Watch Ripper: Letter from Hell For Free

Absolutely Fantastic

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

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.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

This movie had a good idea. Kids taking a class to become profilers from an ex-FBI agent. Then they themselves become targets. One of the classmates, the main character, was stalked by a killer herself in the beginning of the movie. So, you must figure that she took this class because she wanted to understand what was behind those murders, or perhaps to protect herself. Too bad that's what I thought. Because it was nothing of the sort. It become all too predictable and I had the whole thing figured out half-way through the movie. I hate that.I love horror movies so much, that I will even watch bad ones such as Reanimator. But what makes Reanimator so great, is that it was presented in a way that you would take it seriously. You knew what you were getting yourself into watching this movie. Unfortunately, RIPPER tries to be serious, but is unable to provide the substance to do so. In addition, the editing is choppy, and the motives and personalities of the characters are all over the place.Maybe this movie belongs on MTV. Don't waste your time.

Typical slasher movie about a copycat killer, with young people doing things that they shouldn't and getting butchered. I could pretty much predict everything that was going to happen. You'd think that something focusing on Jack the Ripper might be a little more interesting, but "Ripper" doesn't cut it. The most befuddling thing is that Jurgen Prochnow stars in this. He played the submarine captain in "Das Boot" and the terrorist leader in "Air Force One", so what's he doing here? If you want to see a good movie dealing with Jack the Ripper, the choices are: "The Ruling Class" (Peter O'Toole's character ends up believing himself to be Jack the Ripper); "Time After Time" (H.G. Wells chases Jack the Ripper into 1970s San Francisco); and "From Hell" (Johnny Depp plays a detective investigating the murders in 1880s London). And of course some people might include "Dr. Strangelove" (Sterling Hayden plays Gen. Jack Ripper).All in all, you'll do best to avoid this one.

When I saw the title and cover I was hoping that the movie would be like "Ripper" (videogame 1996 starring Christopher Walken). It was an excellent game that combined the old legend about Jack the Ripper with cyber technology. The result a "killer" thriller. But sadly I have to report that "Ripper: Letter from Hell" is nothing like that game. It is just a slasher movie with a very pretentious story. First of all there were some good moments. But overall I missed tension. The murders seem brutal and bloody, but the violence isn't explicit. Also a big problem is that the characters are not very likable. So you won't care for them if they die. The only exciting thing is wanting to find out who the killer is. When the characters have a dialog in one scene it somehow doesn't connect with what happened before the scene. I got the feeling that scenes were missing. This should not have been a problem if the the story was straightforward and clear. This is not the case. The story is confusing as hell. (Maybe that is why we would need a letter to explain things.) And if you were hoping for a decent climax than you will be disappointed. The way it is presented leaves room open for different interpretations. Normally I would love such an ending. Here it isn't very effective. The ending doesn't clear up motive for the killings. Also the connection between Jack the ripper and the killer is not explained very well. There is very little background given on the original Jack the Ripper murders. Assuming that you are not familiar with the murders committed by Jack the Ripper you could easily put some other famous serial killer in his place. The end result would be the same. Since good old Jack still makes quite the impression today he deserves much better treatment. I could have forgiven the pretentious ending if the movie would have been entertaining and exciting but as I said earlier the movie lacked tension and is quite boring. Jurgen Prochnow and Bruce Payne should be ashamed with their performances. It clearly shows that they don't believe in this project and only are in this movie for the money. You know I get it sometimes you have no choice but to be in certain films in order to make a living. But is it that too much too ask that once you are involved you can give it a little effort.I know that like me some of you will be intrigued because of the name Ripper but believe me that nothing remotely interesting has been done with it. A giant waste of your time.

I paid £1.49 for this and I'd say I got my moneys worth. As you'd expect it's very derivative of most films of this genre and treads a fine line between credibility and hokum. However it's not cringe-inducing bad and I'd probably rate it a lot higher if it weren't for the lack of a clearcut resolution at the end. Even the Director's Commentary failed to shed any light on the definitive solution, basically saying it's up to the audience to decide for themselves - acceptable in a more highbrow production but a bit annoying for a film of this level. Still I've seen a lot worse and it's worth the small change from anyone's pocket!