istuart0

In the late 1980's I went on holiday for three weeks to Thailand. And, as I always do, I took several books with me. One of the books was "Jack The Ripper: The Final Solution" by Stephen Knight. It was published in 1984. In the book, almost every painting that Patricia Cornwell identified as having clues that Sickert was Jack The Ripper, are also analysed in the Knight book. Knight also implies strongly that Sickert could have been the Ripper. I find it somewhat disingenuous that at no point in this documentary did Patricia Cornwell ever mention that the Sickert connection had already been postulated nearly twenty years before she began her "research". In my humble opinion, her book (that she says cost her over $6,000,000) could not possibly have been written, nor the documentary made, had Stephen Knight not written his book first.

I first came across these two harpies when I read Kenneth Anger's superb "Hollywood Babylon". His waspish descriptions of this brace of bitches is both hysterically witty and makes you eager to learn more about them. I bought "Hedda and Louella" by George Eells from The Strand book shop in New York but found it rather plodding - I didn't wade too far into the tome. Apparently, this film is based on that book and I was hoping it would be a condensed precis that would make me re-engage with the book, but it didn't. My word, is it dull! The script is dull, the direction - is there any? - is dull and the performance of most of the actors with the exception of Dame Liz and Richard Dysart (who disappointingly plays Louis B. Mayer as a human being instead of the baby eating ogre Kenny Anger makes him out to be). Oh for the film version of "Hollywood Babylon"!