Review #177: The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

This review was originally written in 2022.

Gabe's 100 Bucket List Horror Films Review #32: The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

When I was growing up, this was one of those films that I'd heard referenced a million times, but never seen. I'd heard it was violent, it was scary, and it had something to do with skin on someone's face- so when I finally got around to watching it many years later, I was shocked at how it really was none of those things. I mean, yes, there's some violence in there. Yes, it's scary. And yes, there's a scene where a person has someone else's skin on their face. But like, I feel weird even calling this a horror movie? Obviously it is, but at its core there's so little of what makes modern movies "horror" present in this movie, other than just dealing with a grotesque subject matter. The Silence of the Lambs is a murder mystery with a ticking clock, and a lot of macabre clues that lead the detective to put all of the pieces together.

One of the things I love about the structure of this story (and why it feels so different to most horror films) is that there isn't one villain in particular. Rather, the story more or less follows three villains of varying involvement with the protagonist, and each of the villains has their own agenda and their own set of things they're going to accomplish by the end of the film. The protagonist, Jodie Foster's Agent Starling, is moving in an adeptly-orchestrated dance between each of the three villains' plots in order to get where she needs to go. In retrospect I feel like it's obvious that this movie was based on a novel, because each of the characters clearly has so much depth and backstory to them- some of which comes out in the film, but not all does- and so you end up with a viewing experience that's so much more full-bodied than you would get otherwise.

I think The Silence of the Lambs is an amazing movie, not only for telling such a great engaging story with such amazing characters (there's a reason Hannibal Lecter has spawned several movies and even a TV show about him), but also for providing such an evocative atmosphere for the characters to live in. Watching this film I really got a great feel for the academy in which Agent Starling is rising through the ranks, the type of work environments she has to put up with over the course of her investigation, the chaotic and terrifying mental asylum where Dr. Lecter is held, the creepy dungeon Buffalo Bill uses to keep his victims, and more.

This movie absolutely stands the test of time and is fully deserving of the lasting reputation it has, and I encourage anybody to watch it!

Overall Rating: 10/10 Horses Saying Goodbye

Fun Bit of Trivia: The character of Chris Griffin on Family Guy has the voice he has because Seth Green had a comedy bit of what Buffalo Bill (Ted Levine) would have sounded like as a teenager. For the first few seasons of that show, he was essentially just doing a Ted Levine impression!