Blood Brothers

From Hell is pretty grotesque at times, as the directors have married their love of bleeding bodies to the sticky visuals of Millennium Effects, who added all of the pointless but realistic gore to Spielberg's vulgar tantrum, Saving Private Ryan. Despite their affinity for gashed throats and butchered guts, however, the brothers avoid categorization with cheap slasher movies by delivering extremely impressive production values -- a horror show by way of Merchant-Ivory -- with a superbly somber score by Trevor Jones, performed by the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. If you leave before the stupid Marilyn Manson song blares over the end credits, the eerie authenticity will haunt you.

What's most impressive is the directors' refusal to blow their film into a high-concept mess. Unlike recent tripe like Jeepers Creepers (gay porn masquerading as a monster movie), From Hell wants to dig not only into the guts of the innocent, but into the complex entrails of history as well. After the success of this film, perhaps the Hughes brothers can turn their reactionary perspective -- and ours -- from the basic plight of the victimized underclass to the more intricate horrors of the well-heeled.