The Limehouse Golem

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source: The Limehouse Golem

Jane Goldman adapts Peter Ackroyd's novel. The film is a mystery with a false narrator that ends up being convoluted and uninspired with an uneven tone. Set in pre Jack the Ripper London of the 1880s. Scotland Yard police inspector John Kildare (Bill Nighy) investigates a series of grisly murders in the Limehouse area. Kildare discovers evidence linking playwright John Cree to the Golem murders and he wants to solve the cases before Cree's wife Elizabeth is hanged. She has been accused of murdering her husband. The film is lustily camp with suspects that include Karl Marx. However the misdirection never worked for me. It is watchable and clearly a labour of love for the director working with a low budget.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie and you will too. I love period pieces and i love detective stories. This one had it all.

The movie evokes both the literary legacy of Sherlock Holmes and the historical saga of Jack the Ripper. The costuming and sets are wonderfully Victorian, and the identities of the potential Limehouse Golem are all taken from real life with the exception of John Cree (Sam Reid), who makes appearances in flashback sequences after the revelation of his death at the beginning of the story. There's even a connection made to the historical Ratcliff Highway Murders of seventy years prior, a pair of attacks on two separate families resulting in seven fatalities in 1811 London (the details of which were not referenced in the story). The mention of Karl Marx (Henry Goodman) as a murder suspect was particularly compelling if not amusing, given his notoriety as a philosopher and revolutionary socialist. Dan Leno (Douglas Booth), in fact, was a leading music hall comedian and actor of the era, while George Gissing (Morgan Watkins) was a prolific English novelist. Introducing these real life figures into the plot of a murder mystery was rather clever, each given an opportunity to be seen as the Limehouse Golem in action before the eventual reveal. The film does skirt the horror genre to a degree, with gruesome images of mutilated bodies that guide detective John Kildare (Bill Nighy) onto the trail of his quarry, even as the prime suspect is the only one we ever need to care about. Lizzie Cree (Olivia Cooke), for all of her innocence, troubled background and proper behavior, evokes a sympathetic response from the viewer until the final sequence of reenactments testifies to her identity as the title character.

A father and son are in a car accident. They both are taken to the emergency room. When the boy is taken by stretcher to his emergency operation, the surgeon says, "I cannot operate because he is my son." How is this possible? I was reminded of this riddle all throughout watching The Limehouse Golem, an atmospheric and detailed Victorian era mystery. In it, a series of murders have scandalized the east London district that bears the film's name. Inspector Kildare (Nighy) is put on the case partially out of political convenience. "The public needs fresh blood," says the power hungry Inspector Roberts (Sullivan). To whit Kildare is primed to be Scotland Yard's newest scapegoat. As luck would have however, Kildare comes to believe the serial murders are linked to another case – that of a young actress, Lizzie Cree (Cooke); accused of poisoning her husband (Reid). Can the embattled Inspector crack the case before Lizzie is sent to the gallows? Despite having the pedigree of a slightly cheaper Downton Abbey (2010-2015), the atmosphere of Limehouse Golem is surprisingly layered. The squalid city streets, the busy wings of the burlesque, the hallowed halls of the Limehouse Library (really the John Rylands Library in Manchester) all shot with foreboding beauty in mind. Likewise the camera glides seamlessly between scenes of murder and actors weaving macabre recreations of current events. Theater, so it seems, is its own form of alchemy and director Juan Carlos Medina is determined to show off what jewels he can create. Yet while the film does its due diligence to build its case, the main conceit can't help but leave the impassive viewer uninspired. Don't get me wrong, the plot makes sense but this is a police procedural with a capital P. And as with any police procedural, much of the case is spent trying and failing to create a working scenario with a diverse array of suspects based on the clues provided. Depending on your investment you may just be frustrated that Kildare and his lapdog Constable (Mays) aren't barking up a different tree. If however you're old-school flabbergasted by the big third act reveal, chances are you walked into a mystery movie by mistake. So essentially the mystery doesn't live up to its own hype but the good news is the acting definitely does. Bill Nighy and Douglas Booth are fabulous as always with Booth stealing all the best lines as a vaudeville star and Lizzie's effeminate best friend. The real takeaway however is Sam Reid as John Cree the husband who may or may not be the titular bloodthirsty Golem. While remaining a suspect throughout the film's nearly two-hour run time, Reid remains effortlessly charming. He subtly reveals through action that his character has plenty to hide and can play multiple versions of himself (depending on the narrator) with aplomb. Olivia Cooke likewise gives a stunning performance though because she narrates large swaths of the story proper, she isn't given as much an opportunity to show rather than tell. Considering the movie is based on a novel written by Peter Ackroyd, Limehouse could have been far more of a trial than it ended up being. Thankfully Jane Goldman's capable script and Juan Carlos Medina's affecting direction is the one-two punch needed to prevent The Limehouse Golem from being a gloomy trudge through Victorian England. It could have been a better mystery but at least its not as airless as it could have been.

This is a sumptuous, beautifully produced period horror drama. It reminds me of the kind of carefully crafted historical chillers the BBC sometimes produces for the autumn audience, the like of which receives acceptable ratings against the talent show dross elsewhere on mainstream television, and receives complaints from the cavilling general public for being 'too dark'. I love it: the smoky charnel houses, the rain and waste-strewn cobbles, the dim light, class divides, penny dreadfuls, pox-ridden low-lives, music hall drabs, salty gags, cockney peelers, pea-soupers and the streets of London 'running red with blood.' Dan Leno (Douglas Booth), a kind of Victorian Russell Brand, takes an avuncular interest in young Elizabeth Cree (Olivia Cooke), who is under suspicion for murdering her husband. Inspector John Kildare (Bill Nighy in a role originally taken by the late Alan Rickman) has evidence that her husband may be the legendary murderer 'the Limehouse Golem', and is determined to save Elizabeth from a date with the gallows. There are those who say Bill Nighy only ever plays himself. I think there is truth to this, but when you have cornered the market so brilliantly, why step outside of it? Here, he is exceptional as always as the Inspector, with much support from the excellent Daniel Mays as Constable George Flood. In a small role Damien Thomas (Count Karnstein in Hammer's 1971 'Twins of Evil') plays heavily bearded Soloman Veil. Maria Valverde is wonderful as the arch Aveline Ortega. A terrific twisted, twisty tale admirably directed by Juan Carlos Medina. Well worth your time.

If marks were awarded for 'gimmick' element this would be a finalist offering as it does a Victorian time zone, unsubtle nods to Jack The Ripper and a backdrop of Music Hall which was, of course, at its height at the time and for good measure Dan Leno, a real headliner in the Music Hall, is a character in the story. Given ingredients like these even an upside-down cake could hardly fail to rise yet Jane Goldman's screenplay strives for mediocrity and is played for much more than it is worth by the likes of Bill Nighy, Eddie Marsan, Henry Goodman etc.Essentially it's a string of red herrings suspended from a line of clichés albeit it appears to have its champions.