- Also Known As:
- Unknown
- Year:
- 1986
- Country:
- Predominant Genre:
- Crime
- Director:
- Outstanding Performances:
- Premiss:
- Tracking a serial killer who appears to select his victims at random.
- Themes:
- Alienation
- Christianity
- Empathy
- Emotional repression
- Grieving
- Humanity
- Identity
- Loneliness
- Narcissism
- Solipsism
- Totalitarianism
- White culture
- Similar (in Plot, Theme or Style) to:
- Silence of the Lambs
- Review Format:
- DVD
Caucasian Amorality
Superior to all its sequels, this serial-killer tale features fictional psychiatrist Dr Hannibal Lecktor (sic) recruited by the FBI from his prison cell to help catch the latest crazy. Brian COX plays him for real, rather than melodramatic effect, and this moral blankness is all the more chilling for that.
Here we find an empathetic monster; slaughtering entire families to vainly obtain the acceptance he never received from his own abusive mother. The murdered women here are both punished and their approval desperately desired. (Ultimately, the killer undergoes his desired transformation.) And this is precisely what makes the film often uncomfortable viewing: There but for the grace of God, go I.
As usual with director Michael Mann, the style and music are excellent and ably-complement the idealized families being massacred.
Copyright © 2014 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute this posting in any format; provided mention of the author’s Weblog (http://franktalker5.blogspot.com) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.
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