Actresses portraying Mary

[Mike Covell]

What surprised me about the film "From Hell" was the way the casting was all wrong on the women. Susan Lynch (despite being from Ulster) would have made a perfect Mary Jane Kelly instead of Stride, who should have been played by the late Katrin Cartlidge who actually played Chapman, who should have been played by Lesley Sharp who played Eddowes, who should have been played by Annabelle Apsion who played Nichols, that should have been played by Samantha Spiro who played Tabram.

And then those Hughes Brother's trying to play at Directors!!

It felt like they had cast it right but in dubbing got it all mixed up!! Either that or all the cast were pinned to a board and a draught caught the board, knocking all the pictures onto the floor.
Just as a tea boy was walking by, he picked them up and stuck them were he pleased!!

[j.r-ahde]

Hello Mike!

But the sets were as close to authentic as possible!

Maybe one could use an old saying here;

"A shell without the contents!"

All the best
Jukka

[Mike Covell]

Hi Jukka,
Was there ever a Gargoyles head over George Yard, and when Jack kills on Buck's Row, he immediatly walks around a corner, I thought the row was long until Brady Street?

Other than that I agree that the exteriors were ok and the tour of the set on the extras is pretty fun.

[CraigInTwinCities]

I was bothered by some of the exteriors in FROM HELL. Mostly by the cemetary scene in which MJK (!) is at the funeral of one of the other Jack victims and being confronted by Det. Depp (cuz that character bore no resemblance to our man Inspector Abberline) and the graveyard looks like it's in a picturesque countryside.

The scene stuck out like a sore thumb as seeming surreal and not genuine... I half-expected a luxury limousine (and not the horse-drawn kind) to draw up alongside MJK and whisk her back to... Miller's Court. That's how bad that exterior was....

It's a shame FROM HELL was ever made into such a horrid movie, because the original graphic novel be Alan Moore was actually quite good, and, despite cleaving to the Royal Conspiracy Theory, not a poorly-researched bit of Ripper fiction at all, but quite extensively researched and good on many of the details.

[Mike Covell]

I was bothered by some of the exteriors in FROM HELL. Mostly by the cemetary scene in which MJK (!) is at the funeral of one of the other Jack victims and being confronted by Det. Depp (cuz that character bore no resemblance to our man Inspector Abberline) and the graveyard looks like it's in a picturesque countryside.

Would this be the same graveyard were the crow almost knocks the head stone over?

[BillyE]

On the subject of exteriors, I felt they missed the mark completely with Dutfield's Yard. The Hughes brothers had Liz Stride killed basicly in an alley, a very narrow street, with a ditch running through the middle, rather than a fenced in yard next to the International Worker's Educational Club. Maybe they couldn't find a wagon wheel to put on the wall of the adjoining building.

[Mike Covell]

Maybe they couldn't find a wagon wheel to put on the wall of the adjoining building.

They could have taken it off Netley's coach!!

[BillyE]

Well, it seems out of all the Ripper movies made, and there are a lot of them, only four thought to get even one victim's name right. Two got them all right, the 1988 Michael Caine mini-series featuring Lysette Anthony as Mary Jane Kelly, and the spectacularly awful "From Hell" from 2001 starring Heather Graham as MJK. The other two are the 1997 tv movie featuring Patrick Bergin and Gabrielle Anwar, with Karen Davitt as Kelly, the only actual victim mentioned in the movie, and the Christopher Plummer/James Mason -Holmes/Watson flick Murder By Decree from 1979, loosely based on the Royal Masonic conspiracy with Susan Clark as Mary Jane. Both of the second two movies correctly list only one victim, that being Mary Kelly. Way to go, Hollywood!

Again to list them chronologically:

1. Susan Clark Murder By Decree 1979
2. Lysette Anthony Jack the Ripper 1988
3. Karen Davitt The Ripper 1997
4. Heather Graham From Hell 2001

[CraigInTwinCities]

Would this be the same graveyard were the crow almost knocks the head stone over?

One and the same, LOL!

[John Casey]

Personally I wouldn't mind seeing Charlie Brook(e)s have a go at MJK. She was pretty ok in Bleak House.....

[j.r-ahde]

Hello John!

Not a bad choice either!

But we face(what a word to use in this context! ) the same problem as with the portraits of her;

her face vanished on November the 9th 1888...

So, we all get the same basics, but the nuances...

All the best
Jukka

[Mike Covell]

Here is a pic of Charlie Brooks. She recently announced she is to return to "Albert Square" in popular British soap Eastenders.

[John Casey]

Thats the girl...mind you, as far as looks are concerned, all we can ask is that the actress portraying her has two eyes, two ears, a nose and a mouth I suppose. At least at the start of the film!