Trivia: In the brain eating scene, the piece of brain Ray Liotta eats is actually a piece of cooked chicken.
Trivia: Not a mistake, but something I just noticed on about the 5th viewing. In the very creepy 'I've given very serious thought...to eating your wife' bit, during the ominous pause in the middle a fly crawls down the back/side of Anthony Hopkins' head, then flies around a bit. Can't be helped, and barely noticable, but it does wreck the mood a bit. (01:14:59)
Trivia: "The Silence of the Lambs" director Jonathan Demme was approached to direct and had expressed interest in directing a sequel for some time before the publication of the novel. However, he opted not to return, feeling the novel was too gory and excessive compared to "Silence..." and he didn't feel it would make a good film. Producer Dino de Laurentiis also suggested that Demme was also nervous to make a sequel, given the first film's reputation as potentially one of the greatest films ever made. "Silence of the Lambs" star Jodie Foster also refused to return, feeling the character of Clarice Starling was "betrayed" in the novel of "Hannibal."
Answer: As seen in the first film and in this one, Lecter demonstrates an almost supernatural ability for eluding the law and seemingly being in two places at once. This film was made in the year 2000, before airport security became extremely tight in late 2001. At that time (before 9/11), it was still possible to enter an airport's main concourse through the baggage claim or even from the tarmac without passing through rigorous security. As ingenious as Lecter was, he could have accessed the airport in a number of ways back then. Relieving another passenger of his boarding pass and identification would be no problem for Lecter, either (simply leave the passenger's body in an airport toilet and assume his identity). For the most part, it was Lecter's calm, self-confident charm that allowed him to slither through society always ten steps ahead of the law.
Charles Austin Miller