Ripper: Letter
            From Hell

Perturbed by the death of their classmate, the rest of the study group decides to band together to catch Marisa’s killer. Even Molly manages to stop scowling long enough to join in and - after the death of another member of their group - she announces to Kane’s class she has discovered similarities between the wounds on the bodies of the dead students and those of Jack the Ripper’s victims. However, it quickly becomes apparent that the modern-day copycat killer hasn’t finished yet and is intent on completing his or her recreation of the crimes. Even worse, the surviving members of the study group all share the same initials as the Ripper’s victims …
 
RIPPER: LETTER FROM HELL is actually a lot of fun. For all the protestations by the filmmakers that they were making a serious thriller, it will appeal to those who enjoyed the likes of SCREAM, I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER (1997) and URBAN LEGEND (1998). The script even goes so far as to lift scenes from those films - such as the one where the professor plays that prank on his students. It is handsomely shot and features a number of tense chase sequences; as well as an arrestingly ghoulish hallucination scene where some of the dead students come back to life in the morgue in Victorian garb as ​facsimiles of Jack the Ripper’s victims. It has an international cast - presumably as an attempt to secure overseas sales - and features a good performance by veteran German character actor Jürgen Prochnow as a cop who investigated the original massacre. The cast plays it straight enough for it to work most of the time. AJ Cook can’t be blamed for how her character is written, but it is difficult to warm to her as a protagonist. The film features an ambitious - if somewhat confusing ending - that is to be applauded for trying something a little different but is likely to leave audiences scratching their heads rather than gasping in surprise. 

Like many Canadian slashers before it, RIPPER: LETTER FROM HELL obscures its origins by purposefully trying to look like it is set in any town North America. A few things give it away, including Northcott’s accent slipping with the occasional “Aboot!” style utterance. Not to mention the scenes set at the logging station. The film was shot in and around Victoria - the capital of British Columbia - in the autumn of 2000 on a 25-day shoot on a budget $5 million. Director John Eyres had previously helmed the terrible British supernatural slasher GOOD NIGHT, GOD BLESS (1987). This was a definite step up from that. Although there were the usual denials that this was a slasher movie, despite it obviously being another attempt to wring a last drop of blood out of the post-SCREAM cycle. Even actor Bruce Payne took umbrage with suggestions that it was a horror film. Eyres told the Times Colonist newspaper in October 2000: “There are no gory scenes in the movie but there are a lot of gory things that happen.” He continued: “I’m trying to tilt it more towards Hitchcock.” Although, I’m not sure Hitchcock would have moved the last third of the movie to an isolated cabin in the woods - let alone featured a scene where two people are dismembered by buzz saws!
 
Writers John Curtis and Evan Taylor admitted that it would be compared to the slasher flicks popular at the time but again tried to distance their film from them. “It’s a different kind of movie”, Curtis said. Preferring to compare it to then contemporary releases such as THE SIXTH SENSE or ARLINGTON ROAD (both 1999). It’s always curious when filmmakers seem ashamed of their genre - but perhaps they realised that the cycle had run its course. An irony, of course, is that the artwork used to promote the film used a group photo pretty much like every slasher film that was released around the time. Only AJ Cook and Kelly Brook openly acknowledged that they were making a horror film. 

During production, Times Colonist film critic asked in the paper: “Is there anyone in town who isn’t working on Ripper?” There was even a call out for a bald man - or someone who would be willing to shave his head - as a body double for actor Bruce Payne; which is odd, as the actor has hair in the film. The film’s most ambitious scene was the rave where the killer stalks Kelly Brooks’ character. It was shot at the former B.C. Hydro Building (which also doubled for the sawmill in the movie) and involved 300 extras. The paper reported from the shoot: “ … from strutting drag queens with flashing high-heeled shoes to quasi-punks to enthusiastic teenagers in full Gothic garb.” The extras even managed to freak out locals by descending on MacDonalds en masse. Actress Vaugier said that in real life staying up dancing until 8 in the morning would be the last thing she would want to do. She declared: “I prefer sitting back in a lounge and listening to jazz and having a cocktail.” 

Again, Eyres was keen to distance the movie from the slasher genre even after the scene culminates with a violent knife murder and blood leaking onto dancers on the floor below. He told the paper: “It’s about a whole bunch of people who’ve been together for one week only, like in Ten Little Indians. Nobody knows anybody and everybody watches everybody. That’s why it has a different feel to it than Scream or Urban Legend. It leans more towards Seven or Silence of the Lambs.”
 
The film’s production was significantly delayed for a variety of reasons. It was originally mooted at Cannes in 1998 and then was due to shoot in the summer of 2000. The local paper noted that it was going to be the most ambitious project in Victoria since the end scene of FINAL DESTINATION (2000), where a local square doubled for Paris in that film’s climax. One of the major reasons for the delay was due to the fact they waited for actor Gary Oldman. “He loved the script but he took six weeks to decide whether he’d want to do it”, said Curtis. The delay in production potentially caused it to miss its window of opportunity with audiences' waning interest in the subgenre. Rumours at the time - as unlikely as they seem - were that Jack Nicholson was going to appear in a cameo. Apparently, the plan was for a flashback to Victorian times, with Jack the Ripper turning around at the end of the movie and be revealed as Nicholson. They even toyed with using a Nicholson look-a-like, but jettisoned the idea because he only looked like him with his sunglasses on - and they didn’t have sunglasses in Victorian times!
 
It seems that the ending was changed somewhat. Not only not featuring Nicholson, but originally it was to feature a houseboat blowing up “to smithereens”. An intricate model was built by production designer Mark Harris - who said he agreed to be on the project because he was “ … an art department prostitute.” Despite his best efforts, no houseboat appears or blows up at the end of the movie. Eyres freely admits that the script changed constantly throughout the shooting schedule due to budgetary and time constraints.
 
RIPPER: LETTER FROM HELL had a brief theatrical release in Canada in October 2001 before quickly debuting on TV on Halloween night that year. Overshadowed by another Jack the Ripper thriller - the Johnny Depp starring FROM HELL (also 2001) - it was released straight to video/DVD everywhere else. However, it must have made enough to generate a belated sequel RIPPER 2: LETTER FROM WITHIN (2004). Like many other early 2000’s slashers it is still languishing in Standard definition hell. Which is a shame. Hopefully, one day soon it will get a decent high-definition release. 

BODY COUNT 11: 
Female 6 / Male 5

1. Female seen crucified
2. Male seen dead
3. Female cut up with outboard motor
4. Female is stabbed repeatedly
5. Female falls to her death from a cliff
6. Female dissected alive
7. Male is trapped in a car engine and crushed against a tree
8. Male is bissected with a logging saw
9. Female is decapitated with a logging saw
10. Male is killed with an axe
11. Male dies in the electric chair

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