day, for the hell of it, I went for a walk for half a mile down the road to the Malta Film Studio to see my old buddy Dino. I had not seen him since I’d worked on a version of Dune
Dune (film)
Dune is a 1984 science fiction film written and directed by David Lynch, based on the 1965 Frank Herbert novel of the same name. The film stars Kyle MacLachlan as Paul Atreides, and includes an ensemble of well-known American and European actors in supporting roles. It was filmed at the Churubusco...
. This was pre-Blade Runner
Blade Runner
Blade Runner is a 1982 American science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, and Sean Young. The screenplay, written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples, is loosely based on the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K...
. Dino had pursued me to direct Dune and another film. He's always enthusiastic and aggressive and came after me when I did both Blade Runner and Alien
Alien (film)
Alien is a 1979 science fiction horror film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm and Yaphet Kotto. The film's title refers to its primary antagonist: a highly aggressive extraterrestrial creature which...
, but I couldn’t do the films. Anyway, we had an espresso together and a few days later, he called me to ask if he could visit the Gladiator set. He arrived with a manuscript of Hannibal, about a month before it was published in book form. He said: ‘Lets make this one.’ I haven’t read anything so fast since The Godfather
The Godfather
The Godfather is a 1972 American epic crime film directed by Francis Ford Coppola, based on the 1969 novel by Mario Puzo. With a screenplay by Puzo, Coppola and an uncredited Robert Towne, the film stars Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall, Sterling Hayden, John Marley, Richard...
. It was so rich in all kind of ways."
Although Scott had accepted the job Demme had rejected, he said: "My first question was: ‘What about Jonathan?’ and they said: ‘The original team said it's too violent.’ I said, 'Okay. I’ll do it.'" Scott did, himself, have some uncertainty with the source material. He had difficulties with the ending of the novel in particular: "I couldn’t take that quantum leap emotionally on behalf of Starling. Certainly, on behalf of Hannibal – I’m sure that's been in the back of his mind for a number of years. But for Starling, no. I think one of the attractions about Starling to Hannibal is what a straight arrow she is." (In the novel Lecter and Starling end up an actual couple on the run together). He also "didn’t buy the book from the opera scene onwards, which became like a vampire
Vampire
Vampires are mythological or folkloric beings who subsist by feeding on the life essence of living creatures, regardless of whether they are undead or a living person...
movie." He asked Harris if he was "married to his ending". Harris said he was not, so he changed it.
Script development
Ted TallyTed Tally
Ted Tally is an American playwright and screenwriter.-Screenwriter:Born William Theodore Tally in North Carolina, Tally was educated at Yale College and the Yale School of Drama, and has also taught at each of them...
, the screenwriter for The Silence of the Lambs, was another key member of the original team to decline involvement in Hannibal (he won an Oscar for his Silence adaptation). Tally, like Demme, had problems with the novel's "excesses".
Steven Zaillian
Steven Zaillian
Steven Ernest Bernard Zaillian is an American screenwriter, film director, film editor, producer, and founder of Film Rites, a film production company. He won an Academy Award for his screenplay for Schindler's List and he has been nominated two times for Awakenings and Gangs of New York...
(writer of Schindler's List
Schindler's List
Schindler's List is a 1993 American film about Oskar Schindler, a German businessman who saved the lives of more than a thousand mostly Polish-Jewish refugees during the Holocaust by employing them in his factories. The film was directed by Steven Spielberg, and based on the novel Schindler's Ark...
) was offered the chance to write the adaptation after Tally passed, but he also declined. He explained that "I was busy. And I wasn’t sure I was interested. You can almost never win when you do a sequel." David Mamet
David Mamet
David Alan Mamet is an American playwright, essayist, screenwriter and film director.Best known as a playwright, Mamet won a Pulitzer Prize and received a Tony nomination for Glengarry Glen Ross . He also received a Tony nomination for Speed-the-Plow . As a screenwriter, he received Oscar...
was the first screenwriter to produce a draft, which, according to Ridley Scott
Ridley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
and the producers, needed major revisions. Stacey Snider, co-chairman of Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures
-1920:* White Youth* The Flaming Disc* Am I Dreaming?* The Dragon's Net* The Adorable Savage* Putting It Over* The Line Runners-1921:* The Fire Eater* A Battle of Wits* Dream Girl* The Millionaire...
(a co-production deal was struck between Universal and MGM) said on the rejection of Mamet's screenplay: "There's no way David was going to read 15 pages of our notes and then be available to work on the script day-to-day." Mamet was preparing to direct his own film. A script review at ScreenwritersUtopia.com describes the Mamet draft as "stunningly bad" but found Zaillian's rewrite to be "gripping entertainment". Zaillian, who had already passed, reconsidered and became involved in the project, saying: "It's hard to say no to Dino once and it's almost impossible to say no to him twice."
This question (regarding the script development) was put to Ridley Scott by Total Film
Total Film
Total Film is a British film magazine published 13 times a year by Future Publishing. The magazine was launched in 1997 and offers film, DVD and Blu-ray news, reviews and features...
magazine: "There were lots of rewrites on 'Hannibal' – what was the main problem with the original material?" Scott replied: "That's inaccurate, because there were very few rewrites once I brought in Steve Zaillian. If you were to ask who were the best three screenwriters in the business, Steve Zaillian would be one of them. We discussed Hannibal endlessly." Asked if he had read Mamet's draft, he said: "Yes. He is very fast, very efficient, but he was off doing a film. 'Hannibal' was green lit and his first draft only took about a month. But I was scared that he would not be able to give me enough attention, because that draft needed a lot of work. So I moved on basically." Scott has said there were writing and "structural problems" as to what they would do with parts of the movie. One of Zaillian's key objectives was to revise the script by David Mamet until it pleased all parties, meaning the "love" story would need to be done by suggestion instead of by "assault". Scott worked through the script with Zaillian for 28 days making him "sweat through it with him and discuss every inch of the way with him." After 25 days Scott suddenly realized that Zaillian was "exorcising the 600 pages of the book. He was distilling through discussion what he was gonna finally do...Frankly I could have just made it."
Casting
It was unclear if Jodie FosterJodie Foster
Alicia Christian "Jodie" Foster is an American actress, film director, producer as well as a former child actress....
(Clarice Starling
Clarice Starling
Clarice M. Starling is a fictional character and the protagonist in the novels The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal by Thomas Harris....
) and Anthony Hopkins
Anthony Hopkins
Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins, KBE , best known as Anthony Hopkins, is a Welsh actor of film, stage and television...
(Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter M.D. is a fictional character in a series of horror novels by Thomas Harris and in the films adapted from them.Lecter was introduced in the 1981 thriller novel Red Dragon as a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer...
) would reprise
Reprise
Reprise is a fundamental device in the history of art. In literature, a reprise consists of the rewriting of another work; in music, a reprise is the repetition or reiteration of the opening material later in a composition as occurs in the recapitulation of sonata form, though—originally in the...
their respective roles for which they won Academy Awards in The Silence of the Lambs (best actress/actor). It became apparent that the producers and the studio
Movie studio
A movie studio is a term used to describe a major entertainment company or production company that has its own privately owned studio facility or facilities that are used to film movies...
could do without one of the original "stars" (and would go on to find a replacement). The withdrawal of both Foster and Hopkins could possibly have been terminal for the project, however. De Laurentiis confirmed this after the film's release: "First and foremost, I knew we had no movie without Anthony Hopkins."
Involvement of Jodie Foster
Regarding her involvement in a sequel to Silence of the Lambs, Jodie FosterJodie Foster
Alicia Christian "Jodie" Foster is an American actress, film director, producer as well as a former child actress....
confirmed to Larry King
Larry King
Lawrence Harvey "Larry" King is an American television and radio host whose work has been recognized with awards including two Peabodys and ten Cable ACE Awards....
in 1997 that she "would definitely be part of it". She told Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
in 1997 that "Anthony Hopkins always talks about it. I mean, everybody wants to do it. Every time I see him, it's like: 'When is it going to happen? When is it going to happen?'" De Laurentiis thought Foster would decline once she read the book, even believing the final movie was better for it. Hopkins also had doubts Foster would be involved, saying he had a "hunch" she would not be. Foster did turn it down, confirming this in late December 1999.
This would cause problems for the studio, Universal
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
and partner MGM. "The studio is just back from the holiday and is regrouping based on the news, and has no cohesive game plan at the moment," said Kevin Misher, Universal's President of Production. Misher added that, "It was one of those moments when you sit down and think, ‘Can Clarice be looked upon as James Bond
James Bond
James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
for instance? A character who is replaceable?' Or was Jodie Foster Clarice Starling, and the audience will not accept anyone else?" Foster said in December 1999 that the characterization of Starling in Hannibal had "negative attributes" and "betrayed" the original character.
Foster's spokeswoman said the actress declined because Claire Danes
Claire Danes
Claire Catherine Danes is an American actress of television, stage and film. She has appeared in roles as diverse as Angela Chase in My So-Called Life, as Juliet in Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet, as Kate Brewster in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, as Yvaine in Stardust and as Temple Grandin in...
had become available for Foster's own project, Flora Plum. Salary demands may also have played a part in Foster's non-participation. De Laurentiis said, "I call the agent of Judy Foster. He say to me ‘I have instruction. She no want to read the script if you no give her an offer of $20m and 15% of the gross.’ And I say, ‘Give my love to Judy Foster, goodbye.’" (The article makes clear that "Dino comically mispronounces the actress's name") Entertainment Weekly described the project as becoming "a bloody mess, hemorrhaging talent and money" even despite Hopkins being on-board.
Foster talked about Hannibal in an interview with Total Film
Total Film
Total Film is a British film magazine published 13 times a year by Future Publishing. The magazine was launched in 1997 and offers film, DVD and Blu-ray news, reviews and features...
magazine in late 2005. She said: "The official reason I didn’t do Hannibal is I was doing another movie, Flora Plum. So I get to say, in a nice dignified way, that I wasn’t available when that movie was being shot...Clarice meant so much to Jonathan and I, she really did, and I know it sounds kind of strange to say but there was no way that either of us could really trample on her."
Julianne Moore as Clarice Starling
When it became clear that Foster would skip Hannibal, the production teamProduction team
A production team is the group of technical staff who produce a play, television show, recording, or film. Generally the term refers to all individuals responsible for the technical aspects of creating of a particular product, regardless of where in the process their expertize is required, or how...
considered several different actresses, including Cate Blanchett
Cate Blanchett
Catherine Élise "Cate" Blanchett is an Australian actress. She came to international attention for her role as Elizabeth I of England in the 1998 biopic film Elizabeth, for which she won British Academy of Film and Television Arts and Golden Globe Awards, and earned her first Academy Award...
, Angelina Jolie
Angelina Jolie
Angelina Jolie is an American actress. She has received an Academy Award, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and three Golden Globe Awards, and was named Hollywood's highest-paid actress by Forbes in 2009 and 2011. Jolie is noted for promoting humanitarian causes as a Goodwill Ambassador for the...
, Gillian Anderson
Gillian Anderson
Gillian Leigh Anderson is an American actress.After beginning her career in theatre, Anderson achieved international recognition for her role as Special Agent Dana Scully on the American television series The X-Files. During the show's nine seasons, Anderson won Emmy, Golden Globe, and Screen...
, Hilary Swank
Hilary Swank
Hilary Ann Swank is an American actress. Swank's film career began with a small part in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and then a major part in The Next Karate Kid , as Julie Pierce, the first female protégé of sensei Mr. Miyagi...
, Ashley Judd
Ashley Judd
Ashley Judd is an American television and film actress, who has played lead roles in films including Ruby in Paradise, Kiss the Girls, Double Jeopardy, Where the Heart Is and High Crimes...
, Helen Hunt
Helen Hunt
Helen Elizabeth Hunt is an American actress, film director, and screenwriter. She starred in the sitcom Mad About You for seven years, before being cast in the romantic comedy As Good as It Gets...
and Julianne Moore
Julianne Moore
Julianne Moore is an American actress and a children's book author. Throughout her career, she has been nominated for four Oscars, six Golden Globes, three BAFTAs and nine Screen Actors Guild Awards....
. Hopkins asked his agent if he had any "power" over casting. He informed De Laurentiis that he knew Julianne Moore, with whom he had worked on Surviving Picasso
Surviving Picasso
Surviving Picasso is a 1996 Merchant Ivory Film starring Anthony Hopkins as the painter Pablo Picasso. It was shot in Paris and southern France.It was directed by James Ivory and produced by Ismail Merchant and David L. Wolper...
, and thought her a "terrific actress". Although Hopkins' agent told him he had no contractual influence on casting, Scott thought it correct to discuss who would be Hopkins' "leading lady". Scott said he was "really surprised to find that I had five of the top actresses in Hollywood wanting it." Moore would eventually secure the part. Scott said his decision was swayed in favor of Moore because: "She is a true chameleon. She can be a lunatic in Magnolia
Magnolia (film)
Magnolia is a 1999 American drama film written, produced, and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, narrated by Ricky Jay, and starring Tom Cruise, Philip Baker Hall, Philip Seymour Hoffman, William H. Macy, Julianne Moore, John C. Reilly, and Jason Robards in his last feature film appearance...
, a vamp in An Ideal Husband, a porn star in Boogie Nights
Boogie Nights
Boogie Nights is a 1997 drama film written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. Set in Los Angeles's San Fernando Valley, the script focuses on a young nightclub dishwasher who becomes a popular star of pornographic films, and chronicles his rise and fall from the Golden Age of Porn of the 1970s...
and a romantic in The End of the Affair
The End of the Affair (1999 film)
Michael Nyman would later use "Diary of Love" to open and close his solo album, The Piano Sings . As with many of Nyman's 1990s scores, he incorporates material from his String Quartet No.3, which was in turn based on a choral piece titled Out of the Ruins.-Track listing:#Diary of Hate 2:38#Henry...
" "Julianne Moore, once Jodie decided to pass was always top of my list." said Scott on his female lead. Moore talked about stepping into a role made famous by another actress: "The new Clarice would be very different. Of course people are going to compare my interpretation with that of Jodie Foster's...but this film is going to be very different."
Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter
Hopkins was generally expected to reprise his Academy Award-winning role. Hopkins did say in June 1999 that he would only be interested if the script was "really good". Hopkins says on the making-of feature on DVD that he couldn’t make up his mind to commit. "I was kind of surprised by this book, Hannibal. I thought it was really overreaching and so bizarre. So I couldn’t make up my mind about it all. Some of it I found intriguing, some I was a little doubtful about." When the producers confirmed that they were going to film Harris' novel, Hopkins told them yes, but added: "It needs some condensing." The Hollywood Reporter would confirm that Hopkins had agreed to reprise his role in late December 1999, saying he had approved the latest draft of the scriptScreenplay
A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...
by Steven Zaillian
Steven Zaillian
Steven Ernest Bernard Zaillian is an American screenwriter, film director, film editor, producer, and founder of Film Rites, a film production company. He won an Academy Award for his screenplay for Schindler's List and he has been nominated two times for Awakenings and Gangs of New York...
. Hopkins said he had no difficulty moving back into "Lecter's mind". "I just learned the lines and showed up and walked around as Hannibal Lecter. I thought, 'Do I repeat that same performance, or do I vary it?' Ten years had passed so I changed a bit." In the book, Lecter uses bandages to disguise himself as a plastic surgery
Plastic surgery
Plastic surgery is a medical specialty concerned with the correction or restoration of form and function. Though cosmetic or aesthetic surgery is the best-known kind of plastic surgery, most plastic surgery is not cosmetic: plastic surgery includes many types of reconstructive surgery, hand...
patient. This was left out of the film because Scott and Hopkins agreed to leave the face alone. Hopkins explains why: "It's as if he's making a statement – 'catch me if you can'. With his big hat, he's so obvious that nobody thinks he's Hannibal Lecter. I've always thought he's a very elegant man, a renaissance
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...
man." In the film, Lecter is first seen in Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
"as the classical Lecter, lecturing and being smooth", according to Hopkins. When the film moves to the US, Hopkins changed his appearance by building up muscle and cropping his hair short "to make him like a mercenary
Mercenary
A mercenary, is a person who takes part in an armed conflict based on the promise of material compensation rather than having a direct interest in, or a legal obligation to, the conflict itself. A non-conscript professional member of a regular army is not considered to be a mercenary although he...
, that he would be so fit and so strong that he could just snap somebody in two if they got... in his way".
Further casting
Other stars subsequently cast included Ray LiottaRay Liotta
[File:Ray Liotta is an American actor, best known for his portrayal of Henry Hill in the crime-drama Goodfellas, directed by Martin Scorsese and his role as Shoeless Joe Jackson in Field of Dreams...
as corrupt Justice Department
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
official Paul Krendler (a character that appeared in Silence of the Lambs, though original actor Ron Vawter
Ron Vawter
Ron Vawter was an American actor and a founding member of the experimental theater company, The Wooster Group....
died before the production of Hannibal) and Italian screen legend Giancarlo Giannini
Giancarlo Giannini
Giancarlo Giannini is an Italian actor and dubber.Giannini was born La Spezia, Liguria, Italy. He studied at the Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica in Rome, and made his film debut in a small part in Fango sulla metropoli in 1965...
as the opportunistic Detective Rinaldo Pazzi. Francesca Neri
Francesca Neri
Francesca Neri is an Italian actress.Neri was born in Trento, she has twice received the Silver Ribbon Award for Best Actress from the Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists, for Pensavo fosse amore invece era un calesse, directed by Massimo Troisi and Carne trémula .She has also...
won the role of Pazzi's wife, Allegra. Frankie R. Faison signed on to reprise his role as hospital orderly Barney Matthews. (The actor had appeared in Silence of the Lambs in the same role. He also appeared in the film Manhunter
Manhunter (film)
Manhunter is a 1986 American thriller film based on Thomas Harris's novel Red Dragon. Written and directed by Michael Mann, it stars William Petersen as Will Graham and features Brian Cox as Hannibal Lecktor...
as another character, Lt. Fisk).
Gary Oldman
Gary Oldman
Gary Leonard Oldman is an English actor, voice actor, filmmaker and musician.A member of the 1980s Brit Pack, Oldman came to prominence via starring roles in British films Meantime , Sid and Nancy and Prick Up Your Ears , with his performance in the latter bringing him his first BAFTA Award...
was cast as Mason Verger, one of Lecter's two surviving victims. Co-producer Martha De Laurentiis said they had a "funny situation" with Oldman wanting a prominent "credit". She said: "Now how can you have a prominent credit with Hannibal? The characters are Hannibal and Clarice Starling. So we really couldn’t work something out (at first)." Oldman was apparently "out" of the movie for while, but then came back in, asking to go "unbilled". Oldman would become transformed and "unrecognizable as himself" to play the part of Verger. He would have no lips, cheeks or eyelids. Make-up artist Greg Cannom said: "It's really disgusting... I’ve been showing people pictures [of Oldman as Verger], and they all just say ‘Oh my God,’ and walk away, which makes me very happy." Oldman said that having his name completely removed from the billing and credits allowed him to "do it anonymously" under that heavy make-up.
Key production crew
Scott recruited key production crew whom he had worked with previously. Production designer Norris Spencer had worked on Thelma & Louise, Black Rain and 1492 Conquest of Paradise. Cinematographer John MathiesonJohn Mathieson (cinematographer)
John Mathieson B.S.C. is one of a group of film makers who emerged out of the music video industry of the late 80's and 90's. His peers include cinematographers Tim Maurice Jones and Seamus McGarvey BSC and directors Michel Gondry and David Fincher...
, editor Pietro Scalia
Pietro Scalia
Pietro Scalia is an Italian-American film editor.-Life and career:He was born in Catania , but later he moved to Switzerland with his parents and attended Swiss-German schools until high school. After graduation he decided to move to the United States to pursue his college education...
and composer Hans Zimmer
Hans Zimmer
Hans Florian Zimmer is a German film composer and music producer. He has composed music for over 100 films, including critically acclaimed film scores for The Lion King , Crimson Tide , The Thin Red Line , Gladiator , The Dark Knight and Inception .Zimmer spent the early part of his career in the...
had all worked on Scott's previous film, Gladiator
Gladiator (2000 film)
Gladiator is a 2000 historical epic film directed by Ridley Scott, starring Russell Crowe, Joaquin Phoenix, Connie Nielsen, Ralf Möller, Oliver Reed, Djimon Hounsou, Derek Jacobi, John Shrapnel and Richard Harris. Crowe portrays the loyal Roman General Maximus Decimus Meridius, who is betrayed...
.
Background
Hannibal was filmed in 83 working days over 16 weeks. The film began productionFilmmaking
Filmmaking is the process of making a film, from an initial story, idea, or commission, through scriptwriting, casting, shooting, directing, editing, and screening the finished product before an audience that may result in a theatrical release or television program...
on 8 May 2000 in Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
. The film visited key locations in Florence and various locations around the United States. Martha De Laurentiis said the movie has almost a hundred locations and that it was a "constant pain of moving and dressing sets. But the locations were beautiful. Who could complain about being allowed to shoot in Palazzo Vecchio in Florence? Or President James Madison
James Madison
James Madison, Jr. was an American statesman and political theorist. He was the fourth President of the United States and is hailed as the “Father of the Constitution” for being the primary author of the United States Constitution and at first an opponent of, and then a key author of the United...
's farm in Montpelier or the amazing Biltmore Estate in Asheville?" Eighty million dollars and a year and a half in production were spent before Scott got his first look at Hannibal in the editing room.
Filming locations
- The whole second act of Hannibal takes place in FlorenceFlorenceFlorence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
. Ridley Scott had never filmed there before, but described it as "quite an experience...It was kind of organized chaos...We were there at the height of tourist season." Within Florence the production would visit various locationsFilming locationA filming location is a place where some or all of a film or television series is produced, in addition to or instead of using sets constructed on a movie studio backlot or soundstage...
such as the Palazzo Capponi (as Dr. Fell's workplace), the Ponte VecchioPonte VecchioThe Ponte Vecchio is a Medieval stone closed-spandrel segmental arch bridge over the Arno River, in Florence, Italy, noted for still having shops built along it, as was once common. Butchers initially occupied the shops; the present tenants are jewellers, art dealers and souvenir sellers...
, the Palazzo VecchioPalazzo VecchioThe Palazzo Vecchio is the town hall of Florence, Italy. This massive, Romanesque, crenellated fortress-palace is among the most impressive town halls of Tuscany...
, the Pharmacy of Santa Maria Novella and the Cathedral. - After leaving Italy on 5 June 2000, the production moved to Washington, D.C. Filming took place over six days at Union StationUnion Station (Washington, D.C.)Washington Union Station is a train station and leisure destination visited by 32 million people each year in the center of Washington, D.C. The train station is served by Amtrak, MARC and Virginia Railway Express commuter rail services as well as by Washington Metro subway trains and local buses...
. The unusual sight of a carouselCarouselA carousel , or merry-go-round, is an amusement ride consisting of a rotating circular platform with seats for riders...
would appear in the transportation hub and shopping plaza at the request of director Ridley ScottRidley ScottSir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
. - Filming would last for seven weeks in Richmond, VirginiaRichmond, VirginiaRichmond is the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States. It is an independent city and not part of any county. Richmond is the center of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Greater Richmond area...
for the shootout in a crowded fish market (shot at Richmond Farmer's Market) early in the film. Julianne MooreJulianne MooreJulianne Moore is an American actress and a children's book author. Throughout her career, she has been nominated for four Oscars, six Golden Globes, three BAFTAs and nine Screen Actors Guild Awards....
underwent Federal Bureau of InvestigationFederal Bureau of InvestigationThe Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
training at the Bureau's headquarters before filming. - A barn in Montpelier, Virginia, situated on the estate of President James MadisonJames MadisonJames Madison, Jr. was an American statesman and political theorist. He was the fourth President of the United States and is hailed as the “Father of the Constitution” for being the primary author of the United States Constitution and at first an opponent of, and then a key author of the United...
, was used to house 15 "performing hogs". The fifteen Russian boars used in the shoot, were from a selection of around 6,000 of which the animal wranglers looked at. - Biltmore EstateBiltmore EstateBiltmore House is a Châteauesque-styled mansion near Asheville, North Carolina, built by George Washington Vanderbilt II between 1889 and 1895. It is the largest privately-owned home in the United States, at and featuring 250 rooms...
in Asheville, North CarolinaAsheville, North CarolinaAsheville is a city in and the county seat of Buncombe County, North Carolina, United States. It is the largest city in Western North Carolina, and the 11th largest city in North Carolina. The City is home to the United States National Climatic Data Center , which is the world's largest active...
, the biggest privately owned estate in the U.S., was chosen to signify the huge personal wealth of Mason Verger.
Special make-up effects
Make-up artist Greg Cannom was pleased to be involved in Hannibal as it offered him the chance to produce "incredible and original make-ups". For Mason Verger the make-up team would initially produce 20 different "heads" which looked like "zombieZombie
Zombie is a term used to denote an animated corpse brought back to life by mystical means such as witchcraft. The term is often figuratively applied to describe a hypnotized person bereft of consciousness and self-awareness, yet ambulant and able to respond to surrounding stimuli...
s" and did not reflect the vision Scott had of the character; Scott wanted Verger to look real with hideous scarring, and not something from the "House of Wax". Scott himself would actually call up the help of expert doctors in an effort to get the look of the character as realistic as possible. Scott showed the make-up team pictures of "foetal things", which he thought "touching"; he wanted to make Mason Verger more "touching" than "monstrous", as he thought of Verger as being "someone who hadn’t lost his sense of humour...almost sympathetic." Oldman would spend six hours a day in make-up to prepare for the role.
For one of the final and infamous scenes of the movie an exact "duplicate" was created of the character Paul Krendler, played by Ray Liotta
Ray Liotta
[File:Ray Liotta is an American actor, best known for his portrayal of Henry Hill in the crime-drama Goodfellas, directed by Martin Scorsese and his role as Shoeless Joe Jackson in Field of Dreams...
, a scene which blended make-up, puppet
Puppet
A puppet is an inanimate object or representational figure animated or manipulated by an entertainer, who is called a puppeteer. It is used in puppetry, a play or a presentation that is a very ancient form of theatre....
work and CGI
Computer-generated imagery
Computer-generated imagery is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media...
in a way which Scott called "seamless".
Title sequence
The main titles were designed by Nick Livesey, a graduate of the Royal College of ArtRoyal College of Art
The Royal College of Art is an art school located in London, United Kingdom. It is the world’s only wholly postgraduate university of art and design, offering the degrees of Master of Arts , Master of Philosophy and Doctor of Philosophy...
who worked for one of Scott's production companies in London. The sequence
Title sequence
A Title Sequence is the method by which cinematic films or television programs present their title, key production and cast members, or both, utilizing conceptual visuals and sound...
, shot in Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
by Livesey himself was intended as the second promotional trailer for the film. The studio thought it not "quite right", but it remained on Scott's mind and would eventually end up as the main title sequence
Title sequence
A Title Sequence is the method by which cinematic films or television programs present their title, key production and cast members, or both, utilizing conceptual visuals and sound...
. Livesey would gather footage of pigeons in an empty square in Florence early one morning which, in the final cut, would morph
Morphing
Morphing is a special effect in motion pictures and animations that changes one image into another through a seamless transition. Most often it is used to depict one person turning into another through technological means or as part of a fantasy or surreal sequence. Traditionally such a depiction...
into the face of Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter
Hannibal Lecter M.D. is a fictional character in a series of horror novels by Thomas Harris and in the films adapted from them.Lecter was introduced in the 1981 thriller novel Red Dragon as a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer...
. Scott believed it a good idea, as it fundamentally asked the question: Where is Hannibal Lecter? Scott explains: "And of course this story tells it, with pigeons in the cobblestones of somewhere, where you wonder where that is...and there he is his face appears." The titles are said to have been influenced by the film Se7en
Se7en
Seven is a 1995 American thriller film, which also contains horror and neo-noir elements, directed by David Fincher and written by Andrew Kevin Walker. It was distributed by New Line Cinema and stars Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman, Gwyneth Paltrow, R...
.
Music
Ridley Scott worked very closely with composer Hans ZimmerHans Zimmer
Hans Florian Zimmer is a German film composer and music producer. He has composed music for over 100 films, including critically acclaimed film scores for The Lion King , Crimson Tide , The Thin Red Line , Gladiator , The Dark Knight and Inception .Zimmer spent the early part of his career in the...
, during post-production
Post-production
Post-production is part of filmmaking and the video production process. It occurs in the making of motion pictures, television programs, radio programs, advertising, audio recordings, photography, and digital art...
on Hannibal. Scott believes the music to a film is as important as dialogue
Dialogue
Dialogue is a literary and theatrical form consisting of a written or spoken conversational exchange between two or more people....
– "It is the final adjustment to the screenplay, being able to also adjust the performance of the actors in fact." Zimmer and Scott sat in during the editing process with editor
Film editing
Film editing is part of the creative post-production process of filmmaking. It involves the selection and combining of shots into sequences, and ultimately creating a finished motion picture. It is an art of storytelling...
Pietro Scalia
Pietro Scalia
Pietro Scalia is an Italian-American film editor.-Life and career:He was born in Catania , but later he moved to Switzerland with his parents and attended Swiss-German schools until high school. After graduation he decided to move to the United States to pursue his college education...
to discuss scenes in the film and "not music". Zimmer used a symphony orchestra for the opera sequence, but would mostly use what he described as a "very odd orchestra...only cellos and basses all playing at the extreme ends of their range." This was done to emphasise the character of Hannibal Lecter. He explains: "Anthony's character is for me somebody at the extreme range of whatever is humanly imaginable somehow." Zimmer also did not want the score to sound like a "modern day orchestra". The character Mason Verger had his own "theme", which become more "perverted" as the movie progressed, according to Zimmer. Dante
DANTE
Delivery of Advanced Network Technology to Europe is a not-for-profit organisation that plans, builds and operates the international networks that interconnect the various national research and education networks in Europe and surrounding regions...
's sonnet was put to music by Zimmer and Patrick Cassidy
Patrick Cassidy (composer)
Patrick Cassidy is an Irish classical composer.Largely self taught, with no formal music education, he has worked in many various formats, including TV and films. In 2004, he cowrote the album Immortal Memory with Lisa Gerrard from Dead Can Dance...
for the opera scene in Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
. Tracksounds.com wrote positively of Zimmer's score. "Zimmer truly crafts a score worthy of most fans' full attention...the classical elements, and yes, even the monologue combine to make this an intense listening experience." In a poll by Classic FM (UK)
Classic FM (UK)
Classic FM, one of the United Kingdom's three Independent National Radio stations, broadcasts classical music in a popular and accessible style.-Overview:...
listeners to find the greatest movie soundtrack of all-time, Hannibal ranked at 59. Strauss's The Blue Danube is also played at several points in the film.
Romance
Scott has said he believes the underlying emotion of the film Hannibal is "affection". "In some instances, you might even wonder or certainly from one direction – is it more than affection? It is dark, because the story is of course essentially dark, but it's kind of romantic at the same time." Scott openly admits to a "romantic thematic" running though the film. He told CNNCNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
that: "Hannibal was quite a different target, essentially a study between two individuals. Funny enough, it's rather romantic and also quite humorous, but also there's some quite bad behaviour as well." During the opera scene in Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
, Lecter attends an operatic adaptation of one of Dante
Dante Alighieri
Durante degli Alighieri, mononymously referred to as Dante , was an Italian poet, prose writer, literary theorist, moral philosopher, and political thinker. He is best known for the monumental epic poem La commedia, later named La divina commedia ...
's sonnet
Sonnet
A sonnet is one of several forms of poetry that originate in Europe, mainly Provence and Italy. A sonnet commonly has 14 lines. The term "sonnet" derives from the Occitan word sonet and the Italian word sonetto, both meaning "little song" or "little sound"...
s, and meets with Detective Pazzi and his wife, Allegra. She asks Lecter, "Do you believe a man could become so obsessed by a woman after a single encounter?" Lecter replies: "Yes, I believe he could... but would she see through the bars of his plight and ache for him?" This scene, in the movie, is one which Scott claims most people "missed" the meaning of. It was in reference to Starling – to their encounter in The Silence of the Lambs. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
in its review
Review
A review is an evaluation of a publication, a product or a service, such as a movie , video game, musical composition , book ; a piece of hardware like a car, home appliance, or computer; or an event or performance, such as a live music concert, a play, musical theater show or dance show...
of the film, said Hannibal, "toys" with the idea of "love that dare not speak its name" Composer Hans Zimmer
Hans Zimmer
Hans Florian Zimmer is a German film composer and music producer. He has composed music for over 100 films, including critically acclaimed film scores for The Lion King , Crimson Tide , The Thin Red Line , Gladiator , The Dark Knight and Inception .Zimmer spent the early part of his career in the...
believes there to be "many" messages and subtext in each scene of the film. He says "I can score this movie truly as a Freudian archetypal beauty and the beast fairy tale
Fairy tale
A fairy tale is a type of short story that typically features such folkloric characters, such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, dwarves, giants or gnomes, and usually magic or enchantments. However, only a small number of the stories refer to fairies...
, as a horror movie, as the most elegant piece, on corruption in the American police force, as the loneliest woman on earth, the beauty in renaissance..." Zimmer ultimately believes it to be a dark love story, centering on two people who should never be together – a modern day Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately unite their feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular archetypal stories of young, teenage lovers.Romeo and Juliet belongs to a...
. During post-production
Post-production
Post-production is part of filmmaking and the video production process. It occurs in the making of motion pictures, television programs, radio programs, advertising, audio recordings, photography, and digital art...
of the film, Scott, Zimmer and the editor passionately argued about what a single shot meant, where a tear slides down Starling's cheek during a confrontation with Lecter. They could not agree if it was a tear of "anguish", "loneliness" or "disgust". Scott told the New York Post
New York Post
The New York Post is the 13th-oldest newspaper published in the United States and is generally acknowledged as the oldest to have been published continuously as a daily, although – as is the case with most other papers – its publication has been periodically interrupted by labor actions...
that, the affair of the heart between Lecter and Starling is "metaphor
Metaphor
A metaphor is a literary figure of speech that uses an image, story or tangible thing to represent a less tangible thing or some intangible quality or idea; e.g., "Her eyes were glistening jewels." Metaphor may also be used for any rhetorical figures of speech that achieve their effects via...
ical". Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
even said in their review, "Scott offers a sly parody of relationships – think "When Hannibal met Sally."
Retribution and punishment
Ridley Scott has said that he believes Lecter, in his own way, to be "pure" – one of the key motivating factors for the character is the search for "retribution and punishment"."There is something very moral about Lecter in this film," said Scott in his audio commentary. "The behaviour of Hannibal is never insane – didn’t want to use that excuse. Is he insane? No, I think he's as sane as you or I. He just likes it." Scott did say, however, "In our normal terms, he's truly evil
Evil
Evil is the violation of, or intent to violate, some moral code. Evil is usually seen as the dualistic opposite of good. Definitions of evil vary along with analysis of its root motive causes, however general actions commonly considered evil include: conscious and deliberate wrongdoing,...
." Scott also brings up the notion of absolution
Absolution
Absolution is a traditional theological term for the forgiveness experienced in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. This concept is found in the Roman Catholic Church, as well as the Eastern Orthodox churches, the Anglican churches, and most Lutheran churches....
in reference to Lecter towards the end of the film. Verger has one overriding objective in life: to capture Lecter and subject him to a slow, painful death. In this way, he replaces Lecter as the film's antagonist.
Corruption
Part of the story involves the character Rinaldo Pazzi (Giancarlo GianniniGiancarlo Giannini
Giancarlo Giannini is an Italian actor and dubber.Giannini was born La Spezia, Liguria, Italy. He studied at the Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica in Rome, and made his film debut in a small part in Fango sulla metropoli in 1965...
), a Florentine policeman who learns "Dr. Fell"'s true identity and realizes that this knowledge could make him rich. His escalating abandonment of morality allows him to countenance and facilitate the death of a gypsy pickpocket, egged on by the desire to have the best for his much younger wife. There is a moment in the film when Pazzi becomes corrupted, despite being what Scott describes as "very thoughtful". Paul Krendler also succumbs to greed and corruption. Starling does not, however, and perseveres to the end, even refusing to release Lecter when she believes he is about to cut off her hand in order to free himself.
Promotion
The first trailer appeared in theaters and was made available via the official website in early May 2000, over nine months before the film was released. As the film had only just begun production, footage was used from The Silence of the Lambs. A second trailer, which featured footage from the new movie, was released in late November 2000. In marketing the film, Hopkins' portrayal of Hannibal Lecter was chosen as the unique selling point of Hannibal. "Mr Hopkins is the draw here", said Elvis MitchellElvis Mitchell
Elvis Mitchell is an American film critic, host of the public radio show The Treatment, and visiting lecturer at Harvard University. He has served as a film critic for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, the LA Weekly, The Detroit Free Press, and The New York Times...
in a 2001 New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
article. A poster released in the UK to promote Hannibal, featuring Lecter with a "skin mask" covering the right side of his face, was quickly removed from circulation as it was deemed "too shocking and disturbing for the public."
Upon its release, Hannibal was met with significant media attention, with the film's stars and director making several appearances on television, in newspapers and in magazines. In an article for CBS News
CBS News
CBS News is the news division of American television and radio network CBS. The current chairman is Jeff Fager who is also the executive producer of 60 Minutes, while the current president of CBS News is David Rhodes. CBS News' flagship program is the CBS Evening News, hosted by the network's main...
, Jill Serjeant stated that "the long-awaited sequel to the grisly 1991 thriller Silence of the Lambs is cooking up the hottest Internet and media buzz since the 1999 Star Wars 'prequel'." Stars Anthony Hopkins and Julianne Moore made the covers of a number of magazines, including Vanity Fair
Vanity Fair (magazine)
Vanity Fair is a magazine of pop culture, fashion, and current affairs published by Condé Nast. The present Vanity Fair has been published since 1983 and there have been editions for four European countries as well as the U.S. edition. This revived the title which had ceased publication in 1935...
, Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
, Premiere
Premiere (magazine)
Premiere was an American and New York City-based film magazine published by Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S., published between the years 1987 and 2007. The original version of the magazine, Première , was started in France in 1976 and is still being published there.-History:The magazine originally...
and Empire
Empire (magazine)
Empire is a British film magazine published monthly by Bauer Consumer Media. From the first issue in July 1989, the magazine was edited by Barry McIlheney and published by Emap. Bauer purchased Emap Consumer Media in early 2008...
.
Box office
Hannibal grossed $58 million (USA) in its opening weekend (from 3,230 screens). At the time (February 2001) this was the third-biggest debut ever—only 1997's The Lost World: Jurassic ParkThe Lost World: Jurassic Park
The Lost World: Jurassic Park is a 1997 science fiction thriller film, directed by Steven Spielberg. The film was produced by Bonnie Curtis, Kathleen Kennedy, Gerald R. Molen and Colin Wilson...
and 1999's Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is a 1999 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas. It is the fourth film to be released in the Star Wars saga, as the first of a three-part prequel to the original Star Wars trilogy, as well as the first film in the saga in terms...
grossed more in an opening weekend. It was also, when it was released, the biggest opening box office for an R-rated movie ever. Final domestic box office gross (USA) reached $165,092,268 with a worldwide gross of $351,692,268. The film spent three weeks at number one in the US box office chart, and four weeks at number one in the UK. Hannibal was the tenth highest grossing movie of the year worldwide, in a year which also saw the blockbuster releases of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (film)
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, released in the United States and India as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, is a 2001 fantasy film directed by Chris Columbus and based on the novel of the same name by J. K. Rowling. The film is the first instalment in the Harry Potter film series,...
and The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Hannibal also made over $87,000,000 in US video rentals following release in August 2001.
Reception
The reviews for Hannibal were mixed.TIME
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
wrote: "A banquet of creepy, gory or grotesque incidents is on display in Hannibal. But this superior sequel has romance in its dark heart." Empire
Empire (magazine)
Empire is a British film magazine published monthly by Bauer Consumer Media. From the first issue in July 1989, the magazine was edited by Barry McIlheney and published by Emap. Bauer purchased Emap Consumer Media in early 2008...
gave it two out of five stars, calling it "...laughable to just plain boring, Hannibal is toothless to the end." David Thomson, writing in the British Film Institute
British Film Institute
The British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
magazine Sight & Sound
Sight & Sound
Sight & Sound is a British monthly film magazine published by the British Film Institute .Sight & Sound was first published in 1932 and in 1934 management of the magazine was handed to the nascent BFI, which still publishes the magazine today...
, praised the film. "It works. It's smart, good-looking, sexy, fun...dirty, naughty and knowing." Thomson does make clear, however, he is a great fan of director Ridley Scott's work. He adds: "It is, literally, that Hannibal Lecter has become such a household joke that he can't be dreadful again. It seems clear that Anthony Hopkins and Scott saw that, and planned accordingly. That's how the movie was saved." Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
in its review said "Hannibal is not as good as Lambs... ultimately more shallow and crass at its heart than its predecessor, Hannibal is nevertheless tantalizing, engrossing and occasionally startling." A negative review in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
claimed that what was wrong with the film was carried over from the book: "The result is an inflated, good-looking bore of a movie. The Silence of the Lambs was a marvelous thing. This, by contrast is barely okey-dokey." Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
gave the film a "Thumbs down" rating on the television program At the Movies with Ebert & Roeper and gave the film a 2.5 out of 4 stars rating in his print review, which he began with the following: "Ridley Scott's Hannibal is a carnival geek show. We must give it credit for the courage of its depravity; if it proves nothing else, it proves that if a man cutting off his face and feeding it to his dogs doesn't get the NC-17 rating for violence, nothing ever will."
Hannibal currently has an overall Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
rating of 57 out of 100 from 36 reviews, an IMDb rating of 6.5 out of 10 and a Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
rating of 38 percent, with an average rating of five out of ten from 160 reviews.
Home release
Hannibal is available as a one-disc and two-disc DVD. The two disc DVD contains an array of special features including: CommentaryAudio commentary
On disc-based video formats, an audio commentary is an additional audio track consisting of a lecture or comments by one or more speakers, that plays in real time with video...
by director Ridley Scott
Ridley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
, deleted and alternate scenes, five making-of featurettes and a "marketing gallery" which contains trailers, production stills and unused poster
Poster
A poster is any piece of printed paper designed to be attached to a wall or vertical surface. Typically posters include both textual and graphic elements, although a poster may be either wholly graphical or wholly text. Posters are designed to be both eye-catching and informative. Posters may be...
concepts.
A special "steel-book" edition of Hannibal was released in 2007. There are no significant changes made to the DVD itself; only the package artwork was changed.
The film was originally released as part of The Hannibal Lecter Collection on Blu-ray in 2009. It was then then released as a stand-alone release in 2011.
Differences from the novel
According to VarietyVariety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
the script for Hannibal was: "...for better or worse, quite faithful to the Harris blueprint; fans of the tome may regret the perhaps necessary excision of some characters, most notably Mason Verger's muscle-bound macho sister Margot, as well as the considerable fascinating academic detail, but will basically feel the book has been respected (yes, even the climactic dinner party is served up intact, with the only surprise twists saved for its wake)." Time Out in its review of Hannibal noted: "The weight-watchers script sensibly dispenses with several characters to serve a brew that's enjoyably spicy but low on substance. So much story is squeezed into 131 minutes that little time's left for analysis or characterization." Producer Dino De Laurentiis
Dino De Laurentiis
Agostino "Dino" De Laurentiis was an Italian film producer.-Early life:He was born at Torre Annunziata in the province of Naples, and grew up selling spaghetti produced by his father...
was asked why some characters were left out of the film: "I think if you get a book which is 600 pages, you have to reduce it to a script
Screenplay
A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...
of 100 pages. In two hours of film, you cannot possibly include all the characters. We set ourselves a limit, and cut characters which weren't so vital."
In the book, Mason Verger runs an orphanage, from which he calls children to verbally abuse as a substitute for his no longer being able to molest them. He also has a sister, Margot, whom he raped when they were children and who is a lesbian. When she disclosed her sexual orientation
Sexual orientation
Sexual orientation describes a pattern of emotional, romantic, or sexual attractions to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither, and the genders that accompany them. By the convention of organized researchers, these attractions are subsumed under heterosexuality, homosexuality,...
to her family, their father disowned her. As she herself is sterile due to steroid
Steroid
A steroid is a type of organic compound that contains a characteristic arrangement of four cycloalkane rings that are joined to each other. Examples of steroids include the dietary fat cholesterol, the sex hormones estradiol and testosterone, and the anti-inflammatory drug dexamethasone.The core...
abuse, Verger exerts some control over her by promising her a semen
Semen
Semen is an organic fluid, also known as seminal fluid, that may contain spermatozoa. It is secreted by the gonads and other sexual organs of male or hermaphroditic animals and can fertilize female ova...
sample with which to impregnate her lover, who could then inherit
Inheritance
Inheritance is the practice of passing on property, titles, debts, rights and obligations upon the death of an individual. It has long played an important role in human societies...
the Verger fortune. Also, in the novel, Verger literally has no face and has to be kept in a sterile room at all times to keep bacteria from affecting exposed muscle and tissues. At the end of the book, Margot and Starling both help Lecter escape during a shootout between Starling and Verger's guards. Margot, at Lecter's advice, stimulates her brother to ejaculate with a cattle prod
Cattle prod
A cattle prod, also called a stock prod, is a handheld device commonly used to make cattle or other livestock move by striking or poking them, or in the case of a Hot-Shot-type prod, through a relatively high-voltage, low-current electric shock...
, and then kills him by ramming his pet Moray eel
Moray eel
Moray eels are cosmopolitan eels of the family Muraenidae. The approximately 200 species in 15 genera are almost exclusively marine, but several species are regularly seen in brackish water and a few, for example the freshwater moray can sometimes be found in freshwater...
down his throat. Following up on Krendler's fate in the book, the crooked FBI
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
official is killed when Lecter shoots him with an arrow.
The book's controversial ending has Lecter presenting Starling with the exhumed bones of her father, which he "brings to life" by hypnotizing
Hypnosis
Hypnosis is "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."It is a mental state or imaginative role-enactment . It is usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic induction, which is commonly composed of a long series of preliminary...
Starling, allowing her to say goodbye. This forges an odd alliance between Starling and Lecter, culminating in their becoming lovers and escaping to Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
. At the end of the novel, Barney (the hospital orderly) sees them at the Teatro Colón of Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
.
Also gone from the film were the flashbacks to Lecter's childhood, in which he sees his younger sister, Mischa, eaten by German deserters in 1944. These flashbacks formed the basis for the 2007 film Hannibal Rising
Hannibal Rising
Hannibal Rising is a novel written by Thomas Harris, published in 2006. It is a prequel to his three previous books featuring his character, the cannibalistic serial killer Dr. Hannibal Lecter. The novel was released with an initial printing of at least 1.5 million copies and met with a mixed...
which portrays Lecter as a young man who eventually becomes the killer of the prior films.
The character of Jack Crawford
Jack Crawford (character)
Jack Crawford is a fictional character who appears in the Hannibal Lecter series of books by Thomas Harris, in which Crawford is the Agent-in-Charge of the Behavioral Science Unit of the FBI in Quantico, Virginia. He is modeled after John E...
, while in the book, does not appear in the film.
Hopkins was asked in an interview on the subject of whether or not he believed the idea of Starling and Lecter heading off in to the sunset as lovers (as happens in the book). "Yes, I did. Other people found that preposterous. I suppose there's a moral issue there. I think it would have been a very interesting thing though. I think it would have been very interesting had she gone off, because I suspected that there was that romance, attachment there, that obsession with her. I guessed that a long time ago, at the last phone call to Clarice, at the end of SotL, she said, 'Dr. Lecter, Dr. Lecter...'."