Has too much going on and lacks suspense

Rating: 4/10 (12 May 2015)

If the killer of five street hookers had been arrested in 1888 his name would not have been anything more than a foot note in criminology. Our fascination with Jack the Ripper has less to do with his bloody handy work than with the simple question of who he was. Countless books have been written, countless theories posed. Like the conspiracy theory which places Jack in the middle of British royalty and which is the focus of From Hell.
In From Hell the conspiracy is discovered by Inspector Abberline (Johnny Depp), who is portrayed as having visions of the killer while high on opium. It's a mystical plot element which is totally irrelevant to the story, as is a cameo by the Elephant Man himself. With an overstuffed screenplay, based on the graphic novel, From Hell just has too much going on and makes too little of the actual plot.
It has one plus though: the movie looks great, with a convincingly filthy Whitechapel full of equally filthy prostitutes with bad teeth and greasy hair. Except, of course, for Mary Kelly as played by Heather Graham who gets Abberline's juices flowing with her beautiful head of fiery red hair.
The Hughes brothers make the most of the production design and they know how to suggest a bloody murder without showing too much. But they lack any feel for suspense. Not once do they make you squeeze your arm chair.