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Many consider it the most iconic introduction in movie lore – while he stands completely still.

Clarice Starling, a rookie, navigates a corridor of cells arriving at Dr. Lecter's transparent prison. He is positioned, his face resembling a living skull exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile in his form-fitting blue prison jumpsuit. He doesn't move right up until he throws himself toward the window, making that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Numerous real-crime films have since shown that genuine criminals are usually uninteresting, far from Hopkins' powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized when he landed his Academy Award-winning part in the iconic film back in 1989: a star wasn't born, but a legend was forged. The character of Hannibal drew influence, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in his latest book, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, as well as his icily exacting drama teacher his mentor Fettes. The scenes also contained a parent-child dynamic in these moments; a sore point for Hopkins, who recounts how his portrayal of Lear was subconsciously influenced by deep-seated remorse regarding his daughter Abigail, the estranged daughter from his disastrous first marriage in 1966 with Petronella Barker, who resented his time away and his drinking habits.

The title originates from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins with his father at the seaside – the boy who perhaps believed he couldn't make it. He felt confused, shy and fragile youth raised in Port Talbot, the child of Richard Hopkins, the memorable figure here: a pastry chef and man's man, a straightforward talker who despised the religious hypocrites in their community and avoided displaying emotion, yet possessed a touch of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. His father who was angered by how they were forced humbly to their wealthy relations including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the politician Nye Bevan and helped enroll Anthony as a boy into a posh school: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he shouts during the car ride. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The humility worked, for a while. He was a poor student at his new school. But one day in a literature class he needed to deliver John Masefield's poem The West Wind – without prior preparation – and that voice came to life; he stunned the teacher and the other students. He reasonably claims that verse, by itself, launched him. This, and joining the dramatic society at the YMCA. Notably, he graduated with low prospects, entered the acting world, and shocking his family, was on stage with the great Olivier at the Old Vic within 10 years. He largely achieved it alone, though at that time there were grants to attend Rada – a way up for working-class actors. His dad remained in awe by his son's international fame: upon requesting his son to perform the Yorick monologue from Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then left the room and burst into tears.

As for the hot-tempered, stubborn individual, he left the National Theatre in a moment of anger – causing Olivier's regret and displeasure – but stumbled upon an excellent television part as a suspected war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which paved the way to parts like that in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, that he favored over theater. He stopped drinking during the mid-70s after being a heavy drinker, and managed to live through midlife to deliver outstanding roles, such as Lecter, the steward Stevens in the film The Remains of the Day with Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his second Oscar.

In the later sections of the memoir his personality becomes more opaque, more deliberate. Some of the anecdotage doesn't quite come off. He recalls being taken out to lunch alongside his cast mate in Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul Sorvino, who sought to advise him his acting as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the moment for Anthony to gain insight advice from the renowned performer of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Not really. Hopkins seems to go along with the director's criticism that Sorvino was acting by jealousy. Is that so?

He repeatedly performs the grounded, serious thespian who thinks you must to be on time, remember every crew member's name and get on with it. Quite so. Yet he also tells confronting an obnoxious director who'd made a young extra cry: “Say sorry to her! And learn some manners. If you ever repeat that in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like a person who quit alcohol but maybe not the belligerence that came with it. A Shakespearean like him is aware of Cornwall's speech regarding Kent in King Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he always tells the truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with a lengthy appendix composed simply