Red Dragon | Review

Ratner takes on the fava beans and Chianti and resurrects the trilogy.

I detested Hannibal, no not the Anthony Hopkins (Bad Company) character as in Dr. “H” Lecter, but rather the second installment in the form of a macabre Ridley Scott vision that had more knots in plot than a fish net off the coast of Spain. While sticking to the polite table manner skills, the culinary fetish and the appreciation for the arts and literature, Scott take on Hopkins character was one that showed him evolve into a grotesque, visually loud psycho-path. Perhaps the Thomas Harris novel wanted a little less of the cocooning for the character but I’m not sure the protagonist was meant to become the caricatured creation that Scott made him out to be. The result of Hannibal was that the character (even with the mastered acting skills of a Hopkins) became bland in the imagination of the viewer- no chills up the spine-just a visual bloodbath and a new look for actor Ray Loitta.

At first viewing Brett Ratner’s Red Dragon might seem like a Xerox copy of sorts with Demme’s brilliant Silence of the Lambs-not only are the story elements similar and written by the same screenwriter in-Ted Tally, but so is the character illustration of the most frightening doctor to make it to the celluloid. Ratner brings back some of the familiar-location, faces, musically accompaniment, but where he succeeds is in keeping the Hannibal character fresh-and more importantly keeping the audience entertained and from the get-go he gets us right into with a slow symphonic number that gives us our fun-loving cannibal in his younger moments who makes a main course out of a terrible musician churning out the wrong notes. The pace picks up ever so slightly with the introduction of Edward Norton’s (Death to Smoochy) character an FBI agent whom seeks the professional advice of the doctor. The truth behind the doctor is uncovered, and let’s just say that the struggle didn’t end with a follow-up entrée dinner of cocktail wieners.

The agent Starling character was a much more dynamic screen character- her fight to become a police woman and a person struggling with her childhood, Norton’s character is rather bland-his only vulnerability is that his family isn’t guarded in a house on top of a hill encircled by a pool of sharks. Hopkins gives us plenty of the one-step-ahead of your own thoughts Hannibal but the true performance comes from the very convincing Ralph Fiennes (The End of the Affair)-whose character of the Tooth Fairy reminds us of the introverted Norman Bates in Psycho. Hopefully this is just one sign of the talent that we can expect from his Cronenberg film role in Spider. The rest of the big name cast, Keitel, Watson and the Seymour Hoffman a good job as secondary players.

While sticking to the predictable trajectory of the film, Ratner still delivers a couple of goose-bumps moments which is not bad for the guy whose main claim to fame is the movie Rush Hour, and now he embarks on Superman, don’t throw in the towel just yet. This is definitely not Mann’s stylish Manhunter or even in the same league as Silence of the Lambs, but Red Dragon is nonetheless an enjoyable flick that when compared to Hannibal will be valued as the film that might make it worthy enough to purchase the trilogy set on DVD.

Rating 3 stars