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'Red Dragon' is more Lecter, less story
[Photos: Universal Studios]
Edward Norton, right, is an FBI profiler consulting Anthony Hopkins, who gets back into the skin of Hannibal Lecter in Red Dragon. |
By STEVE PERSALL, Times Film Critic
© St. Petersburg Times
published October 3, 2002
Plot tricks and subdued acting bring the saga full circle, but there's not much mystery to it.
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The most famous cannibal in movie history gets a curtain call in Red Dragon, while moviegoers mostly get leftovers from every serial killer flick since The Silence of the Lambs.
No reason exists to remake Michael Mann's 1986 thriller Manhunter except for allowing Anthony Hopkins to trot out his signature role as Hannibal Lecter one more time. That requires some plot trickery, because Lecter was only a bit player in Manhunter and the Thomas Harris novel inspiring it, Red Dragon.
Brett Ratner's version of the book, with the book's title, handles that requirement well, starting with a gripping prologue that lifts an idea from Harris' third Lecter novel, Hannibal (ignored in last year's movie), and depicting Lecter's capture, described in the first novel (ignored in Manhunter). The final scene of Red Dragon awkwardly brings the sociopath's saga full circle. Between, Ratner borrows heavily in casting and shot selection from Jonathan Demme's Oscar-winning The Silence of the Lambs and Mann's morbid Manhunter tone.
Ralph Fiennes, with a full-body tattoo, is a serial killer dubbed the Tooth Fairy in Red Dragon.
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Gone is the mystery of what makes Lecter tick. In its place is more Lecter than Harris intended until Hopkins turned a sideshow role into a cinematic icon. The relationship between Lecter and Will Graham (Edward Norton), an FBI profiler who nailed him, isn't as complex as Clarice Starling's bleating lambs. Yet Ratner and screenwriter Ted Tally are obligated to expand their conversations so there's a reason to bundle Lecter into that famous mask.
Hopkins goes through his paces with customary elan, concealing his character's evil with erudite insights and playful menace. The performance, and the movie, aren't as over-the-top as Hannibal, a sick joke that went too far. Yet even as we admire the actor truly earning his paycheck, it's obvious that his role is beefed up at the expense of the story.
Norton, one of the best actors working today, is unchallenged by this role and, to a degree, miscast. He doesn't have the backbone for an FBI agent, even one that can occasionally shiver like Starling at Lecter's brilliant madness. Thinking back to William Petersen's take on the tormented role in Manhunter underscores the weakness of this Will Graham.
Emily Watson plays a blind woman who gets involved with serial killer Ralph Fiennes.
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The crux of Red Dragon is Graham's pursuit of a serial slaughterer dubbed the Tooth Fairy, for leaving crooked bite marks on victims. Ralph Fiennes drops his "serious actor" ego for a roll in the dungeon as Francis Dolarhyde, a killer with a Norman Bates complex and inner voices urging him on. Aside from an impressive full-body tattoo reflecting an obsession with author-painter William Blake, Dolarhyde is just another post-Lecter weirdo.
Tally's script doesn't explain why Dolarhyde massacres two families, although Harris diagnosed an assault on the nuclear family he was denied. He simply kills and adds a couple of grisly touches to set him vaguely apart from the Seven crowd. Dolarhyde's tentative crush on a blind woman (Emily Watson) who may either be a victim or his salvation was better defined in Mann's film.
Harvey Keitel sleepwalks through the FBI authority role. Philip Seymour Hoffman is practically lifeless as a tabloid reporter popping up at the proper times to be pushed around or worse. Ratner effectively emphasizes crimes instead of characters, except, of course, his star psycho, whom we know so well. Red Dragon is like the fourth trip through a cannibal's buffet line, and the pickings are getting slim.
Red Dragon
- Grade: B-
- Director: Brett Ratner
- Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Edward Norton, Ralph Fiennes, Harvey Keitel, Emily Watson, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Mary-Louise Parker, Anthony Heald
- Screenplay: Ted Tally, based on the novel by Thomas Harris
- Rating: R; violence, profanity, nudity, sexual situations
- Running time: 125 min.
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