Manhunter and Red Dragon

I watched The Silence of the Lambs last week and it was one of those things where I saw it was on TV and only meant to watch a couple minutes of it but wound up watching the whole thing.  It’s so weird when that happens because it’s something you can’t brace yourself for or even process.  You go into it with the mindset that you’re only going to see this movie for a little bit so you’re not really paying close attention at first but before you know it you’re sucked in.  It’s a totally different and uncommon way to experience a film.  This type of “whim movie watching” happens, at least for me, maybe only once a year.  And I’m talking about seeing the entire thing, not just half or most but from credits to credits.  It’s like you’re in a daze the whole time, like you’re hypnotized by the picture.  It never enters into your head to change the channel or that you should be doing something else.  That’s like the power of cinema or something man.      

Anyway, since I really enjoyed checking out The Silence of the Lambs again after a bunch of years I decided to do a little comparison between Manhunter and Red Dragon.  I’ve already seen both of these but not since 2002 so I needed a refresher.  Just so no one’s in the dark here Red Dragon is a remake of Manhunter which is based off of the book Red Dragon written by Thomas Harris who also wrote the sequel The Silence of the Lambs but the movie Red Dragon came out after the film The Silence of the Lambs making it a prequel as well.  Simple, right?  Manhunter was a flop when it came out but because of the huge success of The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal De Laurentiis gave it another shot and put out Red Dragon.

I do want to mention that I still think The Silence of the Lambs is a kick ass movie.  There’s great atmosphere, great acting all around and great pacing.  I love how there’s two stories happening at once (the relationship between Hannibal and Clarice and the Buffalo Bill killings) but they’re both intertwined so you can’t have one without the other.  It works well that they share equal billing instead one being a subplot of the other.  And Hannibal Lecter really is kind of a creepy dude.  It’s great how they build him up and already make you think that he’s a soulless monster before revealing him.  When Jodie Foster goes to visit him the first time and she has to go through like a hundred cell doors, guards and travel all the way down into the bowels of the institution just builds onto the anxiety.  And then when we finally do see him standing up straight with arms at his sides in the middle of his cell behind plexiglass is pretty damn eerie.  He’s like an artifact that’s been tucked away hoping to be forgotten about but the thing is that no can afford to forget about him or they’ll end up with their face chewed off. 

Now that that’s out of the way let’s move on to Red Dragon.  I’m starting with this one because I think it’ll lay the groundwork for a better comparison to Manhunter.  Also, just to be clear I haven’t read the book so I have no idea which picture is more faithful.  I’m mostly looking at how these two compare to each other. 

Ok, so everything in this movie takes place before The Silence of the Lambs in the mid 80’s.  In the prologue we learn how Hannibal (Anthony Hopkins (Thor)) was nabbed by an FBI agent named Will Graham (Ed Norton (The Italian Job)).  After the credits we flash forward to Graham on a Floridian beach with his family.  His old boss, Jack Crawford played by Harvey Keitel (Cop Land), comes to visit to try and convince Graham to take on the latest serial killer case.  After the usual “I’m retired” speech and the “but no one can catch serial killers like you” rebuttal of course Graham takes the case on.  He visits Hannibal several times to help him out and eventually (spoiler) figures out who the killer is. 

Like with Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs we get to know our killer Francis Dolarhyde a.k.a “the tooth fairy”, played by Ralph Fiennes (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2).  And I really dig it when a movie decides to do that because usually a maniac is much more interesting than a cop and this is no exception.  I mean I don’t have anything against Ed Norton or his character but the killer is who I want to follow around and see what motivates him.  In this case Dolarhyde thinks he’s transforming into something.  I’m not sure if it’s a red dragon or if he worships the red dragon and he’s changing into something else.  That wasn’t very clear but really I don’t think it matters.  The point is that this guy isn’t murdering people for pleasure.  In fact he’s tortured and thinks this red dragon has a hold over him.

The biggest problem with this character though is that I just don’t find him menacing enough.  We only see him kill one person on screen.  All the rest are done off screen.  To be fair the same thing happens with Hannibal in The Silence of the Lambs but the difference is that Hannibal is locked up and Dolarhyde is out on the streets.  Seeing Dolarhyde go about his life and even strike up a romance with Emily Watson (Punch-Drunk Love) doesn’t make him feel very threatening.  Not that I would want to have lunch with the guy but when he brings his new blind girlfriend to pet a sedated tiger on a surgical table at a zoo he kinda lost his edge for me.  That was just a very sweet thing to do.  I like Ralph Fiennes too (at least I think I do) but I thought he was scarier in Schindler’s List.  What’s strange is that in The Silence of the Lambs we don’t see Buffalo Bill kill a single person on screen and yet he seemed more frightening.  And I think it’s because of the relationship Dolarhyde takes on with Emily Watson.  We actually see our killer be nice and kind which undercuts his threat.  We never see Buffalo Bill do anything nice.  That guy’s fucked up through and through.

But what about Hannibal?  He does a nice thing by helping Graham out with his case just like he helped Jodie Foster so why does he come off so nasty?  Well in Red Dragon he definitely doesn’t seem as mean.  I’m having a hard time putting my finger on it but in The Silence of the Lambs there was an aura about him that made you believe that this is not someone to fuck with.  In Red Dragon he feels more like an old friend and like you know he’s gonna help Graham out even though he gives him the runaround.  It might be because we know that he assisted Jodie Foster before (or since this is a prequel: will assist).  It also might be because there isn’t as much dialogue about eating people and tickling breasts ‘n shit this time.

As far as Ed Norton, Harvey Keitel and Philip Seymour Hoffman go, they all do a real solid job.  Hoffman is especially good in the scene where he gets captured by Dolarhyde.  Keitel and Norton both play it straight here without venturing too far into interesting territory.

The film as a whole is just ok.  Not bad and not great.  Most of the bad stuff can be overlooked but there isn’t a tremendous amount of other things to get excited over either (the Danny Elfman score is one of those things though).  I think it’s worth seeing because it expands the world and characters given to us in The Silence of the Lambs.  Probably the most interesting thing about this movie is we learn how Hannibal was caught.  The rest of the picture doesn’t really have a lot to do with that but that’s ok I guess since it’s supposed to be a separate story.

When I saw that Brett Ratner directed this I was surprised because this isn’t the type of material that I associate him with.  When I think Brett Ratner the first thing that comes to mind is Rush Hour.  The two are synonymous.  When I went to go make sure that he made three Rush Hours I also realized that I’ve seen most of his features.  I really doubt I’m ever going to get to The Family Man even though I’m interested in just about anything Nicholas Cage does.  And two Rush Hours was enough for me so that third one is also probably not going to be seen.  But Red Dragon is his best movie in my opinion.  There aren’t a whole bunch of things he could’ve done better because when it comes down to it this story is a not as good version of The Silence of the Lambs.  But it gives me confidence (albeit a very small amount) that Brett Ratner could make something real good one day.     

Manhunter, though, is pretty different overall.  First of all it’s way more 80’s than Red Dragon.  Actually, if the filmmakers didn’t tell me that Red Dragon took place in the 80’s then I might not have noticed it.  In Manhunter they don’t have to tell you because the movie was made during the right time period.

Graham is played by William Petersen (To Live and Die in L.A., Fear), Crawford is played by Dennis Farina (Striking Distance, Midnight Run) and Hannibal is played by Brian Cox (The Ring, X2).  Petersen is more intense, tougher and scruffier than Norton’s version.  I like this cigarette smoking, bearded edition better.  He’s seems way more tortured and determined to catch the killer.  Like he’ll start yelling at the killer, who’s not really there, when he thinks he’s on to something.  I would say Farina is slightly better than Keitel because he was a real cop before he became an actor so it makes his role feel a little more authentic. 

But Brian Cox as Hannibal seems totally off.  Because most (if not all) of us know the Hopkins version of Hannibal it’s hard to see anyone else in that role and that certainly plays into me saying that Brian Cox feels wrong.  He’s not scary, threatening or intense.  Instead Cox plays it very relaxed being sleepy eyed when Graham first visits him and lying on his back with his feet up when Graham calls him up later in the film.  The filmmakers also decided to make him English (and sometimes Scottish when Cox’s accent slips) which definitely makes him hard to accept as a true Hannibal (yeah I know Hopkins is Welsh but Hannibal isn’t).  The way we’re presented to him is completely different also.  Hannibal is kept in an all white cell with regular bars, wearing all white clothes on the top floor of an institution.  This is very different from the dark and grimy cellar that they keep him in, in Red Dragon and The Silence of the Lambs.  Cox’s Hannibal seems like kind of a nice guy actually (except for him telling Dolarhyde to kill Graham and his family) and like he’s happy to help solve the case.  Oh, and it’s strange that Lecter is spelled differently in this one: Lecktor.

Tom Noonan (Last Action Hero, Robocop 2) plays Dolarhyde and he works better than Ralph Fiennes for two reasons: he looks way creepier and we actually see him kill a bunch of people.  Noonan also takes his girlfriend to pet a sedated tiger but the romance is briefer and he just doesn’t seem as nice.

Spoilers from here on

The two biggest differences between these two films are the beginning and the ending.  In Manhunter they skip how they caught Hannibal and just start with Crawford trying to convince Graham to take the case.  And it all ends with a really cool shootout instead of a one on one confrontation like in Red Dragon.  A mano-a-mano fight is exactly what I look for in an ending but this one didn’t work for me.  Having Dolarhyde cop out and fake his death doesn’t fit with his character.  He’s supposed to be crazy and willing to die for his god.  Having this ending just makes him seem like an asshole.  I’m not gonna take him seriously if he can’t follow through on his craziness.  Also it’s really lame that Norton knows exactly how to rattle the killer’s cage and get his son, who’s being held hostage, away from him.  Things just get too convenient for me.  Having Noonan’s Dolarhyde blow away cops with a shotgun and make a stand to the death made him a good deal more threatening.  You have the feeling that this guy could fly off the handle at any moment and do some damage.  You knew he wouldn’t wimp out by faking his own death so he could get revenge later by taking a little boy hostage.  I would’ve had more respect for this character if he went after Graham directly like a man.     

Manhunter was directed by Michael Mann and was his third feature.  You can already see some of his trademarks like this being a movie about cops, trying to portray the investigation realistically, casting real cops, lots of blue lighting and using Chicago as a setting.  I think this is one of his better films but like Red Dragon it’s not great.

Some other things to mention about both films are that Manhunter felt at least fifteen minutes shorter even though both have about the same running time.  Red Dragon is a more even film and this is due mostly to spreading the Dolarhyde romance segments throughout instead of bunching it all in towards the end like Manhunter.  Manhunter is shot a little better but I like how both films look.  Red Dragon goes for dark and dirty while Manhunter is cleaner and 80’s to the max.  Red Dragon fits in much better with The Silence of the Lambs not only because of Anthony Hopkins but also in terms of look and feel.  Red Dragon also has the better title.  Both talk about Graham’s ability to track down killers like it’s a sixth sense.  Some of the lines are exactly the same in both films but three quarters of them are slightly different.   And both have good soundtracks.

After all of that discussion I think they even out.  With Manhunter most of the scenes and dialogue felt rushed compared to Red Dragon and the characters seemed a little flatter but a bunch tougher.  Red Dragon may be more in line with The Silence of the Lambs but it seemed to drag at times.  It’s hard to recommend which is the one to see if you’re only going to do one.  Well if it sways you, Manhunter is weirder.  I mean they play an 80’s power ballad while we watch Dolarhyde get jealous of some guy walking his new girlfriend home and then he kills him.  And “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” blasts during the final showdown.  If that’s the kinda shit you can get behind then Manhunter is for you.  If not, go with the other one.