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In this multiple Oscar-winning thriller, Jodie Foster stars as Clarice Starling,
a top student at the FBI's training academy whose shrewd analyses of serial
killers lands her a special assignment: the FBI is investigating a vicious
murderer nicknamed Buffalo Bill, who kills young women and then removes
the skin from their bodies. Jack Crawford (Scott Glenn) wants Clarice to
interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins), a brilliant psychiatrist who
is also a violent psychopath, serving life behind bars for various acts of
murder and cannibalism. Crawford believes that Lecter may have insight into
this case and that Starling, as an attractive young woman, may be just the
bait to draw him out. Lecter does indeed know something of Buffalo Bill, but
his information comes with a price: in exchange for telling what he knows,
he wants to be housed in a more comfortable facility. More important, he
wants to speak with Clarice about her past. He skillfully digs into her psyche,
forcing her to reveal her innermost traumas and putting her in a position of
vulnerability when she can least afford to be weak. The film mingles the
horrors of criminal acts with the psychological horrors of Lecter's slow-
motion interrogation of Clarice and of her memories that emerge from it.