Reseñas de la crítica

One of the many things I have come to love about Mann over the years is the dopey, humorless intensity of his music tastes, which sound to me like a struggle towards intimacy. Needle-drops like Manhunter’s screamy, resolutely mid-tempo end-credits song “Heartbeat” are clenched rockist libido at the outer limits of its emotive range.

Michael Mann’s first true masterpiece, the film where he successfully balances a hugely emotional story with bold use of his trademark style.

It's Mann's most perfect film, a cold, gleaming diamond that combines the highest craftsmanship possible with a genuine beating heart. In an airtight two hours, Mann propels the film through the exacting investigation to reveal the humanity that resides in both good and evil.

Mann's focus is so esoteric that he slowly turns the garish thriller into a kind of poetry. Slow motion is frequently employed, though the director uses it less to call attention to any detail than for its musical cadence... Mann finds in [some] moments a bold form of character expression, prefiguring an entire career of revealing psychological depth in pulp terms.

Mann's sudden introduction of a blind woman named Reba (Joan Allen) late in the film complicates Dollarhyde's evil during the character's final waking moments, and the narrative decision works for the most part. The pair's sudden first date, including an evocative petting session with a tiger, is unforgettably immersive and symbolic of Dollarhyde's skewed version of the real world.

Where Hopkins was out to frighten viewers by dehumanizing Lecter, Cox and director Michael Mann sought to scare by making Lecktor all too human. Lecktor was not caged, standing like a fierce, alert animal in some private, subterranean zoo as he appeared in Lambs. Manhunter's Lecktor—a super-intellectual—often reclines on his bunk out of boredom. His cell and clothing are all white, the absence of color reflecting its inhabitant's sociopathy.

A turning point in the career of Michael Mann--the film in which ambiance takes on equal importance to the detailed observation of professional ritual--MANHUNTER marks the beginning of this curious director's ongoing fusion of Howard Hawks and Stan Brakhage.

Manhunter still remains the best film version of a novel featuring Hannibal Lecter. Brian Cox displays a subtler, more suggestively seductive technique in the role than the overtly melodramatic, "Count Dracula" thespian overtones associated with... Anthony Hopkins... Influenced by modern painters such as Kandinsky, Mann challenges viewers to see, rather than read. Manhunteris about visualising and experiencing the darkest domains of modern alienation affecting so many of its characters.