OK its time for my final post of the Hannibal Lecter Anthony Hopkins trilogy which is of course on Red Dragon, Hopkins last outing as the infamous fictional serial killer, which shares alot of similarities to Michael Mann's film Manhunter, but both films are based on Thomas Harris's novel of the same name. And with that let's to it and look at the plot for starters as usual....
So the story starts back in Baltimore in 1980 where psychiatrist Dr Lecter (Hopkins) hosts a dinner party at his home and afterwards he receives a visit from an FBI agent Will Graham (Edward Norton). Graham who has a talent for investigating and solving murder cases, consults Lecter over a profile he has put together of a serial killer on the loose at that time. Graham hypothesizes that the serial killer has been removing edible body parts from their victims, which suggests to Graham that the killer is in fact a cannibal. During their meeting, Graham discovers a book which implicates Lecter's involvement in the killings, when all of a sudden Lecter attacks Graham by stabbing him in his side, however Graham manages to fight back and he shoots Lecter. Lecter is then sentence to life imprisonment in a hospital for the criminally insane but Graham retires as a result of the incident.
Years later, another serial killer is on the loose who goes by the nickname of the "tooth fairy" who kills their victims during sequential full moons. Graham is approached by special agent Jack Crawford (Harvey Keitel) of the FBI who asks Will for his help who reclutantly agrees and decides he must seek Lecter's help in order to try and catch the killer. On visiting Lecter, Graham is initially taunted by Lecter who eventually decides to look at the case file of the tooth fairy and gives him some suggestions and clues as to the killer's methods. The serial killer is in fact a psychotic man named Frances Dollarhyde (Ralph Fiennes) who kills at the behest of an alternate personality called "The Great Red Dragon" which he believes with each victim he kills or "changes" as he puts it, will bring him closer to the dragon. Dollarhyde himself was a victim of severe child abuse at the hands of his sadistic grandmother (voiced by Ellen Burstein).
Meanwhile Graham in an effort to lure out Dollarhyde uses tabloid journalist Lounds (Philip Seymour-Hoffman) to print a story which publicly disparages the killer as a "sexually perverted failure". The lure to an extent works as Dollarhyde kidnaps Lounds and takes to his home where he glues to an old wheelchair and shows him his body has a full size tattoo of a William Blake painting on his back of the red dragon. Dollarhyde forces Lounds to recant his allegations after this he bites out Lounds tongue and sets him on fire outside the newspaper building Lounds works for. In the meantime Dollarhyde at a photo lab where he works, meets Reba McClane (Emily Watson) a blind woman who he falls in love with. After they share the night together at his home however, his dragon personality forces him to want to kill Reba but he resists. As a result Dollarhyde decides to go on a trip to Brooklyn Museum where he eats the original Blake painting in an effort to stop the dragon from taking him over entirely. However it is soon ultimately short lived as he returns home to find that Reba is with a fellow employee, Ralph Mandy (Kevin Whaley), which enrages Dollarhyde who later kills Mandy and goes in and kidnaps Reba and takes her to his house where the film reaches it firey climax...
While it is not really a remake of Manhunter, Red Dragon naturally bears a strong resemblance to it as it is based on the same material. Although it has to be said that Red Dragon is actually more faithful to book than Manhunter initally was and also there is a larger inclusion of scenes that include Lecter. And in that respect Red Dragon actually succeeds in being a better film than Manhunter did, as the choices that Mann made saw the end differ with Graham having the showdown at Dolarhyde's home rather than at Graham's as it is in the film and the book. But again similar to Silence of the lambs that centre of the story is the relationship between the agent and the criminal, as Lecter and Graham both share a similar gift in that they can put themselves into the mind of a killer and workout and see their methodologies. The tooth fairy is again akin to Buffalo Bill in that he is a complex not to mention deeply disturbed antagonist who was the victim of years of abuse. And in the story Dolarhyde's relationship with Reba is one of his most intelligent sub-plots as he is attracted to the fact that she is different as she is blind and as she is blind he doesn't see her in the same way as sees his victims or anyone else for that matter.
As for the cast, well this is easily Red Dragon's greatest strength as it would be hard to put together a stronger one than here. Edward Norton does a fine job as the FBI profiler, Will Graham, an agent that can put himself in the place of a killer and understand how they carried out ther crimes, and he remains traumatised by the events of Lecter's capture, but despite that he is brave enough to go back and face him to ask for his assistance in catching the tooth fairy. Norton's scenes with Hopkins are easily his best and some of the highlights of the film, particularly in their meeting years later at Lecter's cell where Will meets with Lecter and he taunts him for having the "stink of fear" on seeing him again. Also the scene at the end where he confronts Dolarhyde at his own beach home is quite gripping and well played as Will clevely plays mind games with him to prevent him from killing his son and spitting back the obscenities that Dolarhyde's grandmother once did "I'm a dirty little beast! Say it! I'm a freak!". Norton's best line probably comes when he goes to meet with Lecter in the prison and Doctor Chilton asks him how did he capture Lecter and Will replies "I let him kill me".
Anthony Hopkins again is great as Lecter, and he has several highlights in the film, and his opening with Will is excellent where Will reveals that Lecter is the killer he is looking for. Also the scene where they meet for the first time in the state prison and Lecter confronts Will by saying "you stink of fear. You fear me yet you came here. You fear this shy boy (i.e. Dolarhyde) yet you seek him out. Don't you see, Will. You caught me because we are very much alike". Hopkins also get's some great dialogue and one of my favourite lines is when he refers to Doctor Chilton (once again played by Anthony Heald) as being "gruesome isn't he? He fumbles at your head like a freshman would a panty girdle!". Also in another scene with Will he says "So I wonder if you want to have more of these little chit-chats" to which Will replies he might not have the time and Lecter says "I have! I've got oodles!". Also in the scene where Will bargains with Lecter for info that will help with the case he gives him back all his old privileges, which he lost (due to giving away Will's home address to Dolarhyde during a phone call that was supposed to be with his lawyer) Lecter insists that he asks for something in return "oh not much, shall we say dinner and a show!".
Emily Watson is very good as Reba, the blind woman whom Dolarhyde falls in love with although one thing that struck me about her performance is for someone who is blind is just how precise she was with some of her movements. This is especially in the scene where she invites Dolarhyde into her home and she precisely cuts a piece of raspberry tart, with the help of a toothpick placed in the centre and she lifts a slice off and places it perfectly on a plate as if she could see! Perhaps though blind people do develop a good sensory perception of where everything is in their home after a time. Philip Seymour-Hoffman is great in his small role as the sleazy tabloid reporter Lounds, who suffers the wrath of Dolarhyde as he is glued to an old wheelchair, has his tounge bitten out and then he is set on fire. Nice way to go! Harvey Keitel also does a good job as Jack Crawford although ultimately he just serves a perfunctory role acting as a superior agent who keeps Will updated on the events. Anthony Heald reprises his role as Dr Chilton, the obnoxious jailor who has it in for Lecter, and he has an amusing scene where he has all Lecter's personal things removed from his cell and he says "I think we will remove Dr Lecter's toilet seat as well!" after Lecter says he unwittingly opened one of Chilton's pieces of mail. And lastly Mary Louise Parker who is criminally underused in this film as she is a terrific actress, but she does well with the small role she has in playing Will's wife, Molly, who at the end of the film plays her part in ending the Dolarhyde threat.
But the film's best performance belongs to Ralph Fiennes as Frances Dolarhyde and his portrayal of the serial killer is both creepy and pitiful at the same time. Fiennes has several highlights in the film and his best scenes include where he kidnaps Lounds and he shows him the tattoo on his back where he announces "I am the dragon and you privy to a great becoming!". His introduction as the "tooth fairy" is also rather creepy as he finishes a workout in his home, and he wears a mask over his face, and he goes to a cupboard where he takes out a pair of false teeth and inserts them into his mouth. And one of the best scenes in the film is where he goes to the museum and eats the Blake painting in an effort to stop the "dragon" from having Reba, which was the reason apparently why the director, Brett Ratner, wanted to do the film in the first place. Fiennes best line in the film comes when he first meets Reba who turns down a lift from an employee Ralph Mandy (Kevin Whaley) who has a thing for her and she says "If there's anything I hate more than pity, its fake pity from a walking hard-on like Ralpy Mandy." and Dolarhyde says "I have no pity". Fiennes also suceeds in making Dolarhyde a pitiful villain simply because we see that he has been the victim of years of abuse from his childhood and the conflict he has when he tries to fight off his "dragon" personality.
Brett Ratner who was a surprising choice for director, actually does a fine job here and he keeps the atmosphere tense throughout, although he doesn't quite bring the suspense to the film that Jonathan Demme did in Silence. Ted Tally who wrote the script for Silence makes a return here and his script is top notch and is very well written. On the production side also worthy of note is the cinemaphotography by Dante Spinotti which is superb and he brings some great colour tones to the film, especially blue tones in the scenes with Lecter, particularly when Will walks with Lecter around a hall in the prison while he is chained up.
So onto the second last part of the review... flaws??? Yes ok Red Dragon isn't perfect, again the intensity and suspense isn't quite as up to speed as it should be and while there is the odd jump moment in there (the scene where Dolarhyde attacks Lounds and bites out his tounge being a good one) it doesn't fill you with any great dread. Anthony Hopkins portayal of Lecter while is still excellent it does start to show signs of self parody and he seems to overdo the menacing looks and grins which serves to undercut his character that bit more and at this point Lecter is becoming a far more hammy villain than anything else, regardless he's still mighty good! Another problem I have with the film is Danny Elfman's score which is very loud and overbearing and it has zero in the way of subtlety, so much for let it creep up on you its just BOOOOOOMMM!! In your face! And its not to take away from Elfman as he is an excellent composer, but I just felt he wasn't the right choice for the film. Also in the scene where Lecter makes his phone call its funny how no one even stayed to listen in on it or even monitor the call, as we clearly saw Chilton record Lecter's conversations with Starling in Silence, but here Lecter is unsupervised and he is free to find out Will's address. Also perhaps the reason behind Dolarhyde's pathology is a bit pat as it boils down to just an abusive grandmother, it is more akin to Pyscho with Norman Bates's demanding late mother. She would have to been quite a horror to push Dolarhyde as far as that!
Anyway that's it for my look at Red Dragon and at the Anthony Hopkins Lecter trilogy, and Red Dragon is a fine thriller and a good remake of the original Thomas Harris which to an extent remains more faithful to nove than Michael Mann's version did.
And with that I shall bid you farewell. (gnash gnash!!).
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