Monday, February 13, 2006

Young Hannibal: Behind the Mask


From Moviesonline, "images for the upcoming prequel to the Hannibal Lecter movies, at the moment titled "Young Hannibal: Behind the Mask" have been uploaded by our colleagues from UHM.

Gaspard Ulliel will portray one of the the young Hannibal Lecters and Gong Li will play Lady Murasaki, the Japanese woman who teaches cultural sophistication to the young Hannibal. Peter Webber will direct the fifth installment of the Lecter franchise scripted by The Silence of the Lambs author Thomas Harris.

The movie will be set in 1940s in Europe and centers on Lecter's childhood in Lithuania through a period in Paris to his arrival in the US. The story will be about "the creation of a monster" and involve complicated casting. The movie requires actors for playing a 5-, a 14-and a 20-year-old Hannibal Lecter. Producer Dino De Laurentiis believes, that an English accent will better to convey the personality of the Lithuanian-born Lecter, than an American would. We also will get to see Mischa Lecter (Hannibal's sister).

After the young Hannibal escapes from an orphanage and runs away to Paris, he takes refuge at the home of his uncle. His wife, Lady Murasaki, becomes the sociopath's teacher. This prequel will also show how Lecter grew fond of the taste of human flesh."

10 comments:

JPX said...

File under, "movies I have no interest in"

Octopunk said...

Who do you root for in this movie?

Octopunk said...

Prequel mania annoys me for two reasons I can think of at this moment: It reminds me of every comic book that boasted the origin story of the character, when most origin stories were pretty similar to each other and not that great.

The second reason is that it implies a need to "find out why so-and-so is like that." Lisa Schwarzbaum pissed me off that time for dissing Pirates of the Carribean on the grounds that we never find out why Johnny Depp behaves the way he does, as if that were some requirement of cinematic fiction. Now that non-requirement is becoming institutionalized.

I'm tired of prequels. I can't think of a single one I'd want made.

Anonymous said...

This movie is obvious garbage.

Lisa Schwarzbaum basically fails to grasp why there are movies at all. She's one of those "Why put the trailer on the DVD? I've already agreed to see the movie!"/"At this point we all know what digital effects look like; what's the point even using them?" people.

She's also one of those "I don't really get sci-fi" reviewers who nevertheless has no compunctions about reviewing sci-fi movies. (I'm not inventing these quotes, by the way.)

Anonymous said...

I'd like to see a sequel to Fight Club: "Li'l Fight Club." Basically, they forgot they already did this as teenagers.

Anonymous said...

"prequel"

Octopunk said...

"Jimmy Smits"

Octopunk said...

The more I look at this title, the more I dislike the "behind the mask" business. That's because Lecter didn't wear a mask by choice. They might as well say "behind the handcuffs" or "when he's not being rolled around on a hand truck."

Anonymous said...

The whole thing is ridiculous. I read "Hannibal" and thought it was a very strange book in that Thomas Harris completely misunderstands his own material. Our "fascination" with Hannibal Lecter extends solely to his role in two very carefully constructed mysteries. Like Octo said, I don't particularly care where he came from, because he's really a big plot device coupled with an unusually brilliant performance from a "slumming" British actor encouraged to ham it up a bit. Both Harris and Demme understood how to interlock the character into the thematic web of the story. By himself, it's like listening to just the drums of a song.

JPX said...

"I don't particularly care where he came from," Agreed! I think this is one of the biggest complaints about the Star Wars prequels; was it really necessary for us to wade through 7.5 hours of films to see how Darth became Darth? Don't get me wrong, ROTS rocked!

Salem's Lot 1979 and Salem's Lot 2024

Happy Halloween everybody! Julie's working late and the boy doesn't have school tomorrow so he's heading to one of those crazy f...