DF: Yes, they are becoming too ubiquitous and not particularly special anymore...

CL: The only tiny bit of inspiration that actually made it from the Criterion "Silence" disc to "Hannibal" is the menu design. I loved Criterion's atmospheric and creepy menus for "Silence" and I referred to them a few times in early menu design meetings with 1K Studios, who created the menus for "Hannibal," as well as all of the other Ridley Scott special editions I've worked on. There was some early talk about making the menus for "Hannibal" more operatic and crimson-looking, but I kept going back to the eerie ambiance that Criterion came up with for their "Silence" menus.

DF: Since Hannibal is a new film, do you alter your approach at all in documenting a film that, in a case such as this, might not even have been released when you started working on supplements? Would you say it is more of a challenge to create supplements for a film that doesn't yet "have a history," so to speak?

CL: In a way, "Hannibal" did sort of have a history, thanks to "Manhunter" and "Silence of the Lambs." You already know what people think of Dr. Lecter, and you know what the reaction was to the novel, so it's not too hard to figure out what people are going to respond to with the movie. For example, I think everyone had a pretty good idea that the dinner scene was certainly going to be the most talked-about scene in the film, so it seemed like a good idea to focus some supplements on it.

When I was shooting the footage of the L.A. premiere, I had a second Mini-DV camera on me, a little Sony palmcorder, and I handed it off to Lisa Ellzey, who's the President of Scott Free, and had her shoot the audience's reaction to some key scenes with the night vision on. Lisa got some great stuff, much of which is seen in the "Reaction" featurette. On the other hand, when I was working on "The Cell" with David, I think we were both a little bit in the dark as to how the film was going to turn out in regards to audience reaction and pop culture impact.

DF: And, oftentimes I've heard, you don't even get to see the final completed film before you have to start on the DVD.

CL: We had seen a rough version of the film on video, and we knew that it was certainly going to be a visually-dense film, but Tarsem was still mixing as we started work on the disc, so all we could really do is focus on the craft behind the film and hope for the best. I definitely wish there was more time to let films settle a bit before work begins on these super deluxe special editions. If you're going to put that much time, money and work into such an elaborate DVD, it'd be nice to know how the film resonated, or didn't, among moviegoers.