Belvedere, Ohio

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Belvedere is a fictional town in the U.S. state of Ohio depicted in the novel The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris, as well as the 1991 motion picture based on the novel.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The small town is located along the Licking River and is the hometown of the killer "Buffalo Bill" (Jame Gumb) and (in the film) of his victim Frederica Bimmel (first victim taken, third victim discovered). Agent Starling (played in the movie by Jodie Foster) is led to the town following the advice of Hannibal Lecter (played in the movie by Anthony Hopkins), who tells her that Buffalo Bill's primary motivation is "to covet", and that he specifically began by coveting what he saw everyday. From this Starling deduces that Buffalo Bill knew his first victim. She goes to the town and interviews Bimmel's father and friend, whose remark about sewing with Bimmel leads her to Gumb's house and lair at the climax of the story.

Lecter ironically tells Starling the location of Buffalo Bill's house in their first meeting in Baltimore, in which he describes one of his drawings in his prison cell as being a view of the Duomo, as seen from the Belvedere in Florence, Italy, a scene he claims to have drawn entirely from memory.

For the film, the location scenes of the town were filmed in the real town of Bellaire, Ohio, also located on the Ohio River. Bellaire, Ohio, also was the childhood home of actor Ted Levine, who played Buffalo Bill in the film.