Edge of Sanity (1989)

Robert Louis Stevenson's 'The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde' has to be one of the most filmed horror stories in the history of cinema, rivaling Bram Stoker's 'Dracula' for the number of versions made.  Consequently, the story had become over familiar, with film makers increasingly desperate to come up with variations of the novel's main theme.  Indeed, it was over familiar by the time Hammer had their first stab at the story with The Two faces of Dr Jekyll (1960), which gives us a taciturn reclusive Jekyll who turns, not into a monster, but a handsome (but cruel) playboy.  Hammer followed it up in 1971 with another variation, Dr Jekyll and Sister Hyde (1971), which introduced a gender twist into the transformation.  Other variations have included a blaxploitation version. Dr Black, Mr Hyde (1976) and Paul Naschy's Dr Jekyll and the Werewolf (1971), which sees the good doctor's Grandson using his serum to transform Naschy not only into his usual werewolf alter ego, but also Hyde-like sadist.  Which might make you think that, by the late eighties, the trope was completely played out - what other variations could film makers introduce in order to make any new adaptations distinctive and original?  Veteran schlockmeister Harry Alan Towers' solution was to pretty much abandon the original novella, save for the central concept and main characters, fashioning a new plot which sees Hyde become Jack the Ripper in a Victorian slasher movie.  Just to ensure that this would be a 'different' re-telling of the story, Gerard Kikoine, an admirer of Jesus Franco and director of erotica, took the director's chair.  The result was Edge of Sanity (1989).

As a satisfactory re-imagining of 'Jekyll and Hyde', Edge of Sanity falls well short, but nonetheless has many merits in its own right.  What is immediately striking about the film is its look and style.  Despite being set in what appears to be Victorian London, (although, in reality, it was mainly shot in Hungary and anachronisms in costumes and props abound), it's look has much in common with eighties pop videos - lots of back-lighting, strange camera angles, smooth tracking shots and close ups of the main characters' faces.  The sets, particularly Jekyll's lab, frequently have an impressionistic feel to them, their decor employing a limited palette of contrasting colours.  The overall result of director Kikoine's efforts is quite striking and gives the film a frantic and off-kilter feel.  The use of such a contemporary style helps emphasis the fact that, to those living then, the Victorian era was perceived as a time of modernity and scientific and technical progress.  The 'modernistic' theme is carried over into the action of the film, with Jekyll administering his serum not through a syringe or by quaffing it from a foaming beaker, but instead by smoking it in something that looks like a crack pipe.  The drug-like nature of this substance is made clear, as Jekyll's transformations into Hyde seem increasingly motivated by his need for another 'hit' of the drug and the subsequent 'high' it gives him in the form of Hyde's increasingly depraved experiences.  Moreover, later on in the film, as Hyde, he starts 'addicting' others to the substance via that crack pipe.  

Inevitably, bearing in mind the film's provenance, Hyde's particular sexual proclivities are driven by Jekyll's own deeply repressed sexual hang ups which, we see in an opening prologue, are born from a childhood incident which inextricably linked, in his mind, the sex, violent punishment, humiliation and voyeurism.  Crucially, the film departs from both the source novella and most other film versions, which present Hyde as being an expression of a primitive part of the personality so deeply sublimated that it never emerges consciously.  In Edge of Sanity, however, Hyde represents a part of the personality that is inextricably linked with the conscious mind, that is ever present, lurking only just below the surface, needing only the slightest catalyst to trigger it into being.  This is made explicit near the film's climax when Jekyll looks into a mirror and hallucinates the highlights of Hyde's depravities, but with Jekyll in place of Hyde, making clear that, in reality, there is no Hyde as a separate entity, it is all Jekyll.  Hyde is merely a persona through which Jekyll can enact his barely repressed fantasies of sex and violence.  Which, of course, puts a whole new light on the apparently saintly Dr Jekyll's work with the poor, most specifically with 'fallen women' - he might rationalise his motivation as being purely altruistic but, in truth, it is much darker.

Overall, Edge of Sanity lives up to its title as the film comes over as utterly bonkers, thanks, in no small part, to Anthony Perkins' performance as Jekyll and Hyde.  While he brings his trademark twitchiness and sense of awkwardness to Jekyll, his Hyde is completely insane: a leering, wild eyed and pasty faced sexual sadist, hell bent on taking the rest of the world with him on his demented ride.  He achieves the latter by forcing those who don't participate directly to watch, in an act of voyeuerism, thereby making them complicit.  After all, according to the film's own rationale, he is only enacting what they themselves really desire, but won't consciously admit to wanting.  Coming late in his career, (he would be dead within a couple of years), Perkins embraces his dual role with relish, cutting, slashing and raping his way through Victorian London.  The rest of the cast echo the theme of duality, with the actors playing the denizens of 'respectable' society giving relatively restrained performances, while those playing characters operating on the 'dark side' - madams, prostitutes, gigolos, etc - giving suitably outlandish playings of their characters.  

Edge of Sanity has endured a somewhat poor reputation, more often than not dismissed as cheap and tasteless exploitation.  More recent years, however, have seen it reappraised in some quarters.  Indeed, seen today, its good points are easier to see - the production design, lighting, stylish direction and enjoyably over-the-top performances give it the air of a far more expensive and classy production.  Its lapses, such as the evisceration of the source novella, are easier to forgive as, in retrospect, some of what it comes up with to replace this material is interesting and surprisingly thoughtful.  Of course, its main 'innovation', the conflation of Hyde with Jack the Ripper isn't really that original, Hammer's Dr Jekyll and Sister Hyde had pulled the same trick - although neither film's versions of the Ripper's murders bear any real resemblance to the events of the actual Whitechapel Murders.  Despite the art house look and psychological trappings of its script, Edge of Sanity never loses sight of the fact that it is an exploitation film, providing the viewer with gallons of gore, aces of bare female flesh and plenty of perversity.  What it lacks, though, is much in the way of suspense, tension or even simply pure shock sequences.  Its pace is too languid, matching its look, for it to work satisfactorily as a thriller.  That said, it is still a lot of fun, for Perkins' performance if nothing else, coming over like the bastard child of Ken Russell (prostitutes dressed as nuns is a recurring motif) and Jesus Franco. Edge of Sanity might not be particularly satisfactory as either an adaptation of 'Jekyll and Hyde' or as a Jack the Ripper thriller, but it remains a fascinating oddity that can be surprisingly rewarding to watch.