A disturbingly bad idea...

Rating: 1/10 (10 October 2004)

The idea for a sequel to the woefully miscast 1990s production of Dracula had been floating around for some years when the decision was made to make Van Helsing younger and turn him into a mercenary. Anyone who is aware of how religious fanaticism and science were virtually at war in the nineteenth century can see how inane this idea is. Hollywood makes its Christian ownership all the more obvious, however, by failing to recognise this basic fact.
That aside, the story started out well, with a raid upon the Frankenstein manor culminating with Dracula and the monster taking off to parts unknown. The problem is, once the titular hero is introduced, it is all downhill. The most profound example of the film's lack of respect for the audience's intelligence lies in the scene when Van Helsing meets Whatshername. As the harpies come out of the woodwork to assault the town, Van Helsing sets about taking them down with an automatic crossbow. So far, so good, but the way in which Van Helsing fires, one would be hard pressed to credit him with being able to hit the sidewalk using a can of paint. Naturally, no villagers are killed by friendly fire despite the fact that hundreds of crossbow bolts are fired in every direction.
It gets worse from there. Much, much worse. One of my favourite scenes is the vampire egg-hatching sequence. Seriously, our heroes just wander through this area with no regard for what might happen if they are discovered. The usage the villains get is incredibly uneven, too. The Frankenstein monster is little more than a plot device, and the Werewolf is only there to facilitate how Dracula is brought down. Making this all about Dracula might have worked if Dracula had not been so incredibly non-charismatic.
After Underworld, Kate Beckinsale needed to appear in something decent fast before she killed her career. Van Helsing is therefore the definition of a bad career move. If Beckinsale is capable of defining her characters through anything other than costume changes, she'd best prove it in her next appearance. Van Helsing sure hasn't done David Wenham any favours, either. The goofy sidekick routine is now so old and tired that he starts being annoying as soon as his character is introduced, and never really stops.
I won't get into the use of special effects here, as while they were quite obviously the focus of the film, they aren't the real problem. Nor is the acting as such, although obviously it didn't work against the limitations of the material. The problem here is that the story was given about as much thought as a pop song, if that. Even after watching the film for a second or third time, one is hard pressed to remember the precise details of the story. The words "tacked on" can be used a lot to describe some plot elements, with the final fight between Van Helsing's group and Dracula being convoluted beyond belief. It's almost like time slows down during this part of the film.
I gave Van Helsing a one out of ten. After such fun pieces as The Mummy, one would have expected something better out of Stephen Sommers. With this film, he gets dangerously close to the status of one-trick pony. It defies belief that Hollywood wonders why ticket sales are not rising to meet production budgets when they are spending said budgets on dreck like this.