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Many consider it the greatest entrance in cinematic history – and he remains without moving a muscle.

A young FBI agent, a rookie, navigates a corridor of cells arriving at Dr. Lecter's reinforced glass enclosure. He is positioned, his face resembling a living skull filled with sinister intent, eerily immobile clad in a tight blue inmate uniform. He stands frozen right up until he propels himself at the barrier, making that extraordinary hissing-slavering sound. A multitude of documentaries on serial killers have since demonstrated that actual serial killers tend to be quite dull, with nothing resembling Anthony Hopkins's captivating film persona.

Hopkins was hardly a newcomer when he landed that Oscar-winning role in the iconic film back in 1989: it wasn't his debut, instead, a superstar was cemented. The character of Hannibal drew influence, Hopkins notes with amusement in his recent memoir, on Bela Lugosi's Dracula, on Stalin as recalled by his daughter, as well as his icily exacting Rada tutor his instructor Fettes. The scenes also contained a father-daughter dimension in these moments; a difficult topic for Hopkins, who recounts how his King Lear was subconsciously influenced by an agonised guilt concerning Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his disastrous first marriage back in 1966 to his first wife, who was angered by his time away and his alcohol use.

The title originates from an historical picture of Anthony as a small child playing on the sand with his father – the kid who maybe thought he couldn't make it. He was a bewildered, lonely, vulnerable little boy raised in Port Talbot, son of Richard Arthur Hopkins, the memorable figure in this story: a pastry chef and a traditional male, a plain speaker who despised the religious hypocrites in their community and refused to expressing his feelings, yet possessed a touch of wistful, tearful romanticism. Richard Hopkins who was angered by how they were forced cap-in-hand to affluent family members such as Aunt Patty, who was connected to the famous Bevan and helped enroll Anthony as a boy into a posh school: “Because they're bloody rich!” he raves in the car on the way there. “We're all hoping for some pickings! Absolute nonsense, that's the truth!”

The humility worked, temporarily. Anthony struggled academically at his new school. But one day in a literature class he had to recite John Masefield's poem known as The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his voice awakened; he amazed the instructor and his classmates. He convincingly states that verse, by itself, started his career. This, and joining the dramatic society at the YMCA. Notably, he graduated without much hope, entered the acting world, and shocking his family, was acting with Laurence Olivier at the Old Vic in just ten years. He largely achieved it alone, though at that time scholarships existed for drama school – an opportunity for performers from modest means. His father was always amazed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: on asking his son to deliver the Yorick lines from the play Hamlet, Richard listened carefully and then left the room and began crying.

Regarding the fiery, bloody-minded son, he quit the National Theatre company in a fit of pique – to Olivier's profound dismay and criticism – but lucked into 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 the film The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey in cinema, that he favored compared to stage acting. He gave up alcohol during the mid-70s after being a heavy drinker, and so survived through midlife to deliver outstanding roles, such as Lecter, the servant Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson alongside Emma Thompson and the old man with dementia in the movie The Father – his next Oscar win.

In the latter half of his autobiography his character seems more elusive, more studied. A few tales doesn't quite come off. He recalls being taken out to lunch by his co-star in Stone's Nixon, the esteemed thespian Paul, who intended to inform him his acting as Nixon wasn't working. Was this the moment for him to absorb a lesson from the famous actor of the Goodfellas fame? Hardly. He tends to concur with the director's criticism of Sorvino as driven by jealousy. Truly?

He often portrays the tough, down-to-earth professional actor who thinks it is one's responsibility to be on time, remember every crew member's name and do the job. Absolutely. Yet he also tells 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 near me, I'll alter your appearance!” Anthony comes across as an individual who stopped drinking but maybe not the belligerence that came with it. An actor of his caliber surely knows the lines about Kent from Cornwall from Lear: “He does not know how to flatter! An honest mind and plain – he is compelled to be honest!”

He finishes his autobiography with a detailed supplement composed simply