A film about cliches (so don't expect much else)

Rating: 5/10 (17 May 2004)

This movie is only slightly better than that unwatchable mess, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. They're both quite comparable with each other.
While Van Helsing is visually impressive, and mostly fun, it's too stupid to recommend to anyone.
--If vampires could have babies like the rest of us, why would they all explode when their father dies? (an obvious plot cop-out)
--Who is Gabriel Van Helsing? What is the history behind him? They tried to tell us but then forgot about it.
--If Frankenstein's monster is such a badass, why is he always getting trapped or running away? I wanted to see him smash Dracula into little bloody meatballs.
The best feature of the film, and there's plenty of it, is Kate Beckinsdale's curves. She makes one of the best entrances I've ever seen, and eventually the pandering, topless-looking blouse she runs around in seems less crude and more like the cherries that top this banquet of fattening dessert.
Directed by Steven Sommers, Van Helsing also recalls his blockbuster Mummy movies (The Mummy, The Mummy Returns). Both of those films were great --and here's the proof. All of these features are about style over substance; about being fun rather than thought-provoking. But where Van Helsing is willing to lessen the depth of its script to the point where its entertainment value is barely skin deep --just so it can accommodate for more villains, The Mummy films were centered around only one villain, forcing them to write a script with deeper characters and better lines.