Hannibal

Hannibal is a very disappointing sequel to "The Silence of the Lambs", not least because such prominent names as the screenwriter David Mamet and the director Ridley Scott are behind it. The film looks like a poor excuse for cashing in on a success, for in actual fact there is no story to tell. That is why the film's plot is also hard to recount.

Agent Clarice Starling and Hannibal Lecter meet again when one of Hannibal's victims, the multimillionaire Mason Verger, played by an unrecognisable Gary Oldman, wants Hannibal's head on a platter - figuratively speaking, that is. Clarice is assigned to the task. At the same time, Hannibal has begun to get a little bored in Italy, so he is not averse to taking up the challenge - if only to see Clarice again.

Anthony Hopkins overacts wildly as the cultivated cannibal. Nor does it improve matters that Julianne Moore has taken over Jodie Foster's role. Whereas Foster can be strong and vulnerable at one and the same time, one frankly finds it a little hard to believe in Moore as an FBI agent.

The attempt to create a truly memorable ending has produced a disastrous result. The ending is quite simply the most disgusting and nauseating I have seen in a very long time. The filmmakers have completely forgotten that one can actually get a long way with the art of suggestion. There are signs of that in the film's atmospheric beginning, but evidently everything has to be spelled out in the end.