Not as bad as they say ...

Rating: 6/10 (6 April 2005)

Partly because I'd heard in so many reviews that this movie was awful, and party just because it was one of the biggest flops of the year, I didn't have very high expectations of this one. Perhaps that's why I enjoyed it so damn much.
This movie follows the story of Doctor Gabriel Van Helsing, who we all know from Bram Stoker's Dracula as an ageing professor who takes on the evil count. Here, however, he is a young and handsome demon hunter / acrobatics expert with an array of cool weapons. In the opening scene of the movie we see Doctor Frankenstein, under the supervision of Dracula, bringing his monster to life while the torch-wielding peasants are already storming his castle. Meanwhile, Van Helsing takes on Mr Hyde in the Notre Dame Cathedral. These scenes pretty much set the tone of the whole thing. The plot has absolutely no internal consistency, but when the film looks this good, how much does it really matter? ... yes, it's stupid, but if you can get in the right frame of mind it can also be a lot of fun.
The acting unfortunately isn't that great ... Hugh Jackman isn't really given a whole lot to work with as far as his Van Helsing character is concerned, and for the most part he simply gives his 'Wolverine' performance all over again, especially towards the end. Kate Beckinsale is a fine actress and has the perfect face for Gothic horror, as best shown in Underworld, but here with her silly Transylvanian accent and looking like Catherine Zeta Jones, it just doesn't work. Probably the most memorable performance comes from David 'Faramir' Wenham, who provides most of the comic relief as Van Helsing's bible-bashing sidekick.
In terms of special effects it's pretty amazing -- this movie did, after all, have a ludicrous amount of money thrown at it ($160 million), but perhaps relying so heavily on CGI was a mistake. Many directors have said that if an effect can be achieved physically, often that's the best route to take. And here, the computer-generated stuff is at times very distracting as rather than being involved in the plot you're sitting there thinking, "Oo, doesn't that creature look good?" The soundtrack is also very cool (even the bits stolen from "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade").
It's unfortunate that this wasn't the box-office hit it was clearly intended to be, but if you're in the mood for a big, stupid, fun action movie that makes no sense and has absolutely no point to it, this one is as good as any.