The Silence of the Lambs at 34: Looking at the watcher

The Silence of the Lambs holds the power to unsettle after 34 years due to strongly defined characters and director Johnathan Demme’s sense of humanity.

That Oscars night, The Silence of the Lambs would go on to make history as the third, and most recent, movie, after It Happened One Night (1934) and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) to win the “Big Five” Awards: Best Picture, Best Director for Jonathan Demme, Best Actor for Anthony Hopkins, Best Actress for Jodie Foster, and Best Adapted Screenplay for Ted Tally. It is the only movie within the horror genre to have ever won the Academy Award for Best Picture.

But The Silence of the Lambs was not just an awards darling. It was a movie that people talked about, a movie that people thought about. To this very day, the shadow of Clarice Starling, Hannibal Lecter and Buffalo Bill hangs over all movies that follow the investigation into serial killings. It has inspired such movies as Se7en, Copycat, Kiss the Girls, The Bone Collector, Cure, Tesis, Spiral: The Book of Saw, The Batman, and Longlegs, to name only a few. On television, The X Files, the CSI Franchise, and Law and Order: SVU would not exist without the success of The Silence of the Lambs.

The movie has been parodied and referenced by films such as The Silence of the Hams, Loaded Weapon 1, Dumb and Dumber, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, and Austin Powers in Goldmember, and television shows such as Angie Tribeca, Stranger Things, Veronica Mars, Riverdale, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, The Simpsons, and French and Saunders. There is even an extended universe that has popped up surrounding The Silence of the Lambs, with the sequels Hannibal (2001), Red Dragon (2003) and Hannibal Rising (2007) and television shows Clarice (2021) and Hannibal (2013–2015). 

When a piece of pop culture becomes so ubiquitous, so replicated, there is a danger of it losing its original power, like the ink on a document fading with each xerox copy. After so many parodies, shouldn’t Hannibal Lecter saying that he ate the census taker’s liver with fava beans and a nice chianti elicit knowing chuckles in 2025? No. The years and number of parodies have not diluted The Silence of the Lambs emotional power and ability to terrify, and I do not predict that happening any time soon. 

Adapted from the 1988 novel by Thomas Harris, The Silence of the Lambs is a horror movie, but not a traditional one. The film is a bildungsroman, the story of the moral and intellectual education of FBI Special Agent Clarice Starling, portrayed by Foster. We are introduced to Starling as a bright and ambitious trainee nearing her graduation from the FBI Academy. She is sent to interview the notorious cannibal Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Hopkins), a once-respected psychiatrist now incarcerated at a Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.

Starling approaches Lecter under the pretense of administering a psychological questionnaire, but her assignment from the FBI is really to draw out of the psychiatrist his insight into the identity and psychology of the wanted serial killer ‘Buffalo Bill.’ The latter killer is so nicknamed due to his predilection for removing the skin of his murder victims. Mixing together the modus operandi of Ed Gein, Ted Bundy, and Gary Heidnik, Buffalo Bill has been able to evade capture, and, as bodies of young women are piling up, the FBI is growing desperate for answers. 

After being shown photographic evidence of Lecter’s crimes by hospital director Dr. Chilton (Anthony Heald), and walking through the Gothic dungeon-style basement of the hospital, Starling is introduced to the brilliant serial killer locked up in his cell. With Lecter standing as still and straight as a cobra preparing to pounce and Starling unable to hide the trembles of fear and uncertainty in her voice, separated by only a thin sheet of glass, the two engage in a verbal fencing match, attempting to find out each other’s strengths and weaknesses. The confrontation is shot in tight, voyeuristic close-ups, giving the scene an edge-of-your-seat intensity though it is only two people talking, while sitting still and trying to show as little emotion as possible. 

From the second he appears in the cell, Hopkins commands the viewer’s imagination, lingering in the mind far longer than he is on screen. Lecter is a monstrous and entrancing creation: urbane, witty, innately frightening, and the smartest character in the movie. The viewer does not like Hannibal Lecter, as they do Clarice Starling, so much as they are captivated by him. As Roger Ebert put it in his review, “He may be a cannibal, but as a dinner party guest he would give value for money (if he didn’t eat you).” You respect his intelligence as well as the affection that he holds for Starling. 

By the end of this meet-cute, with her bravery and honesty Starling has piqued the curiosity of Lecter. He does know the identity of Buffalo Bill. Perhaps to test her cleverness, he shares a clue. As Starling is deciphering the riddle and attempting to get more information out of Lecter , Buffalo Bill (Ted Levine) strikes again, kidnapping young college student Catherine Martin (Brooke Smith), the daughter of a Senator. The President of the United States is now concerned about the status of the FBI’s investigation. With the increased pressure and her personal connection with Lecter, Starling is pulled deeper into the labyrinthine case. 

Clarice Starling is the knight setting out to slay the dragon and rescue the princess from the tower. Still a student, Foster plays Starling as unsure of the depth of her own knowledge and capabilities, and eager to test them out. As far as Starling is surrounded by paternalistic authority figures that look down their nose at Starling due to her womanhood, a stronger driving force for Starling is the chance to prove her talents to herself. Notice the flair of nostrils and flicker of disappointment that clouds Starling’s eyes for a split second whenever she is corrected. The Investigation into Buffalo Bill is the ultimate thesis project, and she is determined to receive top marks. 

The basic story of The Silence of the Lambs could, with very little effort, be told in a pulpy, vulgar manner, full of lurid details and sensationalistic violence. See the movies mentioned above that it inspired, like Kiss the Girls and The Bone Collector. What ennobles The Silence of the Lambs is the talent and humanity of its filmmaker Jonathan Demme. Demme was not a horror movie director. His previous two movies, Married to the Mob (1988) and Something Wild (1986), were rompish screwball comedies. Though The Silence of the Lambs features pieces of extravagant violence, they are filmed in a tremulous manner, as though Demme’s camera was frozen to the spot in terror and couldn’t look away. Demme is not interested in blood and guts for the sake of shocking the viewer, but rather the character’s emotional and psychological reaction to the violence.

Demme approaches the material in a straightforward, journalistic manner. The cinematography, by Tak Fujimoto, is striking and penetrating, but not painterly, and it’s coated in the dull irongrays of federal buildings and the overcast skies of a snowless winter. In comparison to the Grand Guignol stylings of the Hannibal TV Show, The Silence of the Lambs is downright cinema verité. The mundanity of the world makes the content of the movie all the more upsetting. Hannibal Lecter could be walking right past you on a market street in the Bahamas. 

Consistently throughout The Silence of the Lambs, characters look directly down the barrel of the camera; Lecter, Buffalo Bill, Starling’s best friend Ardelia Mapp (Kasi Lemmons).  Even if the viewer does not consciously notice the unusual camera technique, it has a powerful, voyeuristic effect. Even during moments of relative calm, it has an unnerving quality. Characters in movies should not look at you as you watch from the safety of your living room. The camera technique has the effect of putting you, the viewer, in the shoes of Starling.

As FBI Director Jack Crawford (Scott Glenn) says, “You don’t want Hannibal in your head;” the framing of the camera makes it feel as though he is not speaking to Starling, but to the viewer. As Starling tentatively steps through the hospital corridor toward Lecter’s cell, the POV Shot allows the viewer an up close and personal introduction to Hannibal the Cannibal. The result is a feeling of connection between the viewer and Starling. During the finale the viewer is just as trapped in the dark of Buffalo Bill’s basement as she is, hyperventilating with fear at the thought of where the killer could be. 

Blood and viscera can only take you so far. They shock, but do not scare. True fear comes through recognition and emotional investment. While watching The Silence of the Lambs you are scared for Clarice because you care for her; you want her to succeed. It is this emotional investment and connection between the viewer and characters that makes Demme’s film so frightening, even after 34 years.

The Silence of the Lambs is now available to watch on digital and on demand, and on DVD & Blu-Ray.

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