Ridley Scott seems, on the surface, an enigma; is he an artist making highly commercial films, or a top-of-the-line commercial director delivering product which often approximates art? A director of advertisements in the U.K. in the 1970s, Scott began feature directing with "The Duelists", followed that with "Alien", and has since had a string including "Blade Runner", "Someone To Watch Over Me", "Black Rain", "Thelma And Louise", "1492" and "Gladiator". It is interesting to contrast Ridley Scott with his director brother Tony ("The Hunger", "Top Gun", "True Romance") - there is a commonality in styles, yet Ridley's work delves considerably deeper beneath the veneer than Tony's. What do Ridley Scott films all have in common? A sleek look, sharp editing, barreling plots and uniformly fine performances each stand out. All popular entertainments, they are all, in their own way, genre-busters. "The Duelists" took the traditional costume revenge piece and enlivened it; "Alien" crossed space with the old dark house mysteries and formed it's own offspring; "Blade Runner" told the '50s paranoia story with a '40s noir touch and a new millennium mentality; and "Gladiator" made the Roman spectacle merely a backdrop for the reinvented historical revenge piece. And lo! What HAVE we here in "Hannibal"? The historical revenge piece updated into modern Gothic opera (no mean feat!).

"Hannibal" is "Silence Of The Lambs" without the subtle jokes, "Manhunter" sans the earnest documentary approach - it dresses up our current iconic serial killer, Dr. Lecter, as Bluebeard conceived by the Marquis de Sade and executed by Verdi. Here we have Scott stepping again onto the stage of Grand Guignol, to which he is certainly no stranger, witnessed by "Alien" - but he does so tastefully (and rather tongue-in-cheek in some instances). This is the third filmed visit with Dr. Hannibal Lector, but certainly not the last. I have known personally evil men - and I have known killers and murderers; if you live long enough (or hard enough) you probably will too. They are not necessarily one and the same. And they have not been flamboyant and particularly discerning characters, believe me. It is fascinating to me that a character like Hannibal Lecter is a national icon, especially in a society which gives great lip-service to violence in the media. Hannibal is not a cartoon for children - he is a cartoon for literate grownups who purchase hardcover and very pricey paperback books, and the argument about 'violence in the media' is a specious one when you consider the demographics of Hannibal's fans. I guess we still need fictitious boogey-men in our lives - especially if our lives are filled with precious little of the really scary stuff (the old "Most [men] lead lives of quiet desperation' syndrome). Serial killers have been in our collective modern consciousness since at least the 'Jack The Ripper' killings in London in the 1800s, and certainly Hannibal Lecter is directly influenced by Jack - an M.D. adept at the scalpel, taking portions of his victims with him. The 1980s began the most recent trend of serial killing in films, and the genre exploded in the '90s; the best of them all is "Henry: Portrait Of A Serial Killer", though others, such as "Kalifornia" are quite engaging in their own right. Michael Mann's "Manhunter" was a study of the psychology of delayed stress of the main character, an FBI agent who managed to escape a terrible fate at the hands of Dr. Lector and is tracking the new serial killer on the block, dressed up as a police procedural. Jonathan Demme's "Silence Of The Lambs" was a very dark comedy of manners, taking the trappings of horror films and police procedurals and twisting them at every turn. "Hannibal" manages to retain these elements, and embellish upon them in a thoroughly baroque manner, and layering upon them a romance. In "Manhunter" Lecter is a minor player - essayed well by Brian Cox (who plays Lector with much less theatrics than his successor, and which would have to be closer to Dr. Lector's actual character if he were to remain a serial killer - it is hard to understand why Cox's character was caught, so common is he); in "Silence Of The Lambs" he is Clarice Starling's conscience and memories - he is little more than a plot device, serving essentially the same service to the story as in "Manhunter", but used with much more flair. In "Hannibal" Lecter IS the story, which is probably the main reason Jodie Foster turned down the opportunity to revisit Clarice. I read most of the novel "Hannibal" one sleepless night at a friend's house last year, and the following day on the Greyhound bus home, but I never finished the last 50 pages - once the full plot kicked in I got bored and back to real life, for it is Lector and Starling who make the book appealing, and the character of Mason Verger makes the story interesting. It is little more than a hack potboiler sequel with some very interesting history and psychological ideas thrown in, as dubious in its need as any unnecessary extension of a story - there is no epic tale being presented here, simply more chapters of the same story. I saw the film "Hannibal" on a screening VHS cassette, pan-and-scan (which keeps you focused on action and plot, with little of the nuances a 2.35:1 or even a 1.85:1 frame holds, and which is essential in Ridley Scott's films); just as Scott took the environmental text of Hampton Fancher's screenplay for "Blade Runner" and put it all in the subtext of the production design, removing scenes and dialogue and replacing them with atmosphere which imparted the same ideas, here, too, Scott loads on the atmosphere in production design and photographic framing - and which the pan-and-scan thoroughly emasculates by removing a significant portion of every moment of the running time. Without the proper framing a film becomes characters and plot - and Scott is formidable in both areas as a director - but a film is the sum of its parts, and the framing is key to the understanding of it. (On the VHS 'screener', during a particularly grisly climax to a well-built tense scene the message appeared "If you have rented or purchased this videocassette call..." - I wonder if these are the same screeners members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences get to nominate and vote for?) The widescreen DVD replaces what the cassette discards, and aids somewhat in comprehending what might have drawn Scott to this material, other than the fact that it is a straightforward contemporary story, which would require considerably less investment than his previous film "Gladiator" must have required of him. I am still somewhat at a loss as to what really drew him to the project, though, regardless of what he professes. Perhaps it was a chance to simply explore a newer variation on the architecture which surrounded the drama of "Gladiator", and further exploit techniques Scott first worked with in that film to deal with dislocation and violent action. Or maybe it is the chance to improve upon Jonathan Demme's wonderful skills in "Silence Of The Lambs". Or maybe it was those things - and a whole truckload of cash...I'd believe the last in this go-round. Clarice Starling (Julianne Moore) is commandeering a SWAT arrest of a major drug dealer in a Washington D.C. area fresh fish market, but the bust goes bad and a DC cop gets killed, along with the dealer. Starling is given leave of her Special Agent duties pending the investigation into what went wrong. Beginning to make her life hell is Paul Krendel (Ray Liotta), a politician as slimy as they come - and who happens to be on the take from super-wealthy Mason Verger (Gary Oldman). Mason has a bone to pick with Dr. Lecter, given that he is a mobile corpse as a direct result of his one-time involvement with the good doctor - the man who made him cut off his own face during a drug-and-sex orgy. Mason is planning to go to great lengths to extract his revenge on Lecter. Meanwhile, good old Hannibal (on the loose since "Silence Of The Lambs") is living and working as a private library curator in Florence, Italy. A local police detective (Giancarlo Giannini) - a descendent of a notorious Florentine family - recognizes him, and drops a dime to Mason Verger, who is offering $3 million for Lecter alive. Lecter is on to the traitor, though, and does what any bad guy does when he's discovered - he runs (but not without making his displeasure known to Pazzi). He runs right back to the US and Starling, whom he manages to get to chase him and observe when he is abducted by Verger's men. Clarice follows... Working with the same main team responsible for "Gladiator" - Peter Mathieson behind the camera, Pietro Scalia cutting, Hans Zimmer scoring, Norris Spencer designing, Scott makes linen-bond from pulp material, and somehow manages to elevate it to something better than its origin. A special shout out to Greg Cannom, whose make-up just rocks! Ultimately, Scott's "Hannibal" is about corruption - from the Pazzi family of the 17th century through Lecter's in-flight dining companion; corruption and compromise encompass everyone but Starling and Lecter, leaving this "Beauty And The Beast" to be, on some level, an indictment of us all, for aren't we the corrupted, to thrill to the antics of a perfectly sane yet feral man and make him a modern 'hero'? We, the modern audience, are the amphitheater spectators of Scott's "Gladiator", playing God with our thumbs, paying our way through novels and films to get the vicarious thrill of bloodlust Julianne Moore is an excellent actress who does not attempt the same Clarice as Jodie Foster had - she is her own character, and does a fine job with what she is given. Moore seems to take the blockbuster jobs (here, and in "Jurassic Park 2") to allow her to make films like "Boogie Nights', "Magnolia" and "End Of The Affair" - parts that allow her to really work her skills. And, of course, Anthony Hopkins ("Bram Stoker's Dracula", "Legends Of The Fall") all but chews the scenery as Lecter - his theatricality is deliberate, and will keep the series more in the 'camp' vein ("Manhunter" was taken from Harris' first Lecter novel "Red Dragon", and a script is being prepped for a new version of that book as the next in this franchise, with the director from the "Rush Hour" movies signed to direct). Gary Oldman ("Bram Stoker's Dracula", "The Contender", "JFK") again proves he is one of the best actors today who can work under heavy appliance makeup and convey the necessary emotions - his Mason Verger has only eyes, tongue, hand and a little upper body movement, but Oldman uses them magnificently, and finds the comic and ironic tone in Verger's voice. Giancarlo Giannini (Seven Beauties", "Swept Away...") plays the Italian inspector Pazzi quite well, understated and rather subtly. Ray Liotta ("Goodfellas", "Field Of Dreams") is appropriately smarmy as DOJ official and Verger henchman Paul Krendler, and his final scenes are riveting (and hysterical!). Francesca Neri is virtually absent as Pazzi's wife, though she lights up the screen when she is there. Frankie Faison reprises his role as Barney the nurse from "Silence Of The Lambs" - his work here survives in only 2 scenes, as his subplot was essentially eliminated - and he does fine as the polite, intelligent and gentle soul who understands Dr. Lecter perhaps better than anyone else.

Picture: Surprisingly framed at 1.85:1 (but replicated here in anamorphic 1.78:1), the transfer is at least on a par with most recent films from the major studios - perfectly colored and shaded, no blemishes or trickery to sharpen the picture, with excellent black level. I say surprising because the only film of Scott's which has not been framed at 2.35:1 was his first, and I simply wasn't expecting him to change horses midstream in his career. The cinematography is quite good, pushing the edges of the boundaries of modern film stock for the dark scenes (of which there are an ample number), yet never appearing grainy. Where the VHS tape has more headroom above the actors and a bit more picture below, the edges are severely truncated, so the compositions look less enticing, and the production design is shortchanged. Of course, in comparison the VHS is smeary and bland, so it is indeed good to know that studio film distribution on videocassette is fading fast. Sound: Outstanding DTS 5.1 (this is a Universal co-production, and even though MGM got the video rights Universal gets their DTS thrown in) and Dolby Digital 5.1 tracks are included. Dolby Digital 5.1 French-dubbed and Spanish-dubbed tracks too? Whew! COOL! Region One rejoices - no one 'indigenous' to North America has to settle for second-best! Dialogue, of course, is always natural and clear, anchored mostly to the screen. There are only a couple of set pieces to really give your system a workout - such as the fish market shoot-out - but the film contains active rear channels throughout with exemplary ambient and environmental effects, and both the DTS and the Dolby Digital do an excellent job of placing you precisely where you want to be. Hans Zimmer's score, which includes parts of the Goldberg Variations on Bach, Strauss' "The Blue Danube" and his own original compositions, is well-served on both DTS and Dolby Digital tracks.

"Hannibal" is a 2-disc DVD set in a single-sized case (ala "Gladiator" and "Cast Away") with a number of rewarding extras. First is a feature-length commentary by Ridley Scott, the only extra specific to the film on Disc One. At times Scott just describes the action on the screen a bit much (it might have been wiser to have done a track similar to "Gladiator", with several of the principals involved), but Scott never actually goes into 'play-by-play' mode, and generally it is quite good. Scott also has no trouble ascribing some nice touches to serendipity, showing he has no problem with being lucky, and crediting the contributions of others. His commentary has chapter stops, denoting the topics he explores - a very handy feature if you want to go back and hear specific information. He repeats himself a couple of times (as if he hadn't said the same thing fifteen minutes ago), and, as the commentary proceeds he leans away from the mic more often, prompting one to wonder just what it is he's reaching for. Disc One also contains a trailer for "Silence Of The Lambs" (which MGM has released on DVD simultaneously with "Hannibal"). Disc Two opens with a 77-minute "Breaking The Silence: The Making Of Hannibal" documentary which is quite thorough and much more than we've come to expect from these types of things for recent films, organized into chapters from "Development" to "Reaction" (On the packaging MGM calls this 5 featurettes, but I disagree - this is one documentary; maybe 5 featurettes sounds better from a marketing standpoint). Dino de Laurentis (who owns the Lecter franchise), his wife Martha, Anthony Hopkins, Ridley Scott and Julianne Moore are featured extensively - though almost all of the principals get to participate - in interviews done during and after filming, and offer good insight into the entirety of the piece (including Scott's observation that Jodie Foster chose not to return because a feature she wanted to direct had been green-lighted, and she was therefore unavailable when the production of "Hannibal" would require her). The documentary also effectively covers the special make-up effects and animatronics used in the show, and goes in depth into the music scoring of a film, showing Zimmer working with the orchestra during a recording session. All in all, very well done indeed. (There is a neat hidden feature buried here: select "Breaking The Silence..."; scroll down to "Music" - hit the left arrow on your remote and two arrows on the filmstrip will light up; hit Enter and enjoy a reel of 'flash frames' of Julianne Moore set to an original composition, "Clarice") 14 deleted scenes are offered in non-anamorphic widescreen, with and without Scott commentary - including an alternate ending (and, no, not the ending of the book) - totaling 35+ minutes, and looking as if they were taken from an Avid electronic editing workprint. They include scenes of subplots which were removed for time. They are certainly all of the same caliber of what appear in the film - it would be nice to see them cut back in one day, perhaps in a seamless branching version, as the time pressures on DVD are much different than those of a theatrical presentation. In the liner notes on the foldout insert of the case Scott talks about "Director's Cuts" and all, but it still would be nice to see alternate versions of how films might be (and once were during the editing process), given the quality of the deleted elements. Three multi-angle vignettes follow. The first is "Anatomy Of A Shoot Out", which shows four camera set-ups of the Fish Market shoot-out showing the takes necessary to accomplish that sequence - you can view them individually or all on the same screen at once. A second multi-angle piece concerns 'Ridleygrams', showing Scott's personal storyboards alone, with the scene as shown in the film, and with Scott's doing the video interview - and you can again select to see them all at once. The third is "Title Design", which concerns the title sequence directed by Nick Livesey. You can select between seeing the sequence in the film, the original teaser cut of the sequence the notebooks for it and the original footage of the pigeons while listening to the final theatrical sound mix, the teaser sound mix, commentary by Livesey or commentary by Scott. There is a theatrical teaser, theatrical trailer and 19 tv spots! There are also galleries of poster concepts and still photos, broken down into subject matter/location or available in one run-through. Decent cast and crew notes, and the press kit production notes are up next, and the DVD credits complete the special features. The DVD (and the documentary on it) was produced by Charles de Lauzirika; he also produced "Gladiator" for DVD, which should give you an idea how well thought out the supplements are.

haven't yet figured out whether I like this film - I knew upon first viewing I liked "Silence Of The Lambs" (when I discovered it was a comedy of manners), but the jury is still out on "Hannibal" - though leaning toward liking it. I appreciate its craftsmanship, and I've enjoyed the time I've spent watching it, but...Somehow the subversive joy underlying Demme's take on similar material is missing - Scott's sense of humor is much darker, much more droll, and he may have been more jaded about making yet another movie. Most people don't get Demme's meaning (he only obliquely refers to it himself in his commentary on Criterion's disc), while Scott is more open about the matter of these being essentially comedic films. It is interesting to note that Scott has never attempted a comedy in his career. It COULD be, however, that Scott has made a film which transcends the material, and simply needs a bit of time to digest - very few films (no matter what the press wants you to think) are 'instant classics', so time will be the arbiter of whether "Hannibal" achieves that status - as has been proven a couple of times already in Scott's career. The only suspense being generated for me now is whether Thomas Harris will continue writing Hannibal Lecter novels, and how Dino De Laurentis' folks will write their way out of the ending here in adapting any further books continuing Lecter's story; I suppose the "Red Dragon" 'prequel' will do well, but what's a deformed Lecter to do after this? This DVD is excellent in presenting and exploring the film - as thoughtful in it's approach as the 2-disc "Gladiator" was last November - and presenting "Hannibal" in a fine transfer. MGM has a winning DVD on its hands - they're spending their $8 million video launch money quite well, as this ought to be a huge rental and sale title. This is a DVD to REALLY sink your teeth into!