The Matrixorcist

Rating: 6/10 (5 March 2005)

Demon fighter John Constantine, who literally has been to hell and back, battles it out against various creatures of the night in an effort to "buy" his way into heaven. In Constantine he helps a cop investigate her twin sister's suicide. This puts them in the middle of the battle between good and evil.
It's not easy to say so much about the plot, there isn't that much of it to begin with. Based upon a comic book, it suffers from an overload of exposition regarding characters and events. It never really evolves from being an introduction to a full fledged feature film. Still, I couldn't help liking it anyway.
The film looks great, for starters. It's dark and moody, the settings are pretty much stripped down to the bare necessities, and ...well, I kind of like that. The camera work gives the film an edge that works very well and makes it interesting to watch. Style over substance can be quite disastrous, but here it works just fine.
The acting is OK, I guess. Keanu is very uneven, though. Sometimes he really seems to be struggling, but from time to time, he's actually very good. I found Constantine's character pretty interesting, with a not always likable persona. I definitely wouldn't mind seeing more of him and the world he lives in. Of course, it would be nice if they could focus more on the script now that all the introductions are out of the way. Constantine is no masterpiece, but it's still fun if you're into this sort of thing. [6/10]