| Director | The Hughes Brothers |
| Year of Release | 2001 |
| Actors | Johnny Depp, Heather Graham |
Every now and then I like to re watch a film and see if my opinion on it had changed. This review was one of the earlier reviews I did for this site, so I definitely felt my article could have been better if nothing else. But up a re watch, I opinion for this film has only gotten better, having seen a lot of new details I either missed or didn’t write about the first time around.
I have to say, really liked From Hell. With star power like Johnny Depp and Heather Graham in it, it was never going to be a slapped together half cooked film. Of course, both Depp and Graham do amazing jobs at their roles. Aside from being two of the best looking humans on the planet they can really act their parts.
The movie opens up in the seedy underbelly of London, against a back drop of prostitutes and the enforcers that extract their pound of flesh from the ladies. Only problem here is someone else is lurking the streets killing the prostitutes one by one. From hell is loosely based on the Jack the Ripper story, but I guess you’d say it’s more from the law enforcement point of view rather than Jack the Ripper’s. For my money this is quite entertaining. No real dull moments in this film. The dialogue of the day is portrayed rather well, the scenery is magnificent and the costuming flawless. This all adds to the character of the film and gives it a real air of authenticity. I loved the accents and the time spent on recreating the old streets of London town. No detail has been spared in the creation of this film, this makes for not only authenticity but great eye-candy as well. It’s obvious no shortcuts were taken in the creation of this film.
Plot wise this centres on on Inspector Aberline (played by Depp) who is a recovering / relapsing opium addict. He is also the smartest of the police force and routinely called into difficult cases such as this. Aberline has a rare sense of analytics that allow him an insight into the crimes that none of the other police officers have. Meanwhile, the girls one of whom Mary (Played by Graham) are working the streets as they always have done, and aside from the mafia-esque thugs that demand their protection money the girls are now turning up dead with organs removed by a killer who would appear to be a man of wealth, intellect and power. Judging by the precision of the cuts, and methods of killing, possibly even a trained surgeon. It soon becomes clear they law is dealing with a killer that is far more intelligent than your average “run of the mill” killer and probably smarter than the police.
Johnny Depp and Heather Graham feature in From Hell
I won’t go too far into the plot or get into how closely it follows the book (realistically I can’t really remember the book that well anyway) for fear of ruining the plot. The best way to find out of Aberline can find and stop the killer is to watch the movie for yourself! Rest assured there are some great twists and From Hell never gets boring. There is enough blood and guts to keep most horror fans satisfied but it wouldn’t fall into the extreme category by any means. Not an all time classic but a very solid and enjoyable watch. The star power in this movie and a bit of a romantic subplot between Aberline and Mary make this a gripping thriller that is very easy to watch.
From a moral point of view it’s kind of depressing to see women treated in the way they are in this film, but I guess that was part of the time period the story came from. But it does open up your eyes to how people were treated in the past.
Like pretty much anything that has Depp’s name on it this movie went on to do quite well at the theatres pulling in $74 million in box office takings. I’m not sure if I didn’t absorb a lot of the film the first time around or just that it had been so long since I’d watched it, I’m really glad I took the time to go back into this film and give it another watch as well, It was great to refresh my memory on this one as well as giving it a bit of a deeper analysis than I initially had.
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