Review of 10 Rillington Place (1971) by Mark S — 09 Nov 2007

I saw this again the other day for the first time in years, and it was just as disturbing as I remembered it being. Richard Attenborough is eerily convincing as serial killer John Christie, and John Hurt is brilliant as the simple man who loses his wife and young child to Christie's deviance and is then duped into confessing to their murders.

The film doesn't look too deeply into why Christie did what he did, but then again, neither did society at the time the murders took place. When Christie was eventually caught and justice was delivered, he was quickly executed without any proper psychological studies taking place.

The film itself is more a documentary of the facts (and some speculation) that existed at that point in time, and is based largely on the book of the same name. It's a well-handled film, and whilst perhaps biased in its obvious stance against the death penalty, does a good job of implying the evil that existed in Christie without being too graphic.