The Silence of the Lambs

"To enter the mind of a killer she must challenge the mind of a madman."

1991 1h 59m EN

🙌

8.3

BANGER

★8.3TMDB · 18,603

CrimeThrillerDrama

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

Clarice Starling is a top student at the FBI's training academy. Jack Crawford wants Clarice to interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a brilliant psychiatrist who is also a violent psychopath, serving life behind bars for various acts of murder and cannibalism. Crawford believes that Lecter may have insight into a case and that Starling, as an attractive young woman, may be just the bait to draw him out.

“To enter the mind of a killer she must challenge the mind of a madman.”

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Cast

Jodie Foster
Clarice Starling
Anthony Hopkins
Dr. Hannibal Lecter
Scott Glenn
Jack Crawford
Ted Levine
Jame Gumb
Anthony Heald
Dr. Frederick Chilton
Brooke Smith
Catherine Martin
Diane Baker
Senator Ruth Martin
Kasi Lemmons
Ardelia Mapp

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Jonathan Demme
Writers: Ted Tally, Kalina Ivanov, Karl Shefelman
Languages: English
Countries: United States of America

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Grossed $273M — a 14.4× return. The kind of profit studios chase for a decade.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

ERA

Did you know

35 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

CINEMA

Did you know

Part of the "The Hannibal Lecter Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

CAST

Did you know

208+ people credited in cast and crew — a small city's worth of labour.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Jonathan Demme, shot by Tak Fujimoto. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Howard Shore. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Craig McKay shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

CAST

Did you know

Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins and Scott Glenn carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Jonathan Demme directs. Tak Fujimoto behind the camera. Howard Shore scores. Craig McKay cuts. Made its budget back several times over at the box office. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Grossed $273M — a 14.4× return. The kind of profit studios chase for a decade.
235 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.
3Part of the "The Hannibal Lecter Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.
4208+ people credited in cast and crew — a small city's worth of labour.
5Directed by Jonathan Demme, shot by Tak Fujimoto. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
6Original score by Howard Shore. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
7Editor Craig McKay shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
8Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins and Scott Glenn carry the top of the cast.
9Marketing tagline: "To enter the mind of a killer she must challenge the mind of a madman.".
10IMDB entry: tt0102926 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
1118,603 TMDB user ratings logged — serious cultural footprint.
12Classified under 26 themes, including "prison", "based on novel or book", "kidnapping", "psychopath".
13Released under 12 different titles around the world.

The technical file

Cinematography: Tak Fujimoto
Original score: Howard Shore
Editing: Craig McKay
Production design: Kristi Zea
Costume design: Colleen Atwood
Makeup / hair: Alan D'Angerio
Sound: Tom Fleischman
Stunt coordinator: John Robotham
Runtime: 119 min · 1h 59m
Aspect ratio (typical): 1.37:1 (Academy)
Status: Released
Budget: $19,000,000
Box office: $272,742,922
Return: 1435% of budget
Original language: EN
Certification (US): R
IMDB: The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Awards

Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing – Feature Film
Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association Award for Best Actor
Kansas City Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actor
National Board of Review: Top Ten Films
New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actor
Saturn Award for Best Actor
Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best Actor
Boston Society of Film Critics Award for Best Supporting Actor
National Board of Review Award for Best Director
New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Director

Individual records documented via Wikidata; the summary above may count more.

Part of

The Hannibal Lecter Collection

Hannibal Lecter 'Lecktor' is an American psychological thriller film series, adapted from the Thomas Harris novel of the same name. Hannibal is a sequel to the 1991 Academy Award-winning film The Silence of the Lambs that returns Anthony Hopkins to his iconic role as serial killer Hannibal Lecter 'Lecktor'. Julianne Moore co-stars, taking over for Jodie Foster in the role of FBI Agent Clarice Starling. Red Dragon prequel stars Edward Norton as FBI agent Will Graham. Original Manhunter and Hannibal Rising sans Hopkins.

Also by

Jonathan Demme

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Community reviews

What people are saying

Ted Fraraccio2015-07-17
★ 10/10
Unlike a lot of viewers, I first saw The Silence of the Lambs at five years old. So, for me, The Silence of the Lambs is a childhood favorite. Some would say I had an unusual childhood, in this age where some people actually avoid R-rated movies like the plague. The fact that I saw Something Wild, which Jonathan Demme directed five years before The Silence of the Lambs, as well as the original Alien (alone at that), at the same age probably indicates that they were okay with me watching pretty much anything that wasn't rated X, though, honestly, I've never had any interest in that stuff. It was probably due to the fact that, like the movie's protagonist, I don't "spook easily," and many so-called "scary" movies, including this one, never scared me, but (many of them) definitely thrilled me. Granted, I'd seen Saving Private Ryan a few months before, which probably gave me a strong stomach. Well, enough about my wild, albeit fun, childhood. How does The Silence of the Lambs hold up all these years later? For me personally, The Silence of the Lambs is every bit as good as it was the first time I saw it at five years old. On the off chance you don't already know the plot by now, Jodie Foster stars as Clarice Starling, a rookie FBI agent with a degree in psychology who is called from training by her boss Jack Crawford (Scott Glenn) in the middle of a string of murders by a man nicknamed "Buffalo Bill" (Ted Levine) who skins his victims, all of whom happen to be women. Crawford tells her to interview the psychotic Dr. Hannibal "the Cannibal" Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) in prison, hoping he might have an answer of some kind. Lecter brushes her off. After Catherine Martin (Brooke Smith), the daughter of a senator is kidnapped, Lecter agrees to give Starling information about Buffalo Bill on the condition that she tell him personal information about herself. If I had to pick the greatest Best Picture Oscar winner ever, it would most likely be The Silence of the Lambs. Well-acted, well-written, and well-directed, it's definitely my favorite. Let's look at the acting to start. Jodie Foster, unsurprisingly, won a well-deserved Oscar for her performance as Starling. Foster plays Starling as a little scared yet strong at the same time, definitely not a coward as Julianne Moore later played the character in the movie Hannibal, and definitely not someone who would turn cannibal as Thomas Harris wrote the character as doing in the novel Hannibal. Movie or novel, in my honest opinion, the Clarice Starling depicted in Hannibal is an insult to what this Clarice Starling stands for. As we find out about what's been nagging Starling since childhood, Foster plays it especially well where another actress may have overdone it. Anthony Hopkins, like Foster, won an Oscar for his performance as Lecter, and I speak for a lot of people, if not everybody, when I say it was also well-deserved. Hopkins plays Lecter as brilliant yet insane, making him one of the more interesting villains in movie history. Scott Glenn plays Crawford very well for the time he's onscreen. Ted Levine plays "Buffalo Bill" as straight up crazy, and does a very good job of making us hate him. Brooke Smith is only supposed to play Catherine Martin as scared and she does - with dead-on accuracy. Ted Tally won a well-deserved Oscar for his screenplay, adapted from Thomas Harris' novel of the same name. Tally doesn't feel the need to focus on violence and gore, which is one of the movie's strengths. Instead he focuses on the characters, and I'd be lying if I said he didn't flesh them out very, very, very, well. Jonathan Demme also won an Oscar for his directing and he does a very good job of it. The Silence of the Lambs is relentlessly thrilling and it holds me to my seat until the last frame every time I see it, all without relying on excessive gore. I've already mentioned that The Silence of the Lambs doesn't scare me, so it may - or may not - scare you, depending on what you're afraid of. Admittedly, there are a few creepy things displayed onscreen so I can see why it would scare some viewers. Either way, I can't recommend The Silence of the Lambs enough, and everybody should see it at least once. The Silence of the Lambs is a childhood favorite of mine, and it holds up very, very well almost 25 years after its release. It's relentlessly thrilling, flawlessly acted, flawlessly written, flawlessly directed, and one of the few movies that actually deserved all the Oscars it won.
Gimly2020-06-08
★ 8/10
This is one of a few movies I put off reviewing for years, because I honestly don't know what to say about a film this classic. So I'll be brief in my actual review, knowing that it comes from a place where I honestly believe that this is a movie that deserves its praise: Even if the A-plot of the story wasn't one of the best crime thrillers put to screen, the Hannibal Lector moments alone would be enough to make Silence of the Lambs a great movie, most especially his run in Memphis. Final rating:★★★★ - Very strong appeal. A personal favourite.
Melissa Goldfine2020-11-18
It kind of reminds me of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, because Frank and Jame are drag queens who kill.