Stylish and entertaining

Rating: Null/10 (10 June 2002)

No, I won't reveal the plot but let me say as much as this: the main theory about the identity of Jack the Ripper and his motifs presented in this movie are not entirely new. In fact the plot is a mishmash of virtually all the known theories in the Jack The Ripper case. So what about the movie itself? Well, I think it's brilliant. The Hughes Brothers seem to have fallen in love with the Victorian London´s eerie atmosphere that you'll find in Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes or Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Dark alleys, thick fog, snobbish gentlemen in top hats and canes, drunkards and whores barking in Cockney, sinister scientists, Inferno-like mental asylums. And the Hughes Brothers (not with out a tongue-in-cheek) exploit those Victorian London cliches brilliantly.
Johnny Depp does an excellent job as - grab your socks! - a psychic Cockney speaking opium smoking (Sherlock Holmes somebody?) and Absinth drinking detective who is investigating a series of grisly murders on prostitutes or "unfortunates" as they are referred to. The pace is fast, the plot absolutely non-believable, but perfectly logical, acting top-notch. It's entertaining and exciting all the way to the end. My only objection concerns Heather Graham's prostitute. An able actress but much too beautiful to convince as a poor Gin drinking whore in the slum of London's East End in the 19th century. Not even a pimple on her pretty nose!