Disastrous

Rating: Null/10 (26 November 2004)

I know Stephen Sommers had previously directed "The Mummy" (which i enjoyed) and i knew this would not be a film for the Oscars so to speak. My expectations were rather low in other words, or rather i was expecting an entertaining adventure ride since Sommers could previously deliver on that. But Van Helsing is not an entertaining ride. It's a train-wreck!
Van Helsing is the Vatican's premier monster-hunter. Now the Valerious family is in trouble. They swore that they would destroy the vampire Dracula, if they didn't none of their family-members would ever enter heaven. Now only two members of the family remain and Van Helsing must help them, otherwise the family will be doomed forever.
Van Helsing sure doesn't lack action. There is shooting, fencing, kicking and fighting going on throughout the whole running time. It also doesn't lack CGI as almost every scene is filled with CGI of a varying quality. Some of it looks exceptionally good, while some of it is simply terrible. Maybe they ran out of money somewhere?
Of the actors, Hugh Jackman is the only one that really works in his role as Van Helsing. Probably because he seems relaxed and at ease. Everybody else is terrible. Especially Kate Beckinsale as Anna Valerious and Richard Roxburgh as Dracula. Their characters are a mess of stiff acting and horrible accents.
Still. The acting is a minor distraction in this mess. Worse is the complete lack of coherence. Everybody runs around, screaming and fighting, and you never ever get a feel for a single character or what the movie is about. Rather it's loosely connected action scenes put on top of each other. I feel that if i had seen this while i was still 12 years old i may have liked it. But now it's just a lot of noise with no substance. I rate it 3/10 and hope they never make a sequel.