Ridiculous film should have stayed a comic book

Rating: 3/10 (27 February 2005)

As movie viewers are plagued every year with comic book stories being turned into films it shouldn't come as a surprise that the efforts are becoming more and more pathetic and desperate. This film is arguably the worst and it's one of those projects that clearly wasn't made for the purpose of entertainment and instead it's churned out by studios for a reason to try and make money. Story is about a demon fighter named John Constantine (Keanu Reeves) who chain smokes and coughs up blood because of lung cancer but he also starts to notice that the demons he is combating are trying to cross the line from Hell to the living on Earth.
*****SPOILER ALERT***** Police detective Angela Dodson (Rachel Weisz) goes to Constantine for help after her twin sister supposedly jumped to her death but she believes that there is something else going on and needs help investigating it. Constantine explains that there are half breeds living on earth and that a good balance is needed to keep them in line but with a half demon named Balthazar (Gavin Rossdale) and the treacherous angel Gabriel (Tilda Swinton) looming around Constantine's instincts turn out to be true after the Spear of Destiny is found.
This film is directed by Francis Lawrence who has never made a film before and has only directed music videos which would account for the look of the film. If you saw the trailer than your not going to be surprised by anything this film delivers except how ridiculous this really is. About every 10 or 15 minutes Reeves has to explain what he's doing and how he's going to do it and you start to think that he's making it up as he goes along. I can't describe just how much religious/supernatural mumbo jumbo that takes place here and if the story wasn't silly enough the dialog is also a joke. When Constantine is talking to Gabriel about trying to end up in heaven viewers are treated to some real pearls of wisdom as Gabriel looks at him and utters "your f****d!". Reeves is not a bad actor but he seems truly uninspired and if anyone can show me the difference between his performance here and his performance in the Matrix films than I welcome the feedback because it seems to be the same one note effort. Peter Stormare is a wonderful character actor but his Satan comes across as anything but daunting as he wears a white suit and has a thick lisp like Tennessee Williams. I never read the comic book "Hellblazer" that this is (supposedly) based on but it has to come across better than this CGI laden film. If the thought of Reeves pulling out brass knuckles and punching a demon trying to cross over intrigues you than maybe you'll be entertained by this. But for more discernible film viewers this is a nightmare come true and represents the very worst of Hollywood.