Post by Eddie Love on Nov 14, 2010 11:06:52 GMT -5
One of Anthony Perkins’ last starring roles, at least the last I recall being released in U.S. theaters, was the Jekyll & Hyde / Jack the Ripper mash-up EDGE OF SANITY. Made during the crack epidemic, the film recasts the Robert Louis Stevenson classic in terms of violent drug addition leading to crimes similar to the notorious Whitechapel killings. You can think of it as NEW JACK (THE RIPPER) CITY. It’s not entirely successful, or coherent for that matter, but it’s intelligent and unique. Oh, and it is really waaaaaay out there.
When first we see Perkins’ Jekyll, he’s a prosperous doctor with a lovely wife and an opulent house. He walks with a limp, and we see that’s he troubled by disturbing erotic dreams, which may be the byproduct of a new drug that he’s experimenting with, namely cocaine. He’s been testing its properties as an anesthetic and also using it on himself, not aware of the likelihood of addiction. When the lab monkey he’s also been testing on spills some chemicals and invents free-basing and crack, all Hell breaks loose for the good doctor. Divorced from any sense of conforming to the Victorian mores around him, he becomes unhinged and sets on a course of sexual debauchery and ultimately deranged violence.
With the opening scenes of Jekyll at his home and hospital, the film displays some low-budget period detail. However, when he’s on the pipe and hitting the city’s most decadent brothels, the tone and look shifts to the late 80s period of the film’s making. Shafts of neon pink light shine into dark alleyways from the windows of the nightspots Jekyll (now Jack Hyde) haunts. The denizens therein are dressed like New Romantic boys in eye shadow and New Wave party girls in fishnets and vinyl. There are only vague hints of the Victorian setting seen elsewhere in the film. This conceit is pretty bold, and executed with a fair amount of wit. When the erotic temperature goes up, things get really wild and may put you in mind of the bloodiest Madonna video ever.
And, damn, Perkins is game. He really goes balls-out in his scenes as Hyde, going way over the top and employing some animalistic tics along with almost silent movie physical emoting. Unfortunately, when he’s back as Jekyll he has some good moments, but we don’t really see him struggle with his realization of his dark side, as you see in most takes on the tale. (Which may be the point in terms of the film’s take on addiction.) We end up just seeing his grizzly Hyde scenes that get kind of repetitive, but are really intense and sexually specific, if not necessarily explicit.
I’m not sure what point the film is getting at here. If the notion is that drug addition can warp a mind to violence (that “crack is whack”) than that’s fine. But it seems to be suggesting that sexual abandon, or even perversity for that matter, necessarily leads to extreme anti-social behavior. For all the pictures kinkiness, that's a pretty reactionary take. Also, there’s lots of religious imagery which may be standard in shocking people in films of this sort, but I’m not certain if this was supposed to relate to the Jekyll character as it’s never suggested he’s especially pious. (When Perkins goes off in these scenes it put me in mind of his similarly sexually crazed Man of God in Ken Russell’s CRIMES OF PASSION.)
But frankly most of EDGE OF SANITY is over the top with a wild throw-everything-freaky-you-can-think-of-and-see-what-sticks aesthetic at work. It’s a frothing beaker of sex and violence and as such it boils over more than a little. But the essential take on addiction, and its tortured victims, is pretty strong – especially as we see it play out in the picture’s revisionist climax.
