RensDad666’s review published on Letterboxd:
It’s becoming Michael Mann March for me, and I’m realizing what a Mann Stan I am in the process. Okay that was a fun sentence to write.
I’d grown up having seen Jonathan Demme’s Silence of the Lambs which is literature to me, and Ridley Scott’s Hannibal way too many times, but not Red Dragon, which lets me perfectly complement those two different but great films with Manhunter as a prequel.
You really can see the bones of so many future horror-crime procedurals take shape in Manhunter, and Mann’s early raw visual aesthetic and epic storytelling work wonders here. There are some genuine creeps, and heavy tension to be felt in terms of horror and I’m just a sucker for it.
Musically, Manhunter knocks it out of the park. Just in love with the score and soundtrack. All of the original music -big, sweeping analog synths and drum machines- done largely by The Reds really drives Manhunter and fits its tone superbly. And the handful of actual songs are utterly tasteful yet perfectly cringey for something that feels so damn wonderfully 80’s.
What a fkn film.
🔎🀄️🔴🐲🔫
