A few thoughts: A curious sort of failure, this drama/thriller does enough things right to keep it from being bad, but drags so much and becomes too bizarre to really stand out in any sort of good way. Conceptually this is a difficult sort of story to try to tell in any medium, as the primary sense it tries to convey is scent. A tricky thing to work into a visual and auditory art form, but they somehow manage. The performances are also (mostly) pretty great, with Ben Whishaw convincingly playing the titular murderer and Alan Rickman of course doing a great job in his supporting role as one of the people hunting him down. The biggest surprise, though, is Dustin Hoffman. He's awful in this movie. As I mentioned before, the running time becomes a serious problem, as by 90 minutes in I was ready for the movie to start winding down. But there was almost an entire hour left. All in all, I can't help but to call the movie a failure, even though I kind of liked it. It was a curious movie with cool visuals, a few good performances, and an interesting concept, but it more than wore out its welcome and ended on a ridiculously confusing note.
Fans of the conceptually bizarre who enjoy Sweeney Todd-esque horror stories with fine attention to period detail.
My grade: C-
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