Hannibal Rising

[Duck Sauce]

loved SOTL
loved Manhunter
liked Hannibal
watched Red Dragon

[MacGuffin]

Hungry for More Hannibal?

The insatiable Dr. Lecter is coming back for more--on screen and in bookstores.

Random House announced a fall 2005 publication date Thursday for author Thomas Harris' latest Lecter novel, Behind the Mask.

In a statement, Richard Cable, managing director of the Random House Division of the Random House Group, hinted that the tale was a prequel.

"Millions of readers in 25 languages have wondered how Dr. Lecter developed his particular appetite for evil," Cable said. "This novel will satisfy their curiosity."

The book's movie rights have already been snapped up by producer Dino DeLaurentiis, who served up Hannibal and Red Dragon.

It's believed Behind the Mask is the source material for a DeLaurentiis project that has been previously referred to as The Lecter Variations.

Like Behind the Mask, The Lecter Variations is billed as a prequel.

In May, Ain't It Cool News posted a fan account of a DeLaurentiis appearance in which the legendary impresario was said to have promised his new Lecter movie would depict the bad doctor as a budding teenaged cannibal.

The story of the young Hannibal Lecter would seem to preclude Anthony Hopkins, age 66, from reacquiring his taste for fava beans and flesh.

Hopkins won the Best Actor Oscar for licking his chops as Lecter in 1991's The Silence of the Lambs. He was back in man-eating form in 2001's Hannibal and 2002's Red Dragon.

All told, the four Hannibal Lecter films, including 1986's Manhunter, the first big-screen take on Harris' Red Dragon novel, have grossed nearly $400 million, according to BoxOfficeMojo.com.

Red Dragon, the first Lecter tale, was published in 1981, followed by The Silence of the Lambs in 1988 and Hannibal in 1999.

Hannibal took such a grisly turn that Jodie Foster, the big-screen's original Clarice Starling, dropped out of the sequel. Julianne Moore took over her FBI agent badge.

Red Dragon was sans Starling altogether, but not stars. Ralph Fiennes and Edward Norton costarred.

[Alethia]

behind the mask


huh.

[MacGuffin]

Webber Takes on Hannibal the Cannibal
New Thomas Harris-penned sequel focuses on why the infamous cannibal began to feed on his victims.

Producers Dino and Martha De Laurentiis, who have acquired the rights to Thomas Harris' upcoming Hannibal Lecter prequel, Behind the Mask, have set Girl with a Pearl Earring helmer Peter Webber to direct the film adaptation of the novel. The project, for which locations are being scouted in Lithuania, the Czech Republic and Paris, should begin production in May for a summer 2006 release.

Delacorte announced that the new Lecter novel will be out next fall. The story is an expansion of one passage in Hannibal. The passage explains that Lecter watched as his young sister was killed and then eaten by a group of hungry soldiers in war-torn Lithuania during World War II. The revenge story explains to audiences how Lecter became a cannibal and continues to build both an aversion and sympathy for the character, who kills and eats those audiences want to see killed.

Universal and MGM, which partnered on both Hannibal and Red Dragon, will get the first crack at the rights to the new project. Harris is said to be writing the screenplay as he continues to hammer out the novel. The producers and director are also now looking for young actors to portray a young Lecter at three pivotal points in his life.

[MacGuffin]

From the Associated Press: Hannibal Lecter Rises Again

A new "Hannibal Lecter" novel, originally scheduled to come out last year, will be published this December.

Thomas Harris' "Hannibal Rising," which tells of the early years of literature's most famous cannibal, is the fourth of the million-selling series that includes "The Silence of the Lambs," made into an Academy-Award winning film starring Anthony Hopkins.

The new book will have a first printing of at least 1.5 million copies.

"Now, in `Hannibal Rising,' readers will at last learn of Lecter's beginnings and will see the evolution of his evil," Irwyn Applebaum, president and publisher of the Bantam Dell Publishing Group, said Tuesday in a statement.

Harris' novel was originally titled "Behind the Mask" and was supposed to come out in the fall of 2005. Applebaum declined comment when asked by The Associated Press why the book took longer than expected, saying, "Sometimes, that's how the process works."

Harris was simultaneously writing the screenplay for a film version of "Hannibal Rising," due in early 2007.

[MacGuffin]

[pete]

hannibal in space, anytime now.

[nix]

I now hate this character. Even Silence has lost it's luster.

[SiliasRuby]

Saw just a trailer today and they are marketing it now as a hip horror film...I don't know weather or not that will change before we see the "Official" trailer

[MacGuffin]

German Teaser Trailer here.

[bonanzataz]

laughable, mang!

[Derek]

He had his own mask when he was a kid? For kicks?

[diggler]

ugh, they're turning lecter into Jason

[MacGuffin]

Is Your Name... Hannibal Lecter?

Amazon in the U.K. has posted the new international trailer for MGM and The Weinstein Company's Hannibal Rising, coming to theaters in North America on February 9. Starring Gaspard Ulliel, Gong Li, Rhys Ifans, Richard Brake and Kevin McKidd, the thriller was directed by Peter Webber and written by the book's author, Thomas Harris.

[MacGuffin]

Domestic Trailer