Essay On Buffalo Bill In Silence Of The Lambs
“Five foot ten, strongly built, about a hundred and eighty pounds; hair blonde, eyes pale blue. He'd be about thirty-five now. He said he lived in Philadelphia, but he may have lied” Hannibal Lecter ("The Silence of the Lambs Quotes"). In the 1991 movie, Silence of the Lambs, the audience is introduced to an interesting character who is called Buffalo Bill. During the movie the audience learns that Buffalo Bill is a serial killer who goes after plus sized women to skin them. Who is this Buffalo Bill? If he is based off of a real person? If so, what is the true or false information shown in the movie? Throughout this paper, I am going to find out what was the truth behind the mystery in Buffalo Bill by talking about documentary and articles that I have found.
I want to study the real vs none real experiences directors put in their movies, when basing a character off a real person. If a writer is going to base a real person in his or her movie, I believe they should put more background into that character. My example for this whole paper is Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs. This movie came out February 12, 1991, I was not even bored yet. When I watched this movie for the first time I did not realize Buffalo Bill’s character was based off of Ed Gein. Now watching this movie again years …show more content…
later, I find out that Buffalo Bill’s character is based off a serial killer. My question is, why did not writers put more background information in Bill’s character? What is real in Silence of the Lambs based off of Buffalo Bill’s character? To understand who Buffalo Bill’s character, I need to find information about Ed Gein. Using the internet will help me collect information about who Ed truly was. Then, I will find documentaries of Ed and compare his real life to the movie. I believe documentaries are going to be the most efficient way to gain information about this topic. Once I gather all my information, I will sit down to compare different authors and documentaries to see what was real or not real in the movie Silence of the Lambs. The reason why I believe I will get more information out of documentaries is because over time, people have done clips of Ed’s life. Finding articles might be harder to find. By gathering enough information, I should be able to bring the real story of Ed Gein and compare him to the character Buffalo Bill.
Method
The purpose of this study was to find out what is true or false about the character Buffalo Bill. Did the writers follow Ed’s life and show it in the movie perfectly or did the writers make scenes up to make the film continue on? To help me fully understand the awkwardness of Buffalo Bill in the movie, I have to do the research. Another reason is because I believe if a writer is going to write about a serial killer they need to bring that up in the character’s background. As this movie gets older, the younger generation does not know about Ed Gein. This is why I believe writers and producers need to create a better background story. I believe by me looking into this, this can help other older movies and future movies. If writers wrote up and showed a better background for their characters, the newer generations would not have to ask on Google if so and so’s character was based off a real person.
Analysis
Who is this Buffalo Bill character? In the movie, Silence of the Lambs, Ted Levine is the actor of the character Buffalo Bill. According to Silence of the Lambs: The True Story, which was created in 2002, Ted did a great job listening to his director. The director told Ted “to act like no one knows him”. Which meant that the director did not want people to figure out that the writer created Ted’s character off of a serial killer. While creating the film, Ted and the director decided to through in the dance and song in front of the mirror which did not happen in real life. But in that scene we also see Ted’s character wearing a wig, which symbolizes the skinning that Ed did in real life. Another true statement Silence of the Lambs: The True Story, said happened in real life was that Ed put women in a pit to get their bodies ready for skinning. Multiple women could be down in the pit at a time. The movie wanted to reflect the pit, which is why Buffalo Bill told “it” his victims to rub lotion on. Who is this mad man the writes base Ted’s character off of?
Buffalo Bill’s character came from a serial killer named Ed Gein. Ed was born August 2, 1906 in Plainfield Wisconsin. He grew up with an older brother, a father, and his mother. In the year of the 1940s Ed’s father had passed away then four years later his brother passed away in a bush fire. Rumors have been made about Ed killing his own brother but the family or police looked into it (Nurstanti, M. 2013, October 10). Ed was close with his mother. She passed away a year after Ed’s brother passed. At that moment, Ed had lost his one and only best friend and became lost. During this time, Ed became very lonely and started reading anatomy books and crime magazines (Nurstanti, M. 2013, October 10). Ed enjoyed people around children and helping his neighbors. Once Ed felt comfortable with the children he spent time with he would show them his collection of body parts but the children’s parents did not believe them (Nurstanti, M. 2013, October 10). But on November 16, 1957, Ed’s world was about to change.
“His twisted world becomes America’s obsession” (Ed Gein The Real Leatherface Serial Killer Documentary 2015). Bernice Worden was missing and her son wondered if Ed had something to do with his mother being missing. As the police went out to Ed’s farm and did not find him. The police went into Ed’s shed and found Worden’s headless body hanging upside down and gutted like a deer (Ed Gein The Real Leatherface Serial Killer Documentary 2015). Ed was then taken into custody and was questioned. Once Ed got food that he has asked for, he told the police everything. After his statement, the police got a warrant and searched Ed’s house.
When the police arrived to Ed’s house, they were in shock of what they had found. The saw a messy house, “junk was all over the place” (Ed Gein The Real Leatherface Serial Killer Documentary, 2015). With all the junk, the police found four noses, whole human bones and fragments, nine masks of human skin, bowls made from human skulls, ten female heads with tops sawed off, human skin covering furniture, a women’s head in a paper bag, Worden’s head in a sack, and nine vulvas in a shoe box (Ed Gein The Real Leatherface Serial Killer Documentary, 2015). After finding all these body parts, police went back to Ed asking more questions. Ed told them he only killed two women and unbarred the rest of the bodies. He also told the police about his friend Gus and how they looked through newspapers to see if there were women obituaries. If there was, Ed and Gus went to the cemetery the night of a burial service to unbury a woman. They took the helpless dead body to Ed’s house where he skinned his victim.
Thanks to Ed’s unhuman actions, he has given horror movies some fanciful screen characters that he has inspired (Kermode, M.
2001). I can compare him to Buffalo Bill’s character. In the Silence of the Lambs, the audience first learns about him through Hannibal Lecter. We learn that Buffalo Bill got his name because he skins his plus size victims. Later when we first meet Bill, we see he is injured and needs help getting a couch into his van. According to Silence of the Labs: The True Story made in 2002, they stated that Ed caught his last victim by faking an injury. As the audience goes into Bill’s home we can see it is a complete mess, just like Ed’s
home.
In the home of Buffalo Bill, we get a glimpse of a body suit that looks like skin. Ed created a body suit so he could wear it. During the movie, we see Bill dressing up as a girl and singing a song and dancing. No one knows if Ed danced around in his human suite but there is a good chance he did. We know for sure Ed did put on the suite and walk around acting like a woman. The song and dance that Bill did in the movie was for the movie just to grab the audience’s attention showing there could be a chance he is gay.
Discussion
All the articles I read did not state if Ed was gay or not. Authors believed that Ed wore the human suite because he wanted to feel like a woman. Maybe Ed did this because he missed his mother that he loved. Before Ed went to jail, he had his mother’s room boarded up Silence of the Labs: The True Story. When police went through the room they found that everything was preserved. It was a room collecting dust but his mother’s personal belongings were in there.
I believe by now knowing this information about Ed Gein we can get a feel for him in the movie. By finding out this information about Ed and Buffalo Bill, knowing what was true and what was not true in the movie, I can watch the movie again and have a different point of view. I believe this can help people understand what can really happen in the world.
Conclusion
I want to study the real vs none real experiences directors put in their movies, when basing a character off a real person. If a writer is going to base a real person in his or her movie, I believe they should put more background into that character. My example for this whole paper is Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs. This movie came out February 12, 1991, I was not even bored yet. When I watched this movie for the first time I did not realize Buffalo Bill’s character was based off of Ed Gein. Now watching this movie again years …show more content…
later, I find out that Buffalo Bill’s character is based off a serial killer. My question is, why did not writers put more background information in Bill’s character? What is real in Silence of the Lambs based off of Buffalo Bill’s character? To understand who Buffalo Bill’s character, I need to find information about Ed Gein. Using the internet will help me collect information about who Ed truly was. Then, I will find documentaries of Ed and compare his real life to the movie. I believe documentaries are going to be the most efficient way to gain information about this topic. Once I gather all my information, I will sit down to compare different authors and documentaries to see what was real or not real in the movie Silence of the Lambs. The reason why I believe I will get more information out of documentaries is because over time, people have done clips of Ed’s life. Finding articles might be harder to find. By gathering enough information, I should be able to bring the real story of Ed Gein and compare him to the character Buffalo Bill.
Method
The purpose of this study was to find out what is true or false about the character Buffalo Bill. Did the writers follow Ed’s life and show it in the movie perfectly or did the writers make scenes up to make the film continue on? To help me fully understand the awkwardness of Buffalo Bill in the movie, I have to do the research. Another reason is because I believe if a writer is going to write about a serial killer they need to bring that up in the character’s background. As this movie gets older, the younger generation does not know about Ed Gein. This is why I believe writers and producers need to create a better background story. I believe by me looking into this, this can help other older movies and future movies. If writers wrote up and showed a better background for their characters, the newer generations would not have to ask on Google if so and so’s character was based off a real person.
Analysis
Who is this Buffalo Bill character? In the movie, Silence of the Lambs, Ted Levine is the actor of the character Buffalo Bill. According to Silence of the Lambs: The True Story, which was created in 2002, Ted did a great job listening to his director. The director told Ted “to act like no one knows him”. Which meant that the director did not want people to figure out that the writer created Ted’s character off of a serial killer. While creating the film, Ted and the director decided to through in the dance and song in front of the mirror which did not happen in real life. But in that scene we also see Ted’s character wearing a wig, which symbolizes the skinning that Ed did in real life. Another true statement Silence of the Lambs: The True Story, said happened in real life was that Ed put women in a pit to get their bodies ready for skinning. Multiple women could be down in the pit at a time. The movie wanted to reflect the pit, which is why Buffalo Bill told “it” his victims to rub lotion on. Who is this mad man the writes base Ted’s character off of?
Buffalo Bill’s character came from a serial killer named Ed Gein. Ed was born August 2, 1906 in Plainfield Wisconsin. He grew up with an older brother, a father, and his mother. In the year of the 1940s Ed’s father had passed away then four years later his brother passed away in a bush fire. Rumors have been made about Ed killing his own brother but the family or police looked into it (Nurstanti, M. 2013, October 10). Ed was close with his mother. She passed away a year after Ed’s brother passed. At that moment, Ed had lost his one and only best friend and became lost. During this time, Ed became very lonely and started reading anatomy books and crime magazines (Nurstanti, M. 2013, October 10). Ed enjoyed people around children and helping his neighbors. Once Ed felt comfortable with the children he spent time with he would show them his collection of body parts but the children’s parents did not believe them (Nurstanti, M. 2013, October 10). But on November 16, 1957, Ed’s world was about to change.
“His twisted world becomes America’s obsession” (Ed Gein The Real Leatherface Serial Killer Documentary 2015). Bernice Worden was missing and her son wondered if Ed had something to do with his mother being missing. As the police went out to Ed’s farm and did not find him. The police went into Ed’s shed and found Worden’s headless body hanging upside down and gutted like a deer (Ed Gein The Real Leatherface Serial Killer Documentary 2015). Ed was then taken into custody and was questioned. Once Ed got food that he has asked for, he told the police everything. After his statement, the police got a warrant and searched Ed’s house.
When the police arrived to Ed’s house, they were in shock of what they had found. The saw a messy house, “junk was all over the place” (Ed Gein The Real Leatherface Serial Killer Documentary, 2015). With all the junk, the police found four noses, whole human bones and fragments, nine masks of human skin, bowls made from human skulls, ten female heads with tops sawed off, human skin covering furniture, a women’s head in a paper bag, Worden’s head in a sack, and nine vulvas in a shoe box (Ed Gein The Real Leatherface Serial Killer Documentary, 2015). After finding all these body parts, police went back to Ed asking more questions. Ed told them he only killed two women and unbarred the rest of the bodies. He also told the police about his friend Gus and how they looked through newspapers to see if there were women obituaries. If there was, Ed and Gus went to the cemetery the night of a burial service to unbury a woman. They took the helpless dead body to Ed’s house where he skinned his victim.
Thanks to Ed’s unhuman actions, he has given horror movies some fanciful screen characters that he has inspired (Kermode, M.
2001). I can compare him to Buffalo Bill’s character. In the Silence of the Lambs, the audience first learns about him through Hannibal Lecter. We learn that Buffalo Bill got his name because he skins his plus size victims. Later when we first meet Bill, we see he is injured and needs help getting a couch into his van. According to Silence of the Labs: The True Story made in 2002, they stated that Ed caught his last victim by faking an injury. As the audience goes into Bill’s home we can see it is a complete mess, just like Ed’s
home.
In the home of Buffalo Bill, we get a glimpse of a body suit that looks like skin. Ed created a body suit so he could wear it. During the movie, we see Bill dressing up as a girl and singing a song and dancing. No one knows if Ed danced around in his human suite but there is a good chance he did. We know for sure Ed did put on the suite and walk around acting like a woman. The song and dance that Bill did in the movie was for the movie just to grab the audience’s attention showing there could be a chance he is gay.
Discussion
All the articles I read did not state if Ed was gay or not. Authors believed that Ed wore the human suite because he wanted to feel like a woman. Maybe Ed did this because he missed his mother that he loved. Before Ed went to jail, he had his mother’s room boarded up Silence of the Labs: The True Story. When police went through the room they found that everything was preserved. It was a room collecting dust but his mother’s personal belongings were in there.
I believe by now knowing this information about Ed Gein we can get a feel for him in the movie. By finding out this information about Ed and Buffalo Bill, knowing what was true and what was not true in the movie, I can watch the movie again and have a different point of view. I believe this can help people understand what can really happen in the world.
Conclusion