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Many consider it the most iconic introduction in film history – while he stands utterly motionless.

The FBI trainee, new to the job, proceeds down a row of prison cells arriving at the notorious doctor's secure glass tank. The man is present, with features like a skeletal visage exuding demonic evil, eerily immobile wearing a snug blue inmate uniform. He stands frozen right up until he lunges toward the window, emitting that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. Countless documentaries on serial killers have since demonstrated that genuine criminals are often very boring, far from the actor's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly an unknown when he landed the part that won him an Oscar in the iconic film during the late 80s: a star wasn't born, but a legend emerged. The character of Hannibal was inspired, Hopkins cheerfully recalls in this new autobiography, from Lugosi's Dracula, on Joseph Stalin based on his daughter's accounts, as well as his strictly demanding acting coach his mentor Fettes. Additionally, there existed a parent-child dynamic within the narrative; a painful subject for Anthony, who recounts how his Lear was unknowingly shaped by an agonised guilt regarding his daughter Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his failed first union in 1966 to his first wife, who disliked his absences and his alcohol use.

The memoir's title is derived from a vintage war-era photograph of a young Hopkins 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, the child of Richard Hopkins, the standout secondary character in this story: a bread-maker and a traditional male, a direct communicator who loathed the Bible-punching hypocrites in their community and avoided showing his emotions, but had a streak of nostalgic, emotional sentimentality. It was Hopkins Sr who deeply disliked the way they had to go humbly to affluent family members including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the famous Bevan and was able to secure young Anthony into a posh school: “Since they are extremely wealthy!” he raves during the car ride. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The pleading was effective, for a time. He was a poor student in his new institution. But one day in a literature class he had to recite the poem by Masefield known as The West Wind – without seeing it first – and his voice awakened; he shocked the educator and the other students. He says quite plausibly that verse, by itself, propelled him forward. Combined with participating in the YMCA theater group. Notably, he graduated without much hope, went into acting, and amazingly to his parents, was on stage alongside Laurence Olivier at the renowned Old Vic within 10 years. He accomplished it mostly independently, even though back then scholarships existed to attend Rada – an opportunity for actors from humble backgrounds. Richard Hopkins was continually impressed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: when he asked Anthony to deliver the Yorick lines from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then left the room and wept openly.

As for the hot-tempered, stubborn individual, he departed the theatrical troupe in a moment of anger – causing Olivier's regret and disapproval – but stumbled upon an excellent television part as a potential war criminal in the show based on Uris's work, which led indirectly to roles such as in David Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, that he favored to the stage. He stopped drinking during the mid-70s once a notorious drinker, and thus made it into middle age to execute great performances, such as Lecter, the servant Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson featuring Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his second Oscar.

In the latter half of the book his personality becomes more opaque, more deliberate. Some of the anecdotage doesn't quite come off. He recalls going out for lunch alongside his cast mate in the film Nixon, the highly regarded performer Paul Sorvino, who wanted to tell him his acting as Nixon was falling short. Was this the opportunity for Anthony to gain insight something from the legendary star of Scorsese's Goodfellas? Not exactly. He tends to concur with the director's criticism of Sorvino as driven out of envy. Is that so?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who thinks it is one's responsibility to get there on time, know all the crew's names and get on with it. Quite so. However, he also describes standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologise to her! And acquire some decency. If you ever repeat that around me, I'll rearrange your face! He appears to be someone who gave up drink but maybe not the belligerence that came with it. An actor of his caliber surely knows Cornwall's lines on Kent in King Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! A straightforward and sincere nature – he must speak truth!”

Anthony ends his memoir with a detailed supplement composed simply