Manhunter ★★★★

ANTHONY Hopkins’ portrayal of Hannibal Lector in The Silence of the Lambs is one of the most chilling supporting performances ever in a horror film.

Some critics would have you believe that Brian Cox’s portrayal of the same character three years earlier in Michael Mann’s Manhunter is better.

They’re wrong and, to be honest, are probably just making the claim to be contrarian and stand out from the herd.

Cox’s portrayal is good, but it’s very different. Never at any stage did I feel the same sense that everyone who comes near him fears for their lives, as I did with Hopkins.

Make no mistake though; Mann’s film is very good and a better film version of the 1981 novel Red Dragon than the 2002 attempt.

Manhunter didn’t fare well at the box office or critically on its initial release but has since gained a cult following.

It’s a fascinating film with William Petersen as FBI profiler Will Graham reluctantly coming out of semi-retirement to help stop a serial killer dubbed the Tooth Fairy who is slaughtering entire families.

The killer has written a letter to the now imprisoned Lektor in which he shows interest in Graham. This forces Graham to reconnect with Lektor, the man who previously tried to murder him, in an attempt to gain his cooperation.

On the sidelines is a tabloid journalist, Freddy Lounds, whose newspaper the National Tattler becomes a means of communication between the two killers.

As with most Mann films with a modern, urban setting, the film’s look is very stylized with Graham’s quite life with his wife and child in Florida shown as an attractive pure white compared to the garish Atlanta where the murders and manhunt are taking place.

It’s also interesting as one of the first films to examine the impact of profiling work on an investigator and the nexus with the killer.

Petersen wasn’t the most obvious lead but does a very good job, apart from his narrative moments. The rest of the cast is terrific including Cox of course, Tom Noonan as the genuinely scary Tooth Fairy and Dennis Farina as Graham’s boss Jack Crawford.

Among the stand-out sequences are the manner of Freddie Lounds’ demise, the Tooth Fairy’s relationship with a blind woman from his workplace and the brilliantly staged climax.

Watched on Blu-ray