CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Nayan Gough A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Geraldine The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

dkar3 Anyone who has read Sir A.C. Doyle's works regarding Sherlock Holmes will hate this movie. It's an abomination, whereas A. C. Doyle's were clever and quaint. On the other hand, this story is hodgepodge,silly, and completely outside the standards of ACD's work. A disgrace, and the acting is equally poor. In addition, anyone who's read the least about Jack the Ripper will see the inaccuracies and fabrications, which further deplete the quality of this movie. The character of Watson is reasonably well done, but the character of Holmes is not done quite so well. The performance by Donald Sutherland is laughable and its only merit is the make-up artists ability to make him look ghoulish otherwise his acting is atrocious. Overall, a total disaster of a movie that anyone found of Sherlock Holmes will find nothing short of annoying.

Superhanz Not being sure whether this was based on a book or not, the similarities between this plot and that of "From Hell"'s are too many to be neglected to realize the latter's director was much happier in choosing, to start with, to utterly and completely kill the character of the clairvoyant or "medium", if you like: That character just doesn't belong whatsoever to any Sherlock Holmes story (either by Conan Doyle himself or not) taking itself seriously. Utterly and completely unnecessary to its development! Then we have the acting: great actors but mostly, seeming completely out of place.The great James Mason has his TNT-like potential confined to a tired, old fart (too old actually) of a Watson.Not to mention the unfortunate decision to turn his notoriously witty and clever character into some sort of comedy relief - take the pea scene, for instance: he was told to dither and procrastinates too much for a true Watson! From Nigel Bruce to Jude Law and Martin Freeman, I'm still to see such a demeaning portrayal of the good doctor.Then we have Holmes. Unlike the original character, the director quite possibly prompted by the producers, have managed, in their quite apparent failed attempt to make him more human, to almost make him cry like a five year old, scaredy girl. Oh my, where to start? He's lost that truly Sherlockian "certainty". Sherlock Holmes shouldn't just ASK so many questions: he DEDUCES, pure and simply! Specially, as I mentioned earlier, bow to a bloody medium in trying to solve his case!! He's just not sure of his surroundings: at the funeral, why has he suddenly lost his powers to deduce the bad guys are still following him and are therefore certain to track Mary Kelly down via him carelessly taking them to her? For this review's size sake, I won't even delve into other flimsy character portrayals but believe me: it is really mostly other appalling portrayals to watch! But there are still positive point nonetheless. The scenery, props (sometimes a bit overdone, skulls with blinking lights longing at Sherlock's studio and so on and finally, the great Victorian London atmosphere they still managed to pull out regardless. Hence my rating it a point above a weak 5.

renezelwe The background to this well filmed movie involves an interesting and popular, but never official, suspect for the JTR murders. From what I have read and seen the official suspect was the boyfriend of one of the victims who quite likely had reason to hate the other four; he was interrogated for hours and cautioned but there wasn't enough evidence to be certain of a conviction (something to do with different street addresses for back to back houses or something; you've got to remember that hookers were regarded as second class citizens in 1888). All or nearly all of the DVD prints of this movie are unsatisfactory, not because the movie is badly filmed, but because nearly all of the scenes with the camera against the window or inside the room have been omitted. In his commentary a puzzled Mr Clark eventually appears to tell Anchor Bay that their print stinks. This is probably because the complete scenes in the original 1970s VHS releases were quite simply not as graphic as similar scenes in films like Bloodspattered Bride, Suspiria, and Turistas. The movie has now been devalued and needs someone like Lionsgate to put it together properly on Bluray. It is a similar situation to Fistful Of Dollars where the on screen footage of a guy manouvreing three barrels into position turns out to be only the tip of a massive iceberg of missing scenes.

MartinHafer I am a Sherlock Holmes purist, so I am VERY quick to pick apart various Holmes films--looking for the inconsistencies from the original Conan Doyle novels. However, of all the stories I have seen that use these characters that were not based on the writer's original stories, this is among the best. The biggest reason is that the writer seemed to actually have read the stories and knew the characters. The best thing about it is that Watson (played by James Mason) is NOT a bumbling idiot but a brave and reasonably clever man--just like in the original stories. This is a HUGE plus. As for Holmes, Christopher Plummer is not the best but he's better than most. He does NOT say 'elementary my dear Watson' or other such drivel that did not appear in the original tales and he dresses without the stereotypical deerstalker cap and pipe--again, like the original stories. He isn't perfect, though, as you really don't see as much of the deductive skill as you might expect--he's much more human in this story.The story is a WHAT IF--what if Sherlock Holmes had been real and actually investigated the murders attributed to Jack the Ripper. The story is VERY complex and VERY rewarding. However, I must point out that it's easy to feel a bit lost later in the film and you should NOT stop watching. Stick with it--the payoff is great and everything is tied together very well. I am not sure, however, if Arthur Conan Doyle ever would have written such a story as it's tone is very anti-British Empire! I could say more, but it would spoil the film. Overall, excellent acting, very good writing and direction. Well worth seeing and a commendable effort by all.