How disturbing this film is. Ten years after it's release, it can still keep the viewer on the edge of his/her seat. A serial killer (Ted Levine), nicknamed Buffalo Bill by the press because he likes to skin his humps , is kidnapping young women, removing portions of their skin and dumping their bodies. Promising F.B.I. trainee Clarice Starling (Jody Foster) is recruited to help find out why. In an attempt to gain insight into the murderer's motivations, Starling interviews incarcerated psychopathic psychiatrist Dr. Hannibal The Cannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins), himself convicted of a series of hideous crimes involving murder and cannibalism. The doctor agrees to help Starling, but the information he offers comes at a price. For each piece of insight he gives her, she must answer his probing questions about herself and her past. In order for Starling to see the inside of Buffalo Bill's mind, she must open her own to Lecter's hungry probing. This is not a mystery. Very early on in both the film and Thomas Harris's novel from which it is taken, we are made aware of the killer's identity and motivations. Neither is it a police procedural. The mechanics of detection are incidental to the story's true focus, as is the character of Buffalo Bill himself. The film's central focus is the relationship between Starling and Lecter, and it raises some basic questions about evil itself. By it's nature, the printed page is able to deal with things much more explicitly, unconstrained by time or the necessities of literal presentation. Therefore, what is dealt with in an explicit manner in the novel- Do you think I am evil, Agent Starling? -is made implicit and far more subtle in Ted Tally's excellent screenplay. It is conveyed indirectly and brilliantly through the interaction between Starling and Lecter. It is conveyed as much through their eyes as any words they speak. It is conveyed through a monster's finger, suddenly human and gentle for just a moment as it caresses the hand of a woman. Is Hannibal Lecter evil? Maybe. Is he a pure psychopath , as the doctor in charge of his case asserts? Almost certainly. Is he falling in love with the young woman whom he initially saw as nothing more than an opportunity to relieve his boredom by indulging in a little psychological torture? Well.... The acting in this film is uniformly excellent. Everything about it, from the writing on down to the haunting score, works together to draw the viewer in quickly. The climax, in which Starling blindly stalks the killer in his dark basement while he, in turn, stalks her with the advantage of night-vision goggles, is one of the scariest on film. Watch this one with the lights off! 