Does the film trample on the character of Clarice?
From an interview with Jodie Foster:
Ultimately, though, you passed on Hannibal. Is Silence tainted for you with the subsequent milking of the Lecter cash cow?http://www.gamesradar.com/the-total-film-interview-jodie-foster/
I really liked Red Dragon. I liked the original, too – Manhunter – even though it had that kind of Miami Vice feeling to it. You know, I don’t think you can ever take away what Silence was... The official reason I didn’t do Hannibal is I was doing another movie, Flora Plum [a long-cherished project that has yet to be shot]. So I get to say, in a nice, dignified way, that I wasn’t available when that movie was being shot. But Clarice meant so much to Jonathan and I, she really did, and I know it sounds kind of strange to say but there was no way that either of us could really trample on her.
Did you see Hannibal?
[Whispers] I saw Hannibal. I won’t comment.
...[Jodie Foster] said that she did not want to play the new part written for Clarice Starling because it had "negative attributes" and "betrayed" the original character.http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/592904.stm
I must say I can't see how the film Hannibal betrays Clarice. She is a very righteous character in the movie, to the detriment of her own career in the FBI. Not once does she give up in trying to stop Lecter, even at the ending (changed from the novel), when her life is in danger and Hannibal puts her to the test, to see if she will give up her values to save her own life. It seems like a natural progression of the Clarice we leave at the end of The Silence of the Lambs, a hardworking person who knows herself and what she stands for, someone who doesn't have to prove anything to anybody but herself, and who doesn't see any personal merit in playing the game of office politics to climb the ranks of the FBI, because her personality has been shaped by the death of her father, the slaughtering of the lambs, the need to prevent senseless death.
I haven't read the novel, but it seems logical to think its ending was one of the main things that bothered Foster, since Clarice runs off with Hannibal, which could be considered a betrayal of sorts. Wikipedia says Ridley Scott was in the third week before principal photography was due to finish on Gladiator when Dino De Laurentiis contacted him about Hannibal ("about a month before it was published in book form"). That means he got involved in the project in June 1999, approximately, around the same time Jonathan Demme bowed out. Foster announced she wouldn't be back in late December 1999. That leaves six months in which Ridley was on board and Foster hadn't yet turned down the offer. It was Ridley who had the ending changed for the film. Since everybody was eager to persuade Foster to reprise her role, and Ridley changed or was interested in changing the ending, how come she didn't return? It's not only logical, but clear from the BBC article, that she read one or more scripts. To those who've read the book: ending aside, was the Clarice of the novel so different from the Clarice of The Silence of the Lambs film that she was discouraged from returning?
Of course, I'm only going by her words. I just think it's likely she got to see a script with the new ending, or at least was told about the idea of changing it. Maybe she flat out didn't like the story, but I'm intrigued because she has never said that. It's always been about the "betrayal" of Clarice, which is a more specific thing to say. And if she left the project before they changed the ending, that's something she could have explained when asked about it in an interview, but she still talks about the project as if it trampled on the character. I understand sometimes diplomacy is the way to go, but I feel she has remained a bit too tight-lipped about her reservations with the script.
So, do you think the film betrays the character? Why do you think Foster turned down the role? share