10 Surprisingly Good Scenes In Otherwise Terrible Movies

When it was first reported that Hannibal, Thomas Harris' sequel to The Silence of the Lambs, was being optioned, there were good and bad bits of information surrounding the project. It was to be helmed by a director familiar with the horror genre - Ridley Scott. Anthony Hopkins would even be reprising his Oscar-winning role.

But the book's reputation was less than stellar, culminating in the dogged FBI agent Clarice Starling and the cannibalistic psychiatrist running away together. It was as ridiculous as the laughable climactic scene of the film, which features Hannibal feeding cooked pieces of crooked agent Ray Liotta's brain to himself. At the very least, the film had the good sense not to end with the two riding off into the sunset.

There are, however, a handful of moments of true tension, particularly after the killer returns from Italy and makes contact with his agent of interest. Scott keeps the tension up while the two speak via cell phone, Hannibal around every corner, even brushing her hair as he passes her on the merry-go-round in a shopping mall. It's the closest the film comes to the chemistry Jodie Foster established with Hopkins in Lambs, and some of Scott's direction is even inventive, such as when he frames Hannibal against multiple mirrors.

Everything else is just flat-out absurd.