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It stands as the most iconic appearance in movie lore – and he remains utterly motionless.

A young FBI agent, new to the job, must walk the line of detention units arriving at the notorious doctor's reinforced glass enclosure. He is positioned, with features like a living skull radiating satanic malice, unnervingly still in his form-fitting blue prison jumpsuit. He stands frozen right up until he lunges against the glass, producing that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Numerous true-crime documentaries have since revealed that actual serial killers are usually uninteresting, lacking anything like Hopkins' commanding screen presence.

Hopkins was hardly unrecognized upon receiving that Oscar-winning role in The Silence of the Lambs in 1989: it wasn't his debut, instead, a superstar was cemented. The character of Hannibal drew influence, Hopkins notes with amusement in this new autobiography, on the classic Dracula, on Stalin as recalled by his daughter, and also from his strictly demanding acting coach Christopher Fettes. The scenes also contained a father-daughter dimension to these scenes; a sore point for the actor, who recounts how his King Lear was subconsciously influenced by painful regret concerning Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his disastrous first marriage back in 1966 with Petronella Barker, who disliked him being away and his drinking habits.

The book's name comes from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins playing on the sand with his father – the boy who perhaps believed he wouldn't succeed. He appeared lost, isolated and sensitive child from Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character in this story: a bread-maker and man's man, a straightforward talker who detested the religious hypocrites of the chapel and refused to displaying emotion, but had a streak of wistful, tearful romanticism. Richard Hopkins who deeply disliked the necessity of going humbly to their rich relatives like Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the famous Bevan and was able to secure Anthony as a boy into a prestigious academy: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves in the car on the way there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a while. He was a poor student in his new institution. However, one day during an English class he needed to deliver John Masefield's poem known as The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he shocked the educator and the other boys. He says quite plausibly that poems, alone, launched him. Combined with participating in the dramatic society at the YMCA. Remarkably, he left school a no-hoper, pursued acting, and to the astonishment of his parents, was acting alongside Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic within 10 years. He more or less did it on his own, although in those days scholarships existed to attend Rada – a path to success for working-class actors. His dad remained in awe with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: on asking his son to recite the Yorick speech from the play Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then retreated to another room and burst into tears.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he departed the theatrical troupe out of frustration – much to Olivier's disappointment and displeasure – but stumbled upon an excellent television part as a potential war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which led indirectly to characters including in the film The Elephant Man and a thriving starry career in cinema, which he liked more compared to stage acting. He stopped drinking back in 1975 having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and managed to live into his later years to deliver outstanding roles, like Hannibal Lecter, the servant Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson with Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in his film The Father – his second Oscar.

In the latter half of the memoir his character seems more elusive, more deliberate. Some of the anecdotage doesn't quite come off. He recalls being taken out to lunch by his co-star in Stone's Nixon, the much-respected actor Sorvino, who sought to advise him his portrayal of Nixon wasn't working. Was this the opportunity for him to absorb a lesson from the famous actor of the Goodfellas fame? Hardly. Hopkins seems to go along with the director's criticism of Sorvino as driven by jealousy. Truly?

He consistently acts as the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who thinks you must to get there on time, know all the crew's names and do the job. Indeed. However, he also describes confronting an obnoxious director who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologise to her! And acquire some decency. If you ever repeat that in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! He appears to be an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that went with it. A Shakespearean like him is aware of Cornwall's lines on Kent in King Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! A straightforward and sincere nature – he must speak truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply