Jinto

If that ever happens, the first thing I'll do is shoot the idiot who suggested this ridiculous idea.

Born Free

Way off topic please forgive but I just have to confess to something.

On the FBI site search engine, I typed in Hannibal Lecter.

Like they hadn't seen that one before.

Bree

I completely agree with the "filter" idea you've got going; the Holmes stories without Watson (I can think of three off the top of my head - the Lion's Mane, the Blanched Soldier, and the Mazarin Stone) are, compared to say, the Speckled Band.

However, I don't think Harris intended to make Lecter a genius. He is merely well-rounded. Just because he's well-done-up in wines, music, metaphysics, and psychology doesn't make him a genius.

scigirl

Hey nermel, have you read the books? I must confess I'm very intrigued by the whole trilogy (I own SotL on video, Hannibal on DVD, and also own all three books including Red Dragon, and another one he wrote called Black Sunday.)

What strikes me about the character of Hannibal is his ability to perceive people. If he wasn't a sociopath, he would be wildly successful as one of those "psychics" who can pick someone out of an audience and tell a myriad of stuff about them. I always joked to my role-playing friends, "He rolled a 20 for perception" or whatever that was.

Of course he wasn't smart enough to not get caught. And - I had a bit of a problem with his ability to perform very difficult surgeries, seeing that he was a psychiatrist. I mean yeah he had to do a surgical rotation, but that hardly qualifies him to do that complex brain surgery at the end of Hannibal! But then again, it is just a movie.

Alli - what did the site say when you searched? I'm dying to know!

So, is anybody else hungry after reading this thread?

scigirl

sweep

true. In the films he seems to enjoy making his visitors feel like shit by telling them what cheap aftershave they're wearing. In silence of the lambs, Lechter tells clarice she's 'cheap white trash'

perhaps his unusual perception is made possible because he has unhealthy desires. unlike most normal who love shopping and pizzas and junk tv and hair and make up and tits, lechter likes human liver, french philosophy and mozart. Therein lie his perceptual inadequacies.

Born Free

LOL Scigirl I think it said "This is not a legitimate search" or words to that effect.

I couldn't help it.

Ensign Steve

BTW, I just started reading The Red Dragon for the first time. I've read the rest of the series and seen all three movies, but I never got around to reading The Red Dragon. I picked it up last weekend at a yard sale for $0.25.

I'm just getting to the part where Graham is going to go visit Dr. Lecter for the first time. Oooooh, I can't wait!

Jobar

Lecter's cannibalistic tendencies are explained in the book Hannibal, but not in the movie. In fact, the two are so different as to seem almost unrelated, particularly the ending (which I won't spoil for those who haven't read it.)

Let me suggest reading another book- an sf novel from the early seventies, IIRC, by a man named T.J. Bass- Half Past Human. A most fascinating work, it not only explores the topic of cannibalism, but of cannibalism in a world where humans are the only animal left. Plus, it's a rivetting tale, with unforgettable characters!

Ensign Steve

Yep yep. I liked the book way more than the movie, surprise, surprise.

nermal

I read all three, though considerably spaced apart. His perceptions of people are a consequence of his overall ability to percieve his environment on par with Holmes and Auguste Dupin (Poe). Lecter is in some sense a knock off of these characters, Dupin most of all, though he is, of course, a villian (or is he?).
He is described in the books as a kind of supergenius--brilliant if naive mathematician, physician, psychoanalyst, concert capable musician, gourmande, etc. etc. Better even than Buckaroo Bonzai. The book never made mention of his sexual prowess, but I'm sure Ron Jeremy would have some competition.
This is, I think, where Harris screwed up, and why I thouroughly disliked the final book. I'll give Harris credit though; he never wanted to write Hannibal.
In Hannibal, we saw way too much of Lecter. To make him someone we could warm up to, nearly every other character in the book was some kind of comic book evil villian. To make him seem brilliant, nearly every other character in the book was brain dead.
Harris is no super genius himself, so he could not create a legitimate super genius character--therefore Lecter had to seem brilliant by comparison. Harris put him in a world of idiots--Starling being one of a very few exceptions. It's like using perspective to make Tom Cruise look tall in the movies.
Poe was a super genius, if insane. But even he recognized his limitations, and only exposed us briefly to Dupin's brilliance.
Doyle knew he was no genius, so he planted himself in his stories as Watson so as to self depracatingly make Holmes look brilliant.
I think Harris should have taken a lesson from his mentors on this one. The last book failed completely, in my opinion--Though not financially (so maybe Harris is the genius after all?).

BTW the memory palace stuff was fantastic. I found the books referenced, and with practice, it is astounding how easy it is to remember minutiae.
Ed