Hannibal (film) realized that Zaillian was "exorcising the 600 pages of the book. He was distilling through discussion what he was gonna finally do ... Frankly I could have just made it." It was unclear if Jodie Foster (Clarice Starling) and Anthony Hopkins (Hannibal Lecter) would reprise their respective roles for which they won Academy Awards in "The Silence of the Lambs" (best actress/actor). It became apparent that the producers and the studio could do without one of the original "stars" and would go on to find a replacement. The withdrawal of both Foster and Hopkins could possibly have been terminal for
Clarice Starling being suspended, but she is now powerless to stop Verger's men. Lecter is captured by Verger, who plans to feed him to a pack of specially bred wild boars. Starling is aware that Lecter is being held by Verger, so she attempts to save him. Following Verger's death at the hands of his sister Margot, Starling uses the distraction to try to rescue Lecter. She is wounded in the ensuing gunfight with Verger's men, but Lecter rescues her and nurses her back to health. He then subjects her to a regimen of mind-altering drugs and classical conditioning in an attempt