Tag: Thomas Harris

The big debate about this film is if Hannibal Lecter should ever have had an origin story/prequel movie. The answer in my view is: Probably not. That said, an origin for the character is absolutely consistent with Thomas Harris’ writing style. Every other character in his novels have their motivations and psychology examined closely. Often, by Dr. Lecter himself. Harris style of writing largely relies on the realism of these characters. What made Hannibal stand out so well was because he was the enigma, the one unexplainable evil. Harris edged into explaining a lot of Lecter’s thought processes in “Hannibal”, his third novel. That novel was less warmly regarded and the film adaptation skipped most of those elements. To be fair, it’s hard to show thought processes on screen. For this reason, they were correct not to have Clarice take Hannibal up on his offer and go off with him.

But if you have read the novels, it was always clear that Harris wanted to explain Hannibal to us. He just wasn’t sure if he should and I have heard that he did need his arm twisted somewhat to finally set to work on a full origin story. Supposedly it was producer Dino De Laurentiis who told Harris that if he didn’t write the origin story, someone else eventually will. Horrified by this prospect, Harris set to work. As I mentioned though, if you read the books you know Harris does try and help the reader to understand Lecter. He’s not entirely the enigma he is in the movies. To make sure his message wasn’t lost this time he insisted on writing the screenplay to the eventual movie himself. For better or worse director Peter Webber has provided a fairly faithful adaptation of the source material.

Dark Origins

The film begins with a young Hannibal (Played by Aaran Thomas), with his loving family and young sister Mischa (Helena-Lia Tachovská) living in a castle in Lithuania. This is not a good time to be in Lithuania though as the Nazi invasion of Russia has turned the area into part of the bloodiest front line in World War Two. As Hitler and Stalins forces clash, the Lecter family is caught in the middle. The parents are killed and Hannibal and Mischa are left to fend for themselves. Matters get worse as a group of ex-Nazi’s now just trying to survive as Russian forces take over the region hold up in their castle. With it being in the thick of winter and no food available they take drastic action.

Many years later, the story picks up with an adult Hannibal (Now played by Gaspard Ulliel), who has made his way to his last surviving relatives home in France. After settling in, he sets out on his mission to extract vengeance on the people that murdered and ate his sister. Gong Li plays his aunt “Lady Mursaka”, who understands Hannibals drive but can’t stand by who he is becoming. Dominic West (McNulty from the TV series “The Wire”) plays Inspector Pascal Popil, a detective that specializes in bringing war criminals to justice. He too understands Hannibal’s desire for vengeance, but won’t let him get away with taking the law into his own hands. Rhys Ifans plays “Grutas” the head of the gang that murdered Hannibal’s sister.

A Man of Exquisite Taste

The most obvious issue with this film is that Hannibal Lecter is not a character that any actor can play. The gold standard is obviously Sir Anthony Hopkins, who elevated the character into the movie villain hall of fame. Before Hopkins took on the role Brian Cox put in an impressive performance in the movie “Manhunter”. After the release of this movie a third actor, Mads Mikkelsen would take the role and make it his own in a way that arguably even outdid Sir Anthony. With that in mind, perhaps my view of Gaspard Ulliel is a little unfair. However, I was not impressed. It’s not that his acting was bad or anything. It’s just we’re dealing with a complex and chilling character at a time in his life where he is perhaps the most conflicted he is ever likely to be and he felt… generic.

As for the origin itself, it does make a certain amount of sense. Starting out with a trauma that desensitized him and showed him how brutal life can be. Then giving him a reason to pursue and murder those that had wronged him. After that, I guess he just kept going. But this is where the problem lies. Even though Lecter does murder one character simply for being rude there’s not really any suggestion that he will keep going indefinitely with those kinds of murders. The vast majority of his actions were motivated by his revenge. So these elements don’t totally add up. What we do see though is his casual brutality and lack of empathy for his victims. This is balanced by the fact he does not harm the children on one of his victims. So at least here we see something of the man he would become.

A Trail of Destruction

There is another problem too. All these killings are high profile. It’s hard to imagine that no one ever casually looked into Lecters past. Had they done so, he would have quickly become a suspect in Chesapeake Ripper case. In the movie, he fakes his own death too. But then doesn’t change his name after. In the novel at least he is actually arrested, but between the public support (For killing war criminals) and the lack of evidence, he is released. There was an obvious solution here in Inspector Popil. Had the story allowed for Popil to be somewhat sympathetic and realizing that the only way for these men to face justice was for Hannibal to kill them there could have been an air tight backstory for the character. Instead though Popil is totally dedicated to the law, despite his own tragedy. So much so it’s hard to imagine him buying the faked death and not flagging the name globally.

Popil’s actual role appears to be like an early version of Hannibal’s relationships with Will Graham and Clarice Starling. Someone he finds very similar to himself, but just not quite able to see the world the way he does. Sadly though the film doesn’t spend any time looking into this relationship. It’s just sort of there. Another relationship somewhat wasted is Hannibal’s odd romance with his Aunt, Lady Murasaki. We aren’t given a great deal of time to know the character except that she is the one person Hannibal feels close to. Perhaps the idea was for Popil to be a prot-Will Graham and Lady Murasaki to be a proto-Clarice Starling, but in practice neither of them really are that interesting.

Conclusion

As a stand alone movie, this is a reasonable revenge story. As an origin story for Hannibal Lecter though it is a disappointment. It’s not however a complete disaster. Things do, by and large, add up. Even the plot holes can be explained by the fact that in the novels at least, no one suspected Lecter until Will Graham. There was no investigation because Lecter, sensing he’d been rumbled, immediately attacked. While an origin story for Hannibal Lecter was always likely to disappointed, I do feel this one could have been better. Specifically with more to his relationship with sympathetic characters and perhaps a different actor in the lead. I’m giving this a solid 5.5/10. Despite some promise the movie largely just coasts along on it’s predecessors coat tails.