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It stands as the greatest introduction in film history – and he remains completely still.

Clarice Starling, a rookie, navigates a row of prison cells finally encountering the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. There he stands, his face resembling an animated death's head filled with sinister intent, unnervingly still in his form-fitting prisoner's blue outfit. He remains motionless before suddenly he throws himself toward the window, emitting that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. A multitude of documentaries on serial killers have since revealed that actual serial killers are usually uninteresting, far from the actor's powerful on-screen charisma.

He wasn't exactly an unknown at the time he got his Academy Award-winning part in the 1991 thriller back in 1989: it wasn't his debut, instead, a superstar was cemented. The character of Hannibal was based, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in this new autobiography, on the classic Dracula, on the Soviet leader based on his daughter's accounts, and also from his rigorously precise acting coach his mentor Fettes. Additionally, there existed a parent-child dynamic within the narrative; a painful subject for the actor, who also describes how his Lear was subconsciously influenced by an agonised guilt regarding his daughter Abigail, the estranged daughter from his disastrous first marriage in 1966 with Petronella Barker, who was angered by his absences and drinking.

The memoir's title is derived from a vintage war-era photograph of Anthony as a small child with his father at the seaside – the child who might have felt he couldn't make it. He appeared lost, isolated and sensitive child raised in Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in the narrative: a pastry chef and a traditional male, a plain speaker who loathed the sanctimonious churchgoers in their community and didn't believe in showing his emotions, yet possessed a touch of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. It was Hopkins Sr who was angered by the way they had to go cap-in-hand to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the famous Bevan and helped enroll young Anthony into an elite school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he shouts in the car on the way there. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Total garbage, that's all it is!”

The humility worked, for a while. Anthony struggled academically at the prestigious school. However, one day in an English lesson he had to recite the verse by John Masefield titled The West Wind – sight unseen – and his talent emerged; he stunned the teacher and the other boys. He says quite plausibly that poems, alone, propelled him forward. This, along with enrolling in the YMCA drama club. Remarkably, he left school a no-hoper, entered the acting world, and shocking his family, was on stage alongside Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic in just ten years. He largely achieved it alone, even though back then scholarships existed to go to Rada – an opportunity for working-class actors. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: when he asked Anthony to recite the Yorick speech from Hamlet, his father paid close attention and then retreated to another room and began crying.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he departed the theatrical troupe out of frustration – to Olivier's profound dismay and criticism – but fortunately found an excellent television part playing an alleged war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which eventually resulted to parts like that in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a successful acting career in cinema, that he favored compared to stage acting. And he quit booze in 1975 once a notorious drinker, and thus made it into his later years to deliver outstanding roles, including Lecter, the steward Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson featuring Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in The Father – his second Academy Award.

In the later sections of his autobiography his character seems more elusive, more studied. Some of the anecdotage doesn't quite come off. He recalls going out for lunch alongside his cast mate in Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Paul Sorvino, who intended to inform him his acting as Nixon was falling short. Was this the chance for Anthony to gain insight a lesson from the famous actor of the Goodfellas fame? Not really. Anthony appears to agree with the director's criticism of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Is that so?

He often portrays the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who believes it's your duty to arrive punctually, learn everyone's name on set and proceed with the work. Absolutely. However, he also describes standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who'd made a young extra cry: “Say sorry to her! And develop some respect. You ever do that again around me, I'll rearrange your face! Anthony comes across as an individual who stopped drinking but possibly not the combativeness that accompanied it. A Shakespearean like him must know the lines about Kent from Cornwall in King Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A straightforward and sincere nature – he is compelled to be honest!”

Hopkins concludes his book with an extensive addendum composed simply