Product: Constantine [Blu-ray] (2012)
Rating: 3.0
Worth watching, but didn't blow me away.
My introduction to Alan Moore's John Constantine character was in Neil Gaiman's "Books of Magic". It was a series with incredible artists and writers, but the Constantine character from that story always stuck in my mind. Later I picked up "Hellblazer", since I had become a huge fan of the edgy style of Ennis and Dillon. After reading through those, along with Moore's "Swamp Thing", John Constantine grew to be one of my favorite comic characters. I knew last summer that Keanu Reeves was going to play Constantine, so I had enough time to deal with the fact that this movie was not going to follow the comic.This leads to my advise for those who are fans of the comic. If you can't watch this movie as an independent entity from "Hellblazer", you will hate the movie. It doesn't really come close to the comic. So, if you read that book and can't separate yourself, save your money. This also means that I am going to review this film as though I were someone who knows hardly anything about the comic.I think the movie was o.k. It was worth my money on a Friday night, or maybe a rental. I'll deal with the negative points first. Constantine isn't British, which I'm not too upset about. Since they seemed set on casting Keanu as Constantine, I'm glad that he didn't play him British. Have you seen "Dracula" or "Much Ado About Nothing"? I don't think I could have suffered through another film of Keanu struggling to do an accent. Keanu's acting is not very solid in this film, though he's not as bad as a lot of people are saying. I think he can, on occasion, act pretty well. He's great in "My Own Private Idaho", "Little Buddha", and "The Gift". Though, I think he rarely pulls off the action hero thing. He was pretty good in "Speed", and in the first "Matrix" (since he barely had any lines).The movie itself jumps around a lot. There are long spaces of nothing happening, and then suddenly a three minute action sequence or plot movement, followed by a lot of nothing again. It doesn't flow very well as a story. Characters pop in and out of the film without any real development. What was the deal with the fat priest or the bowling ally guy? Constantine's little side kick disappears for half the film and then comes back in the end when it's convenient. There sure seems to be a lot of easy ways to visit hell. Speaking of that, I was not entirely impressed with hell. It kept reminding me of the portrayal in that awful 1997 "Spawn" movie, with loud fire wind everywhere. Finally, CG is not scary. It can be (Gollum), but it takes a lot of money and time. The bug demon made me and my friend and laugh pretty hard. For a horror movie, I never really got the feeling that anyone was in real danger. This was the director's first movie, and sometimes it shows. His previous experience was making Will Smith and Britney Spears videos, so we're not talking about a Spike Jonze or Michel Gondry working on this movie.I give this movie a solid 3 stars, so there are some good points. I really dig Gabriel, and thought that was a well thought out character. Lucifer was menacing, though I think Viggo Mortensen in the "The Prophecy" was better portrayal of the character (since Lucifer is supposed to be a beautiful boy who can temp you). Speaking of that, the plot was pretty close to "The Prophecy", but I can't say more without giving away plot points. Anyway, if movies with magic, demons, hell, etc. interest you, "Constantine" isn't the best one for you to see; but it's not the worst either. If you have nothing better to do, then go ahead and see it. If not, I'm sure most people could probably wait to rent it. It might even be one of those films that's a little better watching at home.