Martybear (From Hell)
From Hell
Directed by Albert & Allen Hughes (as The Hughes Brothers)
Screenplay by Terry Hayes & Rafael Yglesias
Based on a graphic novel by Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell
Dear Boss,
I hear there’s another movie what talks about dear old Jack the Ripper. Imagine my surprise! There I am up on screen ripping up whores again, just like the good old days. Can’t believe they’re still saying I’m a doctor. ha. ha. That joke about the Masons still has me in fits. Imagine Saucy Jack a Mason, ripping whores for a better England! Maybe I’m just down on whores, and maybe I just has a good sharp knife what loves to rip ‘em. You know I’ll just keep going till I get buckled, and that certainly won’t happen any time soon. I been all but uncatchable for over a hundred years, and now I’m getting good at it.
From Hell.
Jack the Ripper has captivated audiences since the Victorian Era, so it was only natural that someone would eventually make a graphic novel about him and his grizzly Whitechapel Murders. Add into the mix over one hundred and twenty years of myth, popular culture, wild speculation, and a layer of hoaxes so thick you’d need a machete to wade through them, and it’s no surprise that the resultant graphic novel weighs in at a whopping 572 pages! It’s only natural that someone is going to want the short version. That’s where From Hell comes in.
Based on the Alan Moore graphic novel of the same name, From Hell tackles this history-inspired collection of wild theories and human inequities. If you like blood, violence, murder, mystery, conspiracy theories, sex, drugs, or embarrassing scandals against notoriously uptight British Royals then you might find something worth liking in this film.
From Hell is a name drawn from one of the three alleged Jack the Ripper letters. Even someone with no background in handwriting analysis can tell immediately that all three were written by different people. They were clearly written at different levels of literacy, but the thing that keeps people coming back to them is that they all contain information that only the killer should know. That said, the “From Hell” letter was written at the lowest level of literacy and with the poorest range of expression.
Which is sort of an analogy for this movie. It’s raw, visceral, and most likely a complete fabrication.
Fred Abberline (Johnny Depp), as he is portrayed in the film, simply doesn’t exist. I suppose they hoped to make him more interesting by combining him with one Robert Lees—the actual psychic consulted by police in the Ripper case—and turning this amalgamated man into a junkie. Well I have to give them all credit, he was interesting. But without a crime we don’t need a detective.
That’s where the kindly hooker comes in. Heather Graham plays Irish-born Mary Kelly, mainly, through the application of a truck-load of red hair dye. It’s made somewhat more convincing by the muddled Eliza Doolittle impression that she affects throughout the film.
The supporting cast is a fine ensemble. Ian Holm, Robbie Coltrane and Jason Flemyng give fine performances that bring a level of depth and humanity to the film—one that casts the Ripper murders in a stark and disturbing light. We should expect no less from the Hughes Brothers. They are the sort of selective filmmakers that Hollywood needs more of—only attaching themselves to worthwhile projects and ventures they believe in. The directing and visuals in this movie are top-notch, and in some places downright disturbing. From Hell definitely ranks as a film worth watching but is definitely not for the faint of heart.
Review by Martybear