it's worth pointing out that the character hannibal lector is a pretty heavy handed choice in names - the read hannibal, but in many ways simply a rote representation of the historical character.

and, if you want to know what this man hannibal barca, whom the ancients revered as brilliant, was really like, then the film is probably not such a terrible representation. but, you need to start with an introduction to nietzsche, to get your head around the different morals that existed in the greek and roman worlds.

i'm not a christian, and i don't spend much time apologizing for it, but this man does not strike me as somebody worth celebrating. unlike alexander's conquests, there was no pax hannibalanus. nor was he struggling against some greater evil, like stalin and roosevelt were. 

hannibal barca was, in truth, one of the worst war criminals that the world has ever seen - and that's how he ought to be remembered. he's not even mithradatic, or napoleonic. he's in the category of the hitlers and the attilas - he's one of the butchers that lost.

i know that the ancients did not see it that way, but they were wrong.