Great Scene: “The Silence of the Lambs”

Flashbacks. Overused? Perhaps. But not when they provide a key revelation. Here is the second flashback in the movie The Silence of the Lambs (1991).

The first one showed young Clarice happily meeting her father, a town marshal, after work. This flashback reveals that her father died when Clarice was a young girl, but also demonstrates how Clarice’s issues about her father’s death lie close to the surface of her consciousness. It drives home a key point: She has never recovered from the loss of her father. His death dictated her choice of vocations (he was in law enforcement, she followed in his footsteps). His death has haunted her as she has subconsciously equated his ‘slaughter’ with the slaughter of the lambs in Montana she witnessed (with horror) as a child. His death made her a victim and fuels her identification with Buffalo Bill’s kidnap victim Catherine Martin. All of that melds together in this evocative flashback scene written by screenwriter Ted Tally.

EXT. SIDEWALK OF THE FUNERAL HOME - POTTER, WEST VA. - DAY

SOUND of organ music, as Clarice, carrying her fingerprint
kit, mounts some steps to the sidewalk. She stops, seeing -

COUNTRY PEOPLE

in their somber best, filing into the mortuary for a service.
The music - "Shall We Gather At The River?" - is issuing
from the open double doors. Several of the mourners glance
over at her curiously.

ANGLE ON CLARICE

staring back at the mourners, hearing the music, as a sense
memory is triggered in her...

IN FLASHBACK - LOW ANGLE, MOVING

as we approach, down the aisle of a country chapel, an open
wooden coffin. Sad country faces turn, looking at us from
the flanking pews. The b.g. organ hymn is "Shall We
Gather...?"

THE SAD, 10 YEAR-OLD CLARICE

in her best dress, is reluctantly approaching the casket.
Her hands are held by the plump hands of unseen matrons.

CHILD'S POV

on the looming coffin... closer and closer... until finally
she can see, lying inside it... her dead father, arms folded,
his marshal's badge still pinned to his lapel.

CRAWFORD (V.O.)
Starling...?

NEW ANGLE (PRESENT DAY)

as the grownup Clarice turns towards the impatient Crawford.
Like her, he carries a large case.

CRAWFORD
We're around back.

CUT TO:

The scene is in this video, beginning at the 4:10 mark:

[Originally posted 9/26/08]