"Now let us give NO thanks for this overcooked turkey!"

Rating: 3/10 (12 October 2005)

If Tom Servo had popped his little gumball-machine head up in a silhouette during "Constantine," he probably would have voiced my opinion precisely: "What pretentious crap!" (from "Pod People," by the way).
This film brought me to one conclusion about mortality, however: I really have to stop trusting the recommendations of people who liked "Resident Evil," for that film and its kin ("Constantine" most definitely included) do nothing but leave a hollow hole of regret in my brain at 2 potentially productive hours put to waste.
Anyway, the perpetually stoic Keanu Reeves (who certainly looks good, even if he still can't act) is a cheap "Noir" demon-dispeller named John Constantine; early on, he performs an exorcism on a girl bound to a bed while Max von Sydow leads a chorus of "The Power of Christ Compels You!" Later on, when one of Constantine's in-the-supernatural-know buddies is consumed by killer flies, Rod Steiger drops by with a message of: "For God's Sake, Get Out Of The Bowling Alley!" Non-actor Gavin Rossdale shows up a few times, proving that there IS life after Bush (he also looks smashing in a suit!). People sprout ostentatious CGI 'wings' or rotting faces in an attempt to remove all metaphor from who is 'good' and 'bad.' Near the end, Constantine massacres a bunch of demonic minions in a hospital in what looks like any given screen shot from "Doom"; shortly after, Satan himself shows up, and you almost think director Francis Lawrence (who, by the way, is a music video auteur by trade) is going to pull a "Joel Coen" out of his seemingly limitless bag of cinematic tricks...but of course, he doesn't. The cinematography is initially unique, but quickly deteriorates into obtuse, showy obnoxiousness and whiplash edits. Rachel Wiesz plays a cop whose twin sister commits suicide...or does she? And more importantly, do I care? Not really, which means the style "Constantine" so tenuously floats on gets old and disingenuous fairly quickly.
Now, I usually allow a certain amount of leeway for comic-book-to-film adaptations, especially in light of recent triumphs like "Sin City," which went to great lengths to reproduce the printed page. Logic and backstory doesn't have to be forthcoming (or necessary at all) if the characters are at least somewhat well-drawn and the story possesses a modicum of interest. "Constantine" is a mumbo-jumbo mess from start to finish, with a story that seems to have been lost (or at least truncated) in translation, an overkill of CGI effects, and a running time that drags like a one-legged zombie in a science lab...