I have often thought that for whatever value the later Hannibal Lecter films have, they all in comparison to fact that he works better in small doses. Hopkins is only on screen little more than 20 minutes in the movies 2 hour plus run time but because his Lecter is in such small doses he has all his power. The later versions put him front and center in the movie and in Hannibal out in the real world - and that's always struck me as something that has affected Hopkins's performance in each film. When he was in a cage, he was terrifying. In the real wrold, he's just another serial killer and we've had two many of those - it's definitely true for Hannibal and its also true for Red Dragon, which has the added problem of a much older Hopkins having to play a younger Lecter. (It's also why I think Michael Mann's Manhunter works better than the sequels, certainly Hannibal.)

I should add Demme was one of the greatest film makers of our time. In comedy he never truly stepped wrong and I recently wrote a piece as to why I thought his reimagining of The Manchurian Candidate is in many ways a minor masterpiece. Few directors have been more talented, versatile and underappreciated. Like Norman Jewison, he was a director whose ffilms were more famous then he was.