When Henry Jekyll's experiments with cocaine have gotten out of control, he transforms into the hideous Jack Hyde.As Hyde he searches the London streets at night for his prey in whorehouses and opium dens.The police can't catch him, he has nothing to lose but his mind.....The illness wasn't doing Perkins any good at this late stage in his life, but thankfully he puts i a grandeur performance in what other wise is a film with all style and no substance.By day, Perkins is the mild mannered doctor, just him, his wife, and a monkey in a cage with a shed load of coke.By night he turns into some sort of New Romantic anti hero, Lipstick and all, and the film turns into some sort of Hazy Fantasy Simon Le Bon would be proud of.And this is where it loses it's way. There s no real back up as to why the doctor sees that woman from the beginning. There is a hint that he is sexually repressed, but it's never really explored enough.We are just treated to the fact that Jekyll hates women due to something that happened to him, so when he turns into Phil Oakey from the Human League, he can unleash the beast.It's not a bad movie, just too eighties, if something could be that.Worth watching for Perkins.

Anthony Perkins plays Dr. Jekyll who after a lab incident caused by his guinea monkey turns him into the sinister Mr. Hyde. Soon the bodies start popping up all over London.The story is well known, but we get a little twist here. The twist being that Mr. Hyde is actually Jack the Ripper. I really liked the fusing of these two stories. It gave the film another dimension to it. Edge of Sanity is a surprisingly sleazy film too, thank goodness. One J.P. Félix is one of the two writers credited with the screenplay. This Félix is apparently actually one of smut peddler Jess Franco's many pseudonyms. It's hardly surprising then that we get regular doses of nudity and some not overly gratuitous violence. We even get the odd humor on occasion. Just watch as the rabid Mr. Hyde has bent a prostitute over the table inspecting her butt and we see her bored face. He's just another weird customer with a fetish. The script is pretty good, but without knowing exactly what, I still felt that a certain something to put it over the top was missing.Anthony Perkins shines as the star of the show. He balances nicely between the two personalities. Perkins has a very charming side, as we've seen in Psycho, which can change in an second. In this film his psychotic features are enhanced with make-up, giving him more of a wax figure look. It looks supremely creepy. In several instances he reminded me of the zombified Stephen from Dawn of the Dead (1978). The story is really a sad one. Dr. Jekyll is only a man traumatized during childhood years and his decent into madness starts off as an unfortunate accident. Jekyll is more a victim of circumstance than anything. He accidentally inhales the smoke from the broken glasses unaware of what the mix will do to him. Unfortunately for the good doctor the effects have fatal consequences. Jekyll's smoking device looks like a crack pipe. This film came in 1989, which was at a time when crack was at its height in the US. Edge of Sanity appears to be a cautionary tale covered in layers of filth. We see Perkins trying to resist it, but his demons get the better of him. His spiral downwards is very well depicted. We see the raving madman and a cold and calculating monster that is Mr. Hyde gradually taking over Jekyll. This is perfectly realized in a party scene, where the topic of freedom is brought up. Jekyll wonders what anyone really knows about freedom. "I thought I was free?" retorts one of the posh ladies. The doctor starts talking about freedom to do whatever we feel like. You see something you like and you take it. The other guests are a tad upset by this, but Jekyll rages calmly on. "You all act as if our manners, our morality, were handed to us by God." With skeptical eyes she replies: "But they are." Perkins continues: "No madam, they're not. We made them up by mutual agreement. But what if I don't agree?" He goes from the dinner table leaving the others in shock. There is a distinct flavor of Nietzsche's philosophy here, which is the rejection of morality as an absolute truth. I doubt Nietzsche would have approved Mr. Hyde's thoughts of doing whatever one feels like, but accepting that life is essentially meaningless is key. The other dinner guests' refusal to accept this makes them passive nihilists. The active nihilist on the other hand sees opportunity to build something instead of hiding in fear behind religion. Jekyll/Hyde is somewhere in between. He rejects God and morality, but instead of building he tears the world apart. And, fortunately for him, in a society as judgmental as this, who would expect that any well educated person could possibly be behind such atrocious crimes? The technical aspects of Edge of Sanity are simply outstanding! The camera-work is impeccable with lots of crooked angels, intruding close-ups of Mr. Hyde and smooth dolly shots. The lighting and use of colors are strong and vivid adding additional delirium. There are gorgeous set-pieces to feast our eyes on. You really couldn't ask for more. In a lot of ways this has an adult Tim Burton feel to it.Edge of Sanity is a nice and creepy horror film. For some reason, despite all its accomplishments I still felt slightly detached to it all. That however, shouldn't deter anyone looking for a sleazy horror with originality, a menacing Perkins and production values far beyond your normal fright flick.

This is a wonderfully twisted take, on Jekyll&Hyde, that's an underrated gem,with an imaginative story and an amazing performance from Anthony Perkins!. All the characters are just great, and it's also very sleazy as well, plus Anthony Perkins is simply amazing in this!. This has to be my favorite Jekyll&Hyde movie, and I thought it was very well made and written, plus this is one of Perkin's most underrated movies. Anthony Perkins is at his most bizarre here, and I absolutely loved it! and it does not have your usual type ending for a Jekyll&Hyde/Jack The Ripper type film, plus the makeup on Perkins was really cool. A lot of people complained this was too unpleasant and sleazy, however I disagree completely as it's refreshingly different for a Jekyll&Hyde film,plus this should be higher then 4.6 in my opinion. It also has a lot of creepy atmosphere as well, and the stalking scenes were great, plus the death scenes are very brutal and gory as well!. This is a wonderfully twisted take on Jekyll&Hyde, that's an underrated gem, with an imaginative story and an amazing performance from Anthony Perkins, and I say it's a must see!. The Direction is awesome!. Gérard Kikoïne does an awesome! job here, with excellent camera work, great use of colors, adding lots of creepy atmosphere, using effective stalking sequences, and just keeping the film at a very fast pace.There is tons of blood and violence. We get a nasty eye gash,bloody whip marks,bloody slit throats, slashed throats,bloody stabbings, stabbing in the forehead,bloody corpses,sink full of blood, slashing's,and lots of blood!.The Acting is wonderful!. Anthony Perkins is amazing as always and is amazing here, he is at his most bizarre, was wonderfully intense, had some great lines, played crazy like no one can, and as Hyde he is actually somewhat frightening, as Jekyll he is likable and innocent, and gave two really commanding performances, this is one of his best roles as far as i'm concerned! (Perkins Rules!!!!!!!). Glynis Barber is beautiful and does excellent as the wife, she was very likable, and handled herself very well, I liked her lots. Sarah Maur Thorp is just plain creepy as Susannah, and gave me the creeps, she was very convincing. Rest of the cast do fine. Overall a must see!. **** out of 5

*CONTAINS SPOILERS*Those who have been dogging Edge Of Sanity should have known what they were getting into before they watched this film -- the film summaries on the video packaging alone gave enough warning that this was going to be a twisted story full of perverse material. I for one am not afraid to say I really LIKE this film! I first saw it in an "unrated" edition on VHS back when it was first released on home video in the late 1980s, and I was enthralled. Now, MGM has released it on DVD in what I think is the closest to that unrated version there is, if in fact it is "re-edited" like the notice on IMDb. I wouldn't be surprised if this DVD edition was actually that original unrated version, as many titles have been showing up on MGM DVD in uncut editions with the original MPAA rating on the cover. While experimenting with anesthetics, Dr. Henry Jekyll accidentally inhales fumes from an altered drug. This unleashes not only ability to act out his inhibitions, it unleashes repressed sexual feelings he had experienced as humiliation during his childhood. He then goes on a killing spree, murdering prostitutes in the area (possibly to get back at the woman who laughed and taunted him in his childhood?). He also obsesses over a prostitute named Susannah that looks just like that woman from his past, and rather than kill her he relishes in her similarly shared dark nature when he gets her to inhale the drug. Note that near the ending, Johnny is hanging upside down while Susannah laughs maniacally, mirroring the opening scene. This brings the film full circle. It's a fascinating idea that Henry Jekyll/Jack Hyde is also Jack The Ripper.Yes, Edge Of Sanity is sinister, twisted, perverse, and trashy. It's also lavish, elegant, and beautifully done, and downright intriguing. The cinematography is excellent (the DVD is a vast improvement over the old VHS of Unrated and R versions), the costumes are a wow, and the music score is superb as well as appropriate to the scenes it enhances. A lot of imagination went into this production, and it's unfair to say it's an inappropriate film. I found it to be more disturbing and wickedly fun than the more recent FROM HELL (which was more a CGI visual feast) and more sexually appropriate than the grandiose arthouse T&A of EYES WIDE SHUT. There's a fair amount of sex, nudity (more full frontal male nudity in a bathhouse scene than the topless prostitutes combined), and even a hint of male bisexuality during Hyde's tryst with Susannah and Johnny. It also says a lot about how things haven't changed so much in society's decadence in issues of drugs and sex. The only thing that I found distracting was that during the rooftop scene, the actress playing the prostitute seemed to have breast implants, something I'm sure that is quite wrong in the context of the time the film is taking place!Anthony Perkins chews the scenery well, playing his part of Jack Hyde to the hilt. It would be hard to think of any other actor that could have carried this part so well. Those who adored him in Psycho, Pretty Poison, and Crimes Of Passion will find a lot to love about his role in Edge Of Sanity. For film collectors of the dark and sinister, this is a nice addition and I am happy that MGM has rescued this film from obscurity for a whole new audience to discover as well as make established fans like myself very, very happy.Call it trash if you want to, but it's quality, wicked, ELEGANT trash!