In 1991, when Silence of the Lambs dominated the Oscars, I was a 15-year old boy just starting high school. By that time, all my big boyhood heroes were firmly entrenched, from Luke Skywalker to Ferris Bueller. I had plenty of male role models in fiction. Today, we behold the age of the heroine. It’s an epic cultural shift, and I believe one heroine quietly led the way. Looking back, I see that Clarice Starling forever changed my views on heroic figures in general and heroic women in particular.

Clarice Starling not only modeled a different form of heroism, she also showed me how a woman’s day-to-day might differ from my own. And her experiences have stayed with me through the years.

In the opening credits, Clarice ignores every male who turns to check her out as she passes them on the FBI training course. When she gets into an elevator, she’s surrounded by a crowd of much taller men, and the physical contrast adds extra tension to an otherwise unremarkable daily moment. But I never forgot the images of Clarice in a male-dominated world. I always relate more to the men who give Clarice harmless attention. And yet, as the film proceeds, the “harmlessness” of male attention upon women takes darker turns.

When Clarice confronts the chilling intellect of Dr. Hannibal Lecter, she’s put on the spot by a question involving Multiple Miggs and her genitalia. Hannibal further asks, “Do you know why he’s called ‘Buffalo Bill?’ Clarice reveals that the nickname was the result of a department-wide joke. “This one likes to skin his humps,” she answers, unamused. Nevermind that women are being stalked, abducted, and mutilated, the homicide division found something funny about it all. Clarice had a hell of a time getting through the demeaning attitudes of the people she met. That includes Dr. Chilton and one of the bug experts, Pilcher, both of whom hit on Clarice first before granting her professional respect.

There is another sequence in the film that stands out as well. Clarice is assigned to inspect the corpse of a woman who has the hallmark mutilations of Buffalo Bill. Clarice notices the glitter on the girl’s nails and says, “looks like town to me, sir.” The observation might have gone unnoticed by a man back then. The heroine’s knowledge shined a light into the blind spots of the existing group. The importance of the heroine’s perspective is echoed again when she’s standing in the bedroom of the murder victim, Frederica Bimmel. Allowing for intuition to guide her, Clarice finds personal photographs hidden in a music box. The object had been in that room unnoticed by Frederica’s father and the spate of FBI agents, all of whom had searched the room many times over. But Clarice knew where to look and what the photos meant.

Lastly, one scene has grown on me and become ever more poignant over the years. On a long car ride, Clarice’s boss casually apologizes for portraying her as too sensitive to handle the truth of a murder case. He said he only did that to drive off the local cops. No big deal. But Clarice responds with “It matters, sir.” And she repeats this phrase when she finishes her thought. “It matters.” Those quiet words opened my eyes to other small things that mattered, even if I hadn’t noticed before.

I didn’t know it at the time, but these subtle moments chipped away at my perception of the world. I never quite saw heroic women the same again. Here’s someone who isn’t physically intimidating. Clarice battled real insecurities. She suffered deep-seated doubts and dealt with people who didn’t take her seriously. She had to work overtime to establish credibility and had to learn to push back at manipulative behavior meant to diminish her. She wasn’t just hunting down a serial killer; she was teaching the world how to deal with and accept heroines into their world. In short, Clarice Starling opened the door for a new model of heroic action.

And to me, it’s bigger than feminism. You see, I’m a small guy. Life taught me that I’m not the one sitting in the captain’s chair like Captain Kirk. I wasn’t the one winning fistfights like Indiana Jones, and I rarely scared away bullies like Superman. So, before Clarice, heroines were either masculinized, like Ripley or Sarah Conner, or they were unrelatable like Scarlet O’Hara or Dorothy Gale. But Clarice changed the landscape for me. She showed me the everyday challenges that women face, she taught me the incredible value of diverse perspectives, and she taught me new ways a person could be heroic without being a physical champion. She’s a universal heroic figure, and she’s different from my boyhood role models.

So, although the lambs may have stopped screaming almost 30 years ago, the actions and messages of Clarice Starling are anything but silent.

Douglas Burton is currently working on a comprehensive study of heroines in fiction. Such work is fast becoming his passion. He believes that heroines have distinctive strategies and archetypal themes that add dynamism to literature, film, and culture. To see more of his work, check out douglasaburton.com.