A glossy glance of American underbelly from Michael Mann, based on
Thomas Harris' Red Dragon. The iconic Hannibal Lecter makes his first
screen appearance here, embodied by the slimy Cox, as he assists
Petersen's highly empathic, out-of-retirement FBI man on the trail of
the "tooth fairy", the latest killer on the loose. Mann has
an incredible eye for detail, and his use of the close-up is pretty much
unparalleled in contemporary American cinema. We see every twitch in
Petersen's face as he digs deep to uncover the nasty path to his prey. A
penetrating and disturbing examination of the nature of evil.
