Hands of the Ripper Reviews

Following TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA (1969), director Peter Sasdy made his last film for Hammer, HANDS OF THE RIPPER, one of that studio's more moody, atmospheric, and haunting releases. Jack the Ripper murders his wife while their three-year-old daughter, Anna, watches. Before leaving, the notorious serial killer embraces his child and kisses her. Fourteen years later, the girl has grown into a beautiful woman (Angharad Rees), but she is psychologically scarred by the experience. Whenever Anna's passions are stirred by a demonstration of physical affection--a kiss, an embrace--she falls into a trance and stabs her companion. Anna encounters a Freudian psychiatrist, Dr. John Pritchard (Eric Porter), who is willing to help her overcome her homicidal compulsion, but his repressed attraction to the beautiful girl only spells trouble for them both. Bearing more than a passing resemblance to Michael Powell's masterpiece PEEPING TOM (1960), HANDS OF THE RIPPER is brimming with the same sort of psychosexual-homicidal compulsions--in both cases brought on by a parent's perversion of love. Director Sasdy skillfully manipulates the complicated material, ferreting out the psychological nuances while delivering a suspenseful and exciting film that ends in a breathtaking climax.