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Movie:
Red
Dragon By: Roxbusters (Lawrencerock.com Contributor) |
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Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Ralph
Fiennes, Edward Norton, Emily Watson, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Harvey
Keitel, Mary Louise Parker, Anthony Heald Hannibal Lecter makes me
as giddy as a five year old school girl on Halloween. In fact, you could
write a movie just starring Lecter, listening to Italian opera whilst
dining on rare lamb shank, and I’d be thoroughly amused for its
two hours. Lecter is probably one of the most deliciously evil characters
ever fleshed out. Through his eyes, we are able to view a world so trite
and inane that we delight in Lecter’s culinary pursuits. Lecter
serves up a savory plate of justice for those individuals who live lives
of intellectual disinterest and misplaced egoism. “If you bore
me with your ways of petty bureaucracy and cultural ignorance, I’ll
eat you,” Lecter seems to say. Amen, brother! (Lest you should
think that I condone cannibalism in certain circumstances, let me make
plain that I do not. However, it is satisfying to see a fictional Lecter
eat his cake at the movies now and again, in the name of “quid
pro quo”). Produced by Dino De Laurentiis,
Red Dragon is a prequel to the extremely successful Academy Award sweeper
The Silence of the Lambs. In the novel Red Dragon (written in 1981),
author Thomas Harris introduces the character of Hannibal Lecter to
the world for the first time. Yet, this movie is not the first time
filmmakers have attempted to relate the story of a killer with a penchant
for defiling his victims with broken mirror shards. A film called Manhunter
(loosely based on the novel Red Dragon) was released in 1986, directed
by Michael Mann (The Insider) and starring Brian Cox as Lecter. The
film achieved very little success and remains unwedded to the triumvirate
we know as Silence, Hannibal and Red Dragon. (I must offer a disclaimer
here: I have yet to see Manhunter, so please treat me more mercifully
than Lecter would. I have, however, read the book and can say with much
appreciation that this new film remains faithful to the words that Thomas
Harris recorded 20 plus years ago). Two paragraphs in and we
haven't even begun to ‘skin’ the surface of this story nor
discuss the main antagonist in the film. Played by a devastatingly gorgeous
and talented Ralph Fiennes, the Red Dragon is known by the light of
day as Francis Dolarhyde, a professional film stock courier. Long background
story short, Francis was abused by his grandmother as a small child
and inevitably developed a taste for watching living things suffer.
Soft spoken and pitiable, Francis is a troubled man who just so happens
to have a demon on his back, both figuratively and literally. A naked
Ralph Fiennes demonstrates for us (by manipulating his muscles in a
particularly gory scene) the artistry tattooed on his back in the image
of William Blake’s The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with
the Sun. This image lives inside Francis as a self-created devil, manipulating
his thoughts and actions towards dastardly ends. The Dragon attempts
to deny Francis' happiness upon falling in love with a caring blind
woman named Reba (Emily Watson); a woman who could care less about his
bothersome cleft palate and harelip. Francis searches tirelessly for
a means to rid himself of the Dragon and enjoy the felicity he
knows he could share with Reba…if only. It's too bad that through
Francis, the Red Dragon he has already murdered and mutilated two families.
Too bad that the FBI's Jack Crawford (Harvey Keitel) has enlisted the
help of a pre-Clarice Starling do-gooder named Will Graham (Edward Norton)
who has an impressive track record for pin pointing serial killers.
After all, it's Graham (as presented in the first scene and opening
credits) who single-handedly discovered the true man-eating identity
of the great Dr. Hannibal Lecter himself. He is the reason Lecter remains
locked up in a Baltimore mental hospital until the end of The Silence
of the Lambs. Francis is, therefore, due to succumb to these forces
beyond his control and will fall prey to Graham, a man who has been
a pupil of 'the arts of the insane' ever since he first set eyes
on Dr. Lecter. To clarify, this plot is
nothing we haven’t feasted on before: young FBI agent enlists the
help of an incarcerated Hannibal Lecter to better his/her search for
an UBER-warped killer. I loved this movie when it was called The Silence
of the Lambs and I still like it as Red Dragon. Why? Two words: Anthony
Hopkins. Part of me does not want
to see Manhunter because it would be like watching someone other than
Jodie Foster play Clarice Starling in… wait a second! (Not right,
my friends, just not right). Hopkins owns Lecter to the point where
you’re mesmerized by the slightest shift of his glazed-over glance
and hypnotized by the monotone of his verbal cadence. Screenwriter Ted
Tally (with sure influence from De Laurentiis) did good by beefing up
Lecter’s sparse appearance in the book for the film. A thriller
without Lecter is like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich without the
p and j. A generous slathering of Lecter in between the layers is always
a good choice. Nevertheless, do I think
Red Dragon is nearly as good as The Silence of the Lambs? No. Do I think
Red Dragon is a worthy prequel to The Silence of the Lambs? Yes. Would
I go see a pre- prequel or even another sequel to The Silence of the
Lambs, based solely on my opinion of Red Dragon? You bet your marinated
liver I would! Should you trust my judgment? Well, for a person
who would be content watching Lecter dance around his cell in a tutu,
I’ll have to leave the judging up to you. -Roxbusters, 10/7/02 On a four horn scale, Red
Dragon receives 3 horns. Copyright 2002, Roxbusters.com.
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