Wordiezett
So much average
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.
Ella-May O'Brien
Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.
Michael_Elliott
Ripper, The (1985) * 1/2 (out of 4) This here was one of the first movies to be produced in order to go straight to video with the director's Blood Cult being considered the very first. The film tells the story of a professor (Tom Schreier) who buys the ring of Jack the Ripper and soon afterwards women start turning up with their throats slashed and guts ripped out. This was a very popular and rather infamous rental back in the day but it's pretty much been forgotten since then. I hadn't seen the film in nearly twenty-years and my memories of it were pretty bad but this viewing really didn't come off as bad as I thought it would. There's no question that the film is bad but I was rather shocked to see how well it actually is considering there really wasn't anything for the director to work off of. In other words, I've seen countless direct to VHS (or now DVD) titles that were cheap and poor but it's rather neat seeing such an early example and notice that it's better than a lot of what followed. The biggest problem is that the film runs 104-minutes, which is at least twenty-minutes too long. The actual story is an interesting one and one that could work but not at the long running time. Another problem is that the film spends way too much time with one of the professor's students and his girlfriend. Both of the actors are very bad so why so much time was spent with them is beyond me. Gore master Tom Savini gets top billing but he only appears in one scene playing the spirit of Jack the Ripper.
wbhickok
Tom Savini as Jack the Ripper! Right on!! I really enjoy this movie, but it suffers drastically from being shot on video. Too bad, a bit of a larger budget, a few re-writes, and it could have been released theatrically. This movie has some of the goriest scenes I have ever seen, and I like gory films. The dialouge is a bit amaturish, and it does have the air of a student film, but with Mr. Savini's special effects, they more than compensate. So to cut it to the quick: If ya like Savini, watch.
Michael Pilkington
A college professor stumbles across a ring that belongs to Jack the Ripper and goes on a murderous rampage. This gory garbage plays like a cheap early 80s music video. How did special effects genius Tom Savini end up in this loser? Avoid this crap at all costs. My evaluation: (no stars).
ICP
This is a movie based on the legend of Jack the Ripper, when a college professor purchases a ring that replicates the ring Jack the Ripper wore he begins to act strange. The movie is poorly filmed and lacks artistic input. The music is boring and the characters are unbelievable at some points. The movie becomes repetitive and there is a small twist thrown in at the end. Wow, this is a hard movie to finish watching, but if you begin to connect with the college professor's infatuation with Jack the Ripper you probably will be able to sit through the whole movie.
