More interesting when he was behind bars

The main fault of this film and it’s not really the films fault at all, is the book it was sourced from.

“Hannibal” was a book too in love with its main protagonist, so much so it had the heroine, the intelligent and principled Clarice Starling run off with him. Thankfully the film dumps this preposterous premise. Unfortunately it cannot avoid over eulogising Dr Lector and surprisingly has just not strong enough a character to carry a film on his own.

This is primarily down to Anthony Hopkins portrayal. His camp pantomime approach strips him of his icy charisma. Compared to Brian Cox’s steely sarcastic cameo in the superb “Manhunter” this is cartoon villainy. He wanders round Florence looking like Henry Blofeld and exuding all the danger of the plumy voiced commentator.

Julianne Moore is an excellent actress but doesn’t sit right as the driven Clarice and Gary Oldham’s Mason Verger looks like a half melted waxwork of Skeletor.

The plots too silly to convince, again the fault of the book, and it finally ends with an attitude that says Lector is a bit of a rogue who just happens to horribly murder and occasionally eat people. The rascal.

It seems even the talented Ridley Scott could not make anything worthwhile with this risible material. The sooner Lector is behind bars again the better. He was far more interesting then.