There was a mystery movie I saw in the late 80's. It started with women being murdered (torn apart) by something. It reminded me a lot of the "sleepy Hollow" movie with Jonny Depp. I'm not sure of the time, but I would guess it was in the early 1800's in Europe. The "something" that was killing the women was a tiger or lion is some type of armor. The bad guy trained the lion/tiger to go out and kill for him.
Do this ring a bell with anyone?