Vitals

William Petersen as Will Graham, tortured FBI criminal profiler

Across the United States, Fall 1986

Film: Manhunter
Release Date: August 15, 1986
Director: Michael Mann
Costume Designer: Colleen Atwood

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

While the Oscar-winning The Silence of the Lambs is a deservedly great movie that brought Thomas Harris’ fictional killer psychiatrist Hannibal Lecter to widespread public attention, the cannibalistic murderer had actually made his cinematic debut a half-decade earlier when Brian Cox portrayed the renamed Dr. Lecktor in Manhunter. Adapted by writer/director Michael Mann from Harris’ 1981 novel Red Dragon (with its title changed by producer Dino De Laurentiis), Manhunter was released 40 years ago this week on August 15, 1986.

Cox starred opposite William Petersen as FBI agent Will Graham, establishing the characters’ antagonistically layered screen dynamic that would be repeated in the 2002 remake Red Dragon and the NBC TV adaptation Hannibal. Continue reading →