I remember seeing the dark horror thriller The Silence of the Lambs decades ago and walking out of the theater in a daze. It was thrilling, it was terrifying, and it was thought-provoking. It also made a clean sweep of the big Academy Awards categories —Best Picture, Best Director (Jonathan Demme), Best Actor (Anthony Hopkins), Best Actress (Jodie Foster), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Ted Tally).
Only two other films in history have achieved that feat: 1975’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and 1934’s It Happened One Night.
But now one of the lead actors in the film, Ted Levine, who played the demented killer Buffalo Bill, is blasting the role that made him famous because it might not fit in with today’s hyper-sensitive social sensibilities and because it supposedly is mean to the trans community.
Oh, please:
"There are certain aspects of the movie that don’t hold up too well," Levine told The Hollywood Reporter.
The portrayal of the character Buffalo Bill, also known as Jame Gumb, has been criticized over the years by the transgender community as harmful.
Buffalo Bill was a serial killer that murdered women in order to harvest their skin to wear.
Despite the character’s sexual orientation not being outwardly stated, he was seen as trans and gender-nonconforming in the film. [Says you. I just thought he was freakin’ psychotic, and assumed his problems went way deeper than just his sexual identity.]
Our sister site Twitchy wasn’t impressed:
Bad News: The Silence of the Lambs Has Been Canceledhttps://t.co/ctZCQSbT0t pic.twitter.com/OIO6ag8DiK
— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) February 16, 2026
When I saw the movie, my thought wasn’t, oh my gosh, he was transgender, how horrible — it was that both he and Hannibal Lecter were incredibly chilling characters, and that there are truly some sick people out there. In fact, there are questions about whether the Buffalo Bill character was what the Left now terms as “trans” today at all.
First of all, it was filmed 35 years ago; second of all, the filmmakers didn’t even have that on their radar:
Despite that [his newfound criticisms], Levine said about his performance as Buffalo Bill: "I didn’t play him as being gay or trans. I think he was just a f------up heterosexual man. That’s what I was doing."
[…]
Demme’s producing partner, Edward Saxon, said to the outlet: "We were really loyal to the book. As we made the film, there was just no question in our minds that Buffalo Bill was a completely aberrant personality — that he wasn’t gay or trans."
Oh. But we’re supposed to get all worked up about it now?
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Meanwhile, the book and the movie explicitly state that Billy is not transgender and was rejected by multiple medical professionals for sex change surgery because he did not meet the diagnostic criteria for gender dysphoria. Jodie Foster’s character, FBI agent Clarice Starling, said, “Billy is not a real transsexual, but he thinks he is.”
Hannibal Lecter adds that Billy’s psychosis came from “a pathological hatred of himself” — not from gender identity. But those facts don’t matter to Levine:
It’s unfortunate that the film vilified that [transgenderism], and it’s f------- wrong. And you can quote me on that.
The Silence of the Lambs released 35 years ago today.
— John Watches Horror (@Y2John84) February 14, 2026
14 February 1991 🍷 pic.twitter.com/4aEkBrwxTe
The twisted murderer Hannibal Lecter was not transgender or gender confused, by the way. He was a white guy. I am a white guy. Should I be deeply offended? Will Variety and The Hollywood Reporter write about my story? I don’t think so.
It’s always problematic to hold up works of art, be they books, movies, or paintings, to the mores of a completely different (and certifiably insane) era. Levine’s 35-year-old awakening doesn’t really hold water and smacks of someone trying to get back in the headlines and earn some woke Hollywood cred.
Editor’s Note: Progressive policies have hurt America immeasurably.
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