Also working against people's perceptions about this film is the fact that Silence of the Lambs depicted Hannibal Lecter in such an unforgettable way, with deep psychology, a snaky performance by Anthony Hopkins, and the vulnerabilities of Jodie Foster's Clarice Starling. That film made so much of an impact that many folks simply felt the need to sweep Manhunter under the rug like it was an embarrassing, wrongheaded, and horribly dated stab at the same material. To the extent that Red Dragon sought to redress the story to be more in line with Jonathan Demme's vision. So here's my rebuttal: shot for shot, Manhunter is easily the equal of Silence of the Lambs. It may lack the rich character development and gritty realism of that film, but you don't need to watch it only in terms of how it's not Silence of the Lambs. Manhunter is so stunningly beautiful in its photography, and so gripping from the first frame, that it has much more in common with Sidney Lumet's 70s stuff than the "slick" and "stylish" shit of the mid-80s. What's more, it's so not "Miami Vice" … although yeah, a few of the shirt-and-tie combinations date it to that era of cocky pastels. William Petersen's latter-day career on "CSI" makes his turn as intense FBI agent Will Graham a bit easier to understand than back in the day, when he was curiously being positioned as a "sexy leading man" (see also To Live and Die in L.A.). Looking back, his slightly off-putting intensity is perfect for the character, and aside from a couple of mishandled outbursts, he's pitch-perfect as the FBI guy whose specialty is getting inside the minds of insane serial killers. Hannibal Lecter here is not the main show, with only a few scenes. Brian Cox (Agamemnon from Troy!) is appropriately elegant and creepy – in some ways, his subtlety is a lot more interesting than Hopkins's, though Sir Anthony gave such a full-flesh performance that it's hard to begrudge his oneupsmanship. Also on hand are a remarkably un-Dennis Farina-like Dennis Farina (much less sure of himself than in seemingly every other film he's been in), a real cute Joan Allen as a blind girl, and Tom Noonan as the unstable, insecure serial killer in question. What makes this movie hold up is the photography – every shot is well-composed and classic-looking, in a way most filmmakers dispensed with in the glitz-hungry 80s. In this way, Manunter may feel a bit old-fashioned, but ironically, it's actually older-fashioned than you'd expect, which gives it a classic feel that, frankly, Silence of the Lambs lacks. Where they went wrong, probably, was by focusing the story on Petersen's character, since history showed us that what audiences really wanted was more focus on the serial killers, particularly Lecter. But there is a lot more to Manhunter than anyone has ever given it credit for … it deserves to be appreciated (seriously!) as one of the best films of the 80s.
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