Review: "Van Helsing" (2004)
You may have noticed something about most reviews of "Van Helsing" available right now: They're all basically the same, but the "ratings" are different. Without exaggeration, there are two kinds of reviews for this film: Reviews that say "It's nothing but monster fights, I hated it" and reviews that say "It's nothing but monster fights, I loved it."
Here is that rare sort of pop-entertainment that Hollywood used to be the world's leading expert in: A film that can really only be liked or disliked in and of itself. There's no message, no "movement," no subtle subtext by which to aid or detract from one's enjoyment: You either LIKE a giant-scale action-epic in which a gunslinging superhero navigates the battle between Count Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster and The Wolf-Man, or you DON'T like it.
Hugh Jackman, who I'm now indeed ready to forgive for "Someone Like You" and "Kate & Leopold," stars as the title hero culled loosely from the pages of Brahm Stoker's orginal "Dracula" where he appeared as an elderly vampire expert. THIS Van Helsing is a Vatican-sponsored monster-hunter with no memory of his immediate past (much the same as Jackman's other hero, "X-Men's" Wolverine) who takes out The Forces of Evil in a manner that suggests Indian Jones and gear that suggest a Victorian 007.
Dispatched to Transylvania with sidekick Friar Carl (David Wenham), Van Helsing's mission in this film (after polishing off a "guest-starring" monster I won't reveal) is to track down and destroy Count Dracula (Richard Roxburgh) before he can kill Anna Valerious (Kate Beckinsale,) a female vampire-hunter and last in a bloodline sworn (thusfar unsucessfully) to destroy The Count before he can execute his Master Plan.
That Dracula's "Master Plan" in this reads like something a gang of pre-teen monster movie fan came up with during a marathon session of action-figure makebelieve is evocative of how smile-inducingly "wacky" the whole thing is. In brief: After 400 years of carrying-on with his sexy trio of Vampire Brides, Drac's castle is (literally) dripping with "Alien"-style pods containing his unborn vampire offspring. To bring his brood to life, Dracula is seeking the scientific reanimation secrets locked inside the missing Frankenstein Monster. Aiding The Count in this quest are Frankenstein's ex-assistant Igor (Kevin J. O'Connor) and The Wolf-Man employed as a VERY effective bodygaurd.
If you can read the above description and the word "COOL!" does not escape your lips at least once, you really have no business expecting to like this movie. It's as simple as that.
This is a monster movie for people who love monster movies. Director Stephen Sommers loves monster movies, and he's made it something of an artistic mission to get MORE monster movies onscreen. His results, thus far, have been mixed: "Deep Rising" is a solidly-cool giant squid yarn hampered by some unfortunate special effects. "The Mummy" was a slick reworking of the Universal Monsters mainstay, while "The Mummy Returns" suffered from fight-scene overkill. "Van Helsing" is a return to form, perhaps not as good as "The Mummy" but definately close. It may be an odd distinction, but it's a fact: Sommers makes the best big-budget summer-movie revamps of old-school monster franchises on the planet.
This is not to say that "Van Helsing" is perfect, it's not. It's stuffed to the brim, often to the point where it begins to feel cluttered, but I'll always take a film that's trying too hard than not hard enough. The pace is certainly a marvel: a 2 1/2 hour film that goes by like a quick breeze. The problems of "Van Helsing" are the problems that tend to come standard with a Monster Team-Up movie, and frankly I wouldn't have it any other way.
Jackman again cements himself as a natural for action roles. Van Helsing, by necessity of plot (and hoped-for franchise) is so mysterious that he's not even afforded a first name until halfway through the film, and with a lesser actor this mystery could've read as lack of development. But Jackman finds a solid hold within his character's minimal dialogue and disaffected "been-there-staked-that" sulk. He's smart enough to know that the film is hinging more on his ability to look cool in a cowboy hat than on character nuance, but he doesn't talk down to the material.
Humor is left to the supporting characters: Wenham (in a COMPLETE 180 from his turn as "Faramir" in Lord of The Rings) is the most endearing "comic relief" foil in awhile. O'Connor, an underutilized character actor and friend of Sommers whom the director usually casts in "the Igor role" in these films finally gets to be THE Igor, and he doesn't so much dive into the role as he does cannonball.
Sample Exchange: Dracula: "Igor, why do you torment that beast ::The Wolfman:: so?" Igor: "It's what I do."
The dramatic roles fall on Beckinsale, who has probably never looked more drop-dead gorgeous than she does here as a bodice-clad swordswoman saddled with the sexiest faux-German accent in recent memory; and Schuler Hensley as the Frankenstein Monster, who takes the pathos and self-pity ever associated with the role to such operatic heights of exaggerated melodrama that it nearly renders the characters steam-belching mechanical appendages and exposed, spark-throwing, glass-domed brain to near-subtlty.
And then there's Roxburgh, who plays Dracula as though he was offered money by Gary Oldman to make HIS scenery-chewing turn as the Count look reserved and introspective by comparison. Pacing up and down walls, morphing into a huge man/bat hybrid and engaging in some of the most surreal crazy-people-arguing scenes ever with his emotionally unstable Brides, Roxburgh here gives the best "on another PLANET than the rest of the movie" bad-guy effort since Alan Rickman in "Robin Hood."
What more can I really say? This is a movie where handsome heroes and droolicious heroines battle werewolves, vampires and other monsters in giant gothic castles, sprawling dance halls and mad science labs full of whirring turbines and explosions of sparks using crosses, garlic, stakes and gas-powered "automatic crossbows." I LIVE for this stuff. This stuff makes me go to the movies. This stuff makes me want to MAKE the movies. If you're at all like that, you'll probably get a kick out of this.
Highly reccomended, just tons of fun.
NOTE: While it won't get the film confused with being high-art, "Van Helsing's" ending is "unexpected" enough to have prompted the studio ask critics not to reveal details. I agree with them. Anyone who spoils the surprising events of the MASSIVELY kick-ass 3rd act of "Van Helsing" is being profoundly uncool. For what it's worth, the finale of this film houses two of the most pleasant and (for summer-action cinema) "gutsy" surprises I've seen in a movie this year.
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