Van Helsing

[cornerofmadness]

Well since it has become apparant when Utah told me my interview was at noon they meant noon in Utah not noon in Florida so I've had time to write up my review of the movie.

Van Helsing, hmm what to say. It was pure eye candy and very little else. I’ll try to review without spoiling too much.

It was fun to look at but you really had to turn off your brain or it would get a Charlie horse. I know Hollywood couldn’t get period clothing right if their life depended on it and I can live with that...sort of. I thought Anna’s leather corset and high heeled boots were exceedingly stupid and inappropriate (but then again I’m not the one they want drooling over her) I mean, HOW does she run in ice and snow in three inch spiked heels. And let’s face it, Van Helsing’s clothing was stolen lock stock and barrel from Vampire Hunter D (heck for a while there I was afraid his big secret past was he WAS Dracula’s son and I probably would have walked out).
Clothing issues aside, I could accept the fantasy weapons like the gas powered cross bow machine gun (but boy, he needs to learn to aim) or the make-shift tasers and all the other stuff. It’s a fantasy story so I can forgive that and the hundreds of other anachronisms. I’ll admit it, I went to drool over Hugh Jackman and to look at the pretty special effects.
Now onto the movie. I disagree with the critics that said it had no plot. It had a plot. It just wasn’t a very strong one. The movie had way too much resemblance to League of Extraordinary Gentleman which is automatically a black mark in my book. Having Mr. Hyde as the opening villain was rather a yawn. And you can see how much James Bond the writers have watched since the story structure was lifted directly from it. A) we come in on the end of Van Helsing’s battle with a villain B) we go back to headquarters and get our new assignment C) Q gives out all the cool weapons our hero will be using in this movie (in this case Q is a friar who’s name escapes me at the moment). D) we got off on our new assignment E) Get a female love interest whether we need one or not.
I’ve got nothing against the James Bond set up. It works well enough. I liked the headquarters (the Catholic Church but it has a secret order that’s not just Catholics. Every religion you can imagine is bond together to eradicate evil. I LIKED that idea. Too bad more didn’t come of it). This movie offers a lot of laughs but I don’t think they MEANT to. Headquarters is one of them with the gate that drops down and won’t let Van Helsing out of the confessional.
We learn vital clues here. The biggest MacGuffin is the plot threads of a) the Valorious line has been trying to destroy Dracula for 400 years and they’re down to the last two of the line, Anna and her brother Valkan who’s missing and b) Van Helsing has no memory of his past and he’s doing this trying to regain his memory.
Van Helsing goes off but he takes Friar Q with him. Like Bond, Van Helsing’s rep is known everywhere he goes. The battle scenes spew out from here on in practically non stop. Like I said, it’s wonderful to look at. The special effects are great but they forgot they need a story worthy of having these effects. It got too busy. Dracula and his brides (who I really liked), Frankenstein’s Monster (who’s far more human in attitude in this) and werewolves (major plot points).
Without giving away any plot, let’s just say Dracula needs Frankenstein’s Monster to achieve a goal. This is the main plot. It’s relatively interesting if simple. Now if they had only reversed a few things like giving us Prince Valkan instead of Princess Anna as a partner to Van Helsing. Valkan was fun to watch. He’s a ballet dancer in real life and he could move so well. He was pretty too look at but they gave him so little to do I can’t tell you if he can act.
Kate Beckinsale (Anna) most definitely can’t. I’m sorry to any of her fans but quite frankly I don’t know how she gets roles. She can’t emote. She mumbles her lines in some kind of mush mouthed accent. She’s too perfect in appearance and her interactions with Jackman are sterile. Never once did I believe he felt a hint of emotion for this woman. Like I said, I would rather it be a male buddy picture than to suffer through this lame attempt to give Van Helsing a love interest. Beckinsale could have been coated in potassium and dropped into water and she STILL wouldn’t have had any chemistry.
But what really ruined it for me was her strength, agility and ability to never get hurt. I can believe this of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. This is explained why Buffy is so strong and heals so fast. Anna is a normal human being yet she flies through acrobatic moves pretty much impossible for most humans. She gets hits, dropped off roofs, dropped down shafts etc etc and not only is she never hurt, she’s never even bloodied except once. Hell she never even gets dirty or her hair messed up (Bless LoTR for proving you can make your heros dirty and damaged without losing their appeal. Van Helsing’s director should have taken note). It bothered me to the point of distraction. She never came alive as a real human. She never even slowed down a step when she was hurt. At least Van Helsing paused a bit from time to time (it’s tough to do action movies, I know that. We all know that no human could withstand what they’re showing but this was just over the top). She never even manage to look tough. She usually just came across as looking reckless.
There were so many other little things that bothered the crap out of me. The stagecoaches spontaneously catching fire (um, did Friar Q coat them with his TNT gel?), werewolves with retractable claws and the ability to stick to walls like Spiderman, Gypsies living in castles (I mean was there really a need to use the word Gypsy since it never really came into play as a culture or magic), electrical cables in 1888 running freely everywhere, the masquerade ball when suddenly hundreds of vampires appear from nowhere. I could go on and on.
There are some good points. Friar Q in spite of his scurrying like a rat way of walking, was decent comedy relief. Jackman does a good job with what he had to work with. The special effects were wonderful.
We of course get the typical Dracula knows Van Helsing’s secret so we have to wonder if he’ll kill Drac or not because of it. I won’t tell you that since it ruined the end. But I’ll give the end of the movie two things, it really delivered everything I wanted to see in this movie. One I won’t tell you about since it’ll spoil the ending. The other was, the subtle curving of Jackman’s ass barely clothed. I had to wait to the end to see it but oooo mama it was worth it.

Comments

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

We're ditzes.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

Yep