History Buffs: From Hell

[Music] hello and welcome history buffs my name is nick hodges and in this episode i'll be reviewing the historical horror movie from hell based on the graphic novel by the legendary alan moore from hell tells the tale of the most famous serial killer in history jack the ripper everyone knows his name and the horrific legacy left behind in white chapel for over a hundred years his story has been told and retold time and time again from newspapers to books to tv and to film all tirelessly analyzing and cross-examining every detail trying to make sense of the madness during the autumn of terror this 2001 film joins the fray but despite its fascinating subject matter its contribution to the legend is poorly executed over the course of this review i'll be going over the real history behind jack the ripper as well as point out the movie's biggest flaws and inaccuracies this is from hell it's 3 45 in the morning the slums of london's east end that burst with life during the day hang with an eerie stillness whenever interrupted its empty streets magnify faint noises in the distance whether it be lone footsteps and cobbled streets or the occasional dog barking in bucks row new sounds break the silence a cart driver called charles cross approaches on his way to work he notices the body of a woman lying before a gate another man called robert paul passes by and spots this as well together they rush over and see a middle-aged woman lying dead with a throat slit and a deep gash in her lower abdomen the two frightened men leave her side to fetch a policeman not wanting to make a scene the police removed the corpse as quickly as possible only a few hours remains before the locals woke up for work by the time they did her blood and any possible evidence left behind was gone at the mortuary the extent of the lady's mutilations were clear the two deep cuts in her neck reached all the way to her spine and she had also been disemboweled in their examination the doctors concluded that the inflicted wounds were not frantically made the cuts were too precise leaving them to theorize that they could only have been made by a man experienced in dissection when the story of the murder reached the newspapers it brought a lot of attention the victim's identity was eventually revealed to be a local prostitute called marianne nichols normally the murder of a prostitute in white chapel might have only been regarded as a local story after all it was well known for being a dodgy place and violence against prostitutes was not uncommon but this murder was something very different unprecedented the excessive mutilations turned the stomachs of victorian londoners but they had no idea that more was on its way in the late 19th century london was the industrial heart of the british empire its power and influence felt the world over but it was a capital city hardly worthy of the name its skies were choked with thick smog pumped into the air round the clock by coal smoke leaving factories and chimneys the gap between the haves and have-nots was immense as millions of the urban poor lived in overcrowded slums and ghettos often with entire families living in one room life's prospects in finding work was difficult especially for unmarried women turning many to drink in prostitution often whatever was earned was used to simply pay for room and board for a night out of london societies they were the most shunned and the most vulnerable with this grim side of london life now in the spotlight was quite frankly an embarrassment to the elite eager to conclude this investigation as quickly as possible scotland yard assigned frederick abeline one of their top inspectors to the case having served in white chapel years before his local knowledge and already established presence in the community were vital assets for now the newspapers were content with spinning their own theories mainly passing it off as a potential gangland slaying for the next week the investigation continued but found nothing new that was until the body of another prostitute was discovered on saturday the 8th of september at 6 am annie chapman was found in the backyard in hanbury street as with marianne nicholls her throat had been severed by two severe cuts and she had also been disemboweled but chapman's mutilated remains were more excessive than mary ann nicholls her intestines had been removed and placed on her shoulder and a uterus was missing but despite the increased ferocity the surgical precision in the cuts remained the same the careful removal of the organs also showed the killer's knowledge of anatomy supporting the same theory as before this new lead directed the police to investigate doctors medical students and butchers when the second murder was announced to the public all claims of it being gangland killings were silenced the cruelty behind the attacks just didn't add up panic began to grip the east end with people looking for someone to blame by lashing out in all the wrong places a local man called george lusk founded a group named the white chapel vigilance committee and it took to the streets in search for the killer it started by targeting the neighborhood's large jewish communities one piece of evidence the newspapers sensationalized was the leather apron found at the crime scene this convinced many that it belonged to a polish jew called john pisa who was commonly known as leather apron he had a history of violence including minor assaults and prostitutes pisa was arrested and questioned but later released due to his cleared alibis however this did little to assure the white chapel vigilance committee or alleviate their anti-semitism unhappy with the lack of police progress and protection george lusk put together a group of volunteers from the community to patrol the streets at night combined with the police presence this joint effort seems to be working over three weeks went by without further attacks or much else pertaining to the investigation the frenzied media circus surrounding it inspired hundreds of fraud to send in fake letters claiming to be the killer many were disregarded outright except for one that was delivered to the central news agency on the 27th of september written in red ink it read dear boss i keep on hearing the police have caught me but they won't fix me just yet i have laughed and they look so clever and talked about being on the right track that joke about leather apron gave me real fits the next job i do i should clip the ladies ears off and send it to the police officers just for jolly wouldn't you keep this letter back till i do a bit more work then give it out straight my knife so nice and sharp i want to get at work right away if i get a chance good luck yours truly jack the ripper it was the dear boss letter that gave us the name we all know today it very nearly got disqualified with the other fake letters but something about it intrigued the journalists after much debating they decided to forward the letter to scotland yard on the 29th of september as expected they were skeptical about it as well nothing much added to the letters legitimacy that was until the following night after 22 days of peace jack was back around 12 45 am on sunday september 30th a hungarian jew called israel schwartz was walking down burner street when he thought he saw a young couple having an argument by duttfield diard quickly turning violent the man threw the screaming woman onto the pathway not wanting to get involved schwartz crossed the road passing by a second man standing nearby watching him the first man stopped what he was doing and cried out to the second lipsky a derogative name for a jew the second man began following shorts causing him to panic and run eventually the man gave up the chase and schwartz escaped unharmed his eyewitness testimony was considered one of the most crucial in the entire investigation not only did he see an actual attack in progress but it opened the possibility there might be two men committing them instead of one at one o'clock a pony driver called louis dm shoots approached dartfield's yard when he saw the body of a woman in the pathway she was identified as the prostitute elizabeth stride later confirmed by schwartz as the very same woman he saw being attacked supported by the fact that unlike the previous victims stride's corpse had no mutilations her throat had been slit the same as the others but that's about it meaning that schwartz had disturbed the killer before he had time to finish forcing the ripper's hand to strike again that very night just 15 minutes away from burner street another body was discovered on mitre street belonging to catherine eddos there had been no interruption this time her face lacerated almost beyond recognition her abdomen grotesquely disemboweled and half a kidney was missing as the police fanned out searching the nearby areas they found a piece of a blood-stained apron lying on the floor and gallston street this would later be confirmed as catherine eddowes above the apron piece was a message written in chalk on the wall it read the jews are the men that will not be blamed for nothing at 5 00 am commissioner warren came personally to look at it and was faced with a dilemma aside from the apron piece there was nothing about the message itself that indicated there was by the ripper it's likely that it was just anti-semitic graffiti and had been written a while ago if however it was written by jack its sinister purpose was obviously to drive suspicion onto the jewish community to avoid civil unrest commissioner warren ordered it to be washed off when the results from the post-mortem examination came in the police re-examined the dear boss letter what interested them was the sentence the next job i do i shall clip the lady's ears off and catherine eddo's earlobe had been sliced but both ears remained it could have just been a coincidence but on the 1st of october scotland yard received a postcard also allegedly from the killer reading i was not coddling dear old boss when i gave you the tip you hear about saucy jack's work tomorrow double event this time number one squealed a bit couldn't finish straight off and not got time to get ears off for police thanks for keeping last letter back till i get to work again jack the ripper the writer's knowledge of the murders was intriguing as the postcard was written before they were even published in the newspapers but although the public didn't know about it the police didn't rule out that both the dear boss letter and the postcard could have been hoaxes written by an ambitious journalist however even this level-headed theory would be challenged as another letter was sent this time accompanied by a package they have both been sent to george lusk on the 16th of october the letter read from hell mr lusk sir i sent you half the kidney i took from one woman preserved it for you the other piece i fried and it was very nice i may send you the bloody knife that took it out if you'll only wait a while longer signed catch me when you can mr lusk the package included half a woman's kidney and a match catherine eddo's missing half needless to say this letter and its package was treated very seriously by scotland yard but they noticed that its handwriting poor grammar and spelling was considerably worse to the previous letter and postcard appearing to be written by different people and maybe that's the point if jack the ripper really was a doctor or a surgeon then he would have been an educated man which is what the police were looking for so to throw off the scent he sends them poorly written letters with just enough information validating them which kind of makes sense why each one gets progressively worse as if they're overcompensating but that's just my opinion at this point in the investigation public confidence in the metropolitan police and scotland yard was an all-time low every day the papers published another article mocking their efforts labeling them as incompetent one issue of punch took the not so subtle approach with a cartoon comparing the investigation to a game of blind man's bluff for nearly 10 weeks of fruitless efforts the commissioner sir charles warren was ridiculed and scrutinized fed up with it all on the 8th of november he sent in his letter of resignation coincidentally it was right before jack's final murder at 10 45 a.m on friday the 9th of november a landlord was making his rounds to collect rent money one of his properties was a single bedroom flat in miller's court dorset street and it was currently occupied by a young prostitute called mary jane kelly when his knocks and calls were answered he peered through the window to see if anyone was home he was met with an indescribable sight of appalling horror and gore it was jack the rippers magnum opus his previous killings had always been out in public and the risk of being caught always limited the time he could spend on each victim but out of sight in mary kelly's flat he no longer needed to hold himself back he could give in to his most evil and sickest desires so that is pretty much how the story of jack the ripper ends for 10 weeks he terrorized the people of white chapel before disappearing just as suddenly as he arrived there were of course other murders that followed also targeting prostitutes but these were believed to be copycats but mary jane kelly is widely believed to be the last victim of jack the ripper i should also point out that there were other murders that preceded marianne nichols that some believe were also carried out by the ripper but i chose to focus instead on the canonical five that was marianne nichols annie chapman elizabeth stride catherine eddowes and mary jane kelly as to the fate of jack the ripper who he was and why he stopped we will probably never know his crimes remain unsolved but not for lack of trying the metropolitan police in scotland yard threw all their resources at this case interviewing 2 000 people investigating 300 persons and attaining 80 suspects all to no avail but could it be possible that out of all of these suspects one of them was indeed jack the ripper hiding in plain sight the police never realizing that the face of true evil was staring right back at theirs these eyes will deceive you they will destroy you they will take from you your innocence your pride and eventually your soul these eyes do not see what you and i see behind these eyes one finds only blackness the absence of light these are the eyes of a cycle man for this chapter i'm going to go over a list of suspects pertaining to the possible identity behind jack the ripper but before i do i need to explain that there's no way in hell i can cover them all especially within the time constraints of a brief review there's literally hundreds of people thought to be the killer so if i miss your favorite one please don't hold it against me also if you're considering watching this film or better yet reading the graphic novel by alan moore then you might want to do that first before watching the rest of this video as i'm about to go into some major spoilers for the rest of you i'm guessing that either you've seen it or you're not really bothered by it and you just want to learn some history in which case let's get started the entire basis behind from health's plot hinges on this elaborate conspiracy theory involving the freemasons that they were responsible for the white chapel murders for any of you who don't know the freemasons are a centuries-old secret society that boasts some of history's most influential figures such as winston churchill the duke of wellington voltaire mozart and george washington because of members like these some people think that the freemasons are pulling strings behind the scenes and running the world in the movie from hell the white chapel murders are sanctioned by the freemasons to cover up a royal scandal involving prince albert victor the grandson of queen victoria prince edward married and crook a commoner and a catholic married her in a catholic church made a baby a legitimate baby who is in fact here to the throne of england all these women were there all these women were eyewitnesses to an event that could rip the empire to pieces committing these murders is the queen's physician sir william gull and instead of taking care of it quietly he goes way beyond the call of duty by mutilating the bodies apparently they're supposed to be in accordance with the physical penalties of masonic rituals and oaths we asked sir william to remove a threat to our family and to our throne not to engage in these ghastly rituals oh no of course not your majesty that was unexpected now obviously this theory is ridiculous but its potential as a good story was too good to pass up by the creative industry which is why it was adapted by both the graphic novel and the movie as well as a 1988 miniseries called jack the ripper but once you look at the evidence its plausibility falls apart first introduced in a book published in 1976 called jack the ripper the final solution where its author stephen knight presented the royal family and freemason connection as well as state of the english painter walter sickert was an accomplice of jack the ripper his main source for this information was joseph gorman who claimed to be walter sickert's illegitimate son however after the book's successful publication stephen knight's source admitted that he had made the whole thing up so now both the book and the theory are widely discredited by the academic community but even if this hadn't happened i still wouldn't believe it why would the queen ask her family physician who was in her 70s at the time and had recently suffered a stroke to kill five prostitutes wouldn't it be easier just to have them arrested and make them disappear it's just stupid because it tries to rationalize the killings of a psychopath some people find it easier to accept a convoluted conspiracy than the awful truth that these women died for no real reason other than to satisfy a sick evil man's perversions so that takes care of william gull and the whole freemason royal family angle but who are some other suspects we can consider instead well frederic aberline's favorite suspect was seven klostovsky a polish barber living in white chapel who had previously had a career in poland as a surgeon before emigrating to london some time after 1887. he was eventually convicted of murdering three of his wives and hanged in 1903 but unlike jack the ripper he used poison so it doesn't really match his mo another suspect was stage actor richard mansfield while the murders were going on he was performing in the play the strange case of dr jekyll and mr hyde and his transformation into mr hyde was so effective that it convinced terrified audience members that he must have been the ripper mansfield was of course questioned by the police but no evidence could be found to implicate him unfortunately this accusation did serious damage to mansfield's acting career despite his innocence walter sickers is another potential suspect who has popped up more recently as i said earlier walter sickert was an english artist and the man was obsessed with jack the ripper it is most obvious for some of his paintings that are heavily inspired from the murders in fact there is one scene in the movie that pays homage to his painting the camden town murder patricia cornwell a contemporary american crime writer was convinced that sickert was the ripper writing about it in her book portrait of a killer jacked the ripper case closed and reportedly spent several million pounds during her investigation however her findings weren't enough to convince the academic community there was also an irish american called francis tumblet who is considered to be the ripper he was a snake oil salesman who frequently visited europe and had urged a reputation as a troublemaker with the law although nothing too serious just various acts of thievery and misdemeanors but he did keep getting the attention from the authorities for more serious crimes for example in 1865 he was arrested under suspicion for his involvement for abraham lincoln's assassination which he was innocent of and let go francis tubbletee came across the metropolitan police's radar when they arrested him on november 7th 1888 for homosexual offences after paying his bail he fled the country and this didn't look really good to the police who were already looking into him as a suspect especially as the murder stopped right after he left but by focusing on this american another went by completely unnoticed an actual serial killer called hh holmes he has become quite a popular suspect in recent years his arrival and departure in england matches within the murders time frame as well as his physical description with eyewitness testimonies he was also a practicing surgeon making him an ideal candidate of being jack the ripper the strongest argument for it is that back in his home chicago he was confirmed to have killed up to nine people his method of doing so was horrifying holmes had built a hotel specifically designed to kill human beings a tenant would struggle to make it out alive from the maze-like corridors secret rooms doors that open to nothing but brick walls any screams for help would be muffled by walls lined with asbestos and a steel vault to suffocate or starve out his victims that's what they would experience if they escaped from their bedrooms but holmes had also engineered death traps in them as well while his tenants slept hidden gas lines would pump in poison gas after they died he would take their bodies to the basement where a furnace awaited truly a terrifying individual but reparologists think it's unlikely that he was jack the ripper holmes ultimately killed for profit whether it was by robbing his victims or selling their organs to medical colleges whereas jack hill for pleasure was much more impulsive only taking select organs indicating their purpose as trophies rather than to be sold now whilst i don't think that hh homes as jack the ripper the possibility is still intriguing and i'm definitely looking forward to seeing the upcoming movie made about him called devil in the white city it's set to star leonardo dicaprio as holmes and be directed by martin scorsese for this final chapter i'm going to go over some of the numerous inaccuracies made in the film and you most likely noticed so far that i haven't spoken that much about it to be honest i find it incredibly dull and it still hasn't left much an impression on me i really just picked from hell as an excuse to talk about the history of jack the ripper which i do find very interesting and now i have to talk about how this movie [ __ ] it up so where do i start i guess we could literally go to the very beginning with a direct quote by jack the ripper one day men will look back and say i gave birth to the 20th century it's referenced again later in the movie by jack himself one day men will look back and say i gave birth to the 20th century it's a cool line but it doesn't come from jack the ripper and it isn't written on any of his alleged letters the quote is actually from the graphic novel and this wouldn't necessarily bother me if they only had the character jack say it but having it written like this makes it look deceptively authentic here i'll show you but what's going to frustrate history buffs the most are the terribly written characters frederick abeline played by johnny depp is the worst offender in the movie he's a genius detective also happens to be a psychic and his visions allow him to see the future and the murders he's investigating maybe because he's also like an opium addict and these may just be hallucinations since they're shown in a green filter look like the absent that we see them drink it's very confusing because in the movie it also implies that these visions are real in any case it should be rather obvious that the filmmakers got a little bit carried away the real abaline was middle-aged fat balding a decent detective but nowhere near the brilliant mind johnny depp is portrayed to be he also didn't have psychic superpowers and he wasn't an opium addict which then obviously means he didn't die of an overdose but lived a long comfortable life until 1929 and it's not just me who hates this portrayal of abba line here's an interview mtv did with ellen moore the author of the graphic novel from hell he was an unassuming man in middle age who was not a heavy drinker and who as far as i know remained faithful to his wife throughout his entire life johnny depp saw fit to play this character as an absent swilling opium den frequenting dandy with a haircut that in the metropolitan police force in 1888 would have gotten him beaten up by the other officers okay he said that far better than i ever could and just for fun here's a nitpicky question how does detective avalyn own a grammar phone the movie takes place in the autumn of 1888 the grammar phone was only just revealed to the public for the first time in may 16 1888 by its inventor emil balina so i highly doubt have been commercially available yet even if it was a middle class detective certainly couldn't afford it even if he could what would he listen to there was no record companies producing music back then society hasn't caught up yet to this psychological marvel especially not within three bloody months of its reveal the only music he could potentially listen to was by emil berlin himself [Applause] [Music] [Applause] next i would like to talk about mary jane kelly portrayed by heather graham now normally i think she's a decent actress but she's terribly miscast here the first thing you're going to notice is that she can't pull off a cockney accent to save her life i warned you and your friend's payment was expected monday i'm working ain't i we all are it's only the heart and soul of the gang isn't it your job to me knowing that small detail i used to think it too small to spend a life in but now i'm not so sure that's bad enough already but i want to discuss how unconvincing her character's portrayal is from a historical angle although the real mary kelly was known to be young and beautiful it still doesn't change the fact that she was a 19th century prostitute from white chapel but in the film she's very well groomed her clothes are clean her hair beautifully shines like she just came out of a hairdresser she just stands out when compared to the other prostitutes who are battered grimy and disheveled far more fitting appearances based on the living conditions take for example this scene to the movie's credit this is very accurate these girls are so poor that they have to sleep in a dos house that's a victorian homeless shelter and they're paying for the cheapest service it was called a penny sit-up basically if you paid a penny you could sleep in a seated position and lean against a rope tucked beneath your arms some dos houses were so overcrowded that this was the only service they provided so this clearly shows just how desperate the situation is which leads me to my next point one of the likely reasons they could only afford a penny sit-up was because they spent most of their money on booze mary jane kelly was especially well known for being a drinker but we never see her on-screen counterpart get plastered she has like these little dainty sips here and there but nothing to suggest she's an alcoholic unlike her friends where we do get that impression and i think the reason why is because the filmmakers are so intent on making heather graham look pretty that they sacrifice any attempt at authenticity no matter how beautiful a girl may be it's not a sexy look if she's completely shit-faced i wanna go upstairs i should also mention that detective appleline didn't have an intimate relationship with mary kelly because they never met before her murder and yes she was in fact murdered unlike in the movie where she escapes just in time to run away to ireland i also have a problem with the unfair portrayal of sir charles warren the metropolitan police commissioner overseeing the white chapel murders in from hell he's reduced to a one-dimensional cliched bad guy there's a scene where warren and abeline are debating about who jack the ripper might be and the filmmakers pull every cheap trick in the book to make him look like a prick for example he's xenophobic well one thing's for certain an englishman didn't do it he's racist maybe one of these red indians wandered into white chapel and indulged his natural inclinations he's a snob no well bread man would do this he's an anti-semite what about the jews well sir for the sake of public safety in general i'd like to be careful about spreading the rumors that it might be at you oh piss off nobody was more concerned about the well-being of the jewish community than the real charles warren that's why he ordered that graffiti washed off washed that off what you heard me it's evidence listen to me in another hour there will be a thousand people poking about in here if those words are seen not a jew in london will be safe oh i thought you didn't care about the jews he seemed pretty cool with pointing a finger at them a second ago or a jew taylor might have money there are plenty of them in white chapel just for the record no he's not a diet anti-semite he really does it because he's a freemason and he's using his power and influence to cover up evidence so all you're doing is destroying its value as evidence no all i'm doing is taking charge of an investigation that you have bungled to the point of gross inefficiency and i've had enough you are suspended from duty everly i should also point out that charles warren didn't suspend abilene during the investigation nor did he promote him after the last murder you are reinstated indeed you are promoted it's so frustrating with just how much history is an inconvenience to this film they go way too far with the creative liberties in order to push this masonic conspiracy narrative whilst it's true that the real charles warren was a freemason you shouldn't read too much into it so was richard pryor as for the idea that the police were compromising their own investigation for elaborate cover-up is ridiculous crime scene investigation was in its infancy at the time as well as the metropolitan police they were the world's first modern and professional police force and yet they were only established in 1829 so quite naturally a case like this investigating the world's first modern serial killer it was going to throw them through a bit of a loop anyway let's wrap this up what are my final impressions with from hell i think it lacks direction it has cliched writing it has little respect for the graphic novel and especially not to the history they're both based on which makes me wonder if the source material is such a burden to your narrative then why even bother adapting it in the first place whilst the masonic royal family theory might be wrong it's still possible to adapt it as a storyline and be respectful to the time period which is why i would like to recommend instead that you watch the 1988 miniseries jack the ripper starring michael kane everything from hell gets wrong this gets right it's a must watch for every history buff well that about wraps it up my name is nick hodges and thanks for watching history buffs and remember if you like the show help the channel grow if you wish to support history buffs then you can now do so at patreon and as always let me know in the comment section what you thought about from hell and of course what historical movie should i review next in the meantime check out the history buff's twitter and facebook pages for new updates until then i'll see you next time [Music] you

Channel: undefined

Views: 1,773,733

Rating: 4.9053831 out of 5

Keywords: History Buffs, From Hell, johnny depp, ian holm, horror, heather graham, alan moore, from hell 2001, sir william gull, Whitechapel, Jack the Ripper, Cannonical Five, Review, Mystery, 1888, Victorian Era, Devil in the White City, H.H Holmes, Historical Accuracy, Historical Review, crime, walter sickert, annie chapman, elizabeth stride, catherine eddowes, mary jane kelly, mary ann nichols, east end, Michael Caine

Id: Lq0kJR8usNI

Length: 32min 28sec (1948 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 07 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/dekenfrost]

The part about jack the ripper was legitimately interesting, however the "review" of the movie which occupies the last fourth of the video seemed a bit unnecessary and I didn't care for it.

He said it himself, he used the movie as excuse to talk about jack the ripper and didn't really care for the movie anyway.

Now I'm not saying the movie is great, but he doesn't really talk about the movie in its own terms, but almost exclusively about how it isn't accurate and how all these small details were wrong.

I just don't see the value in this, he said himself that a lot of the theories about jack the ripper are vague, so what does it matter if the movie is inaccurate? Every movie about jack the ripper will be inaccurate to some degree. Not every movie has to be, or wants to be historically accurate and I never got the impression that it was very important for this movie.

All that said, I do understand this is for history buffs, so fair enough. From Hell also certainly wasn't a great movie and I appreciate the recommendation of "The Devil in the White City" which could be a much more interesting take on the Ripper.

[u/ChurchOSkatan]

Devil int he White City is a fantastic book. I don't read much non-fiction, but the story of the 1893 World's Fair interspersed with H.H. Holmes is just too intriguing to pass up.