Writer: Stephen Sommers
Director: Stephen Sommers
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Kate Beckinsale
Rated: 12a
Running Time: 131 mins
Trailer: Quicktime, Various Sizes
Tagline: The One Name They All Fear

Van Helsing is a splitter. It’s the sort of film that is going to divide opinion in many different ways. People will love it, people will hate it, and some people will go ‘errrr’.

The film centres on Van Helsing (bet you hadnÂ’t guessed that), a monster hunter who works for an ancient order made up of clerics from various religions. This orderÂ’s purpose is to destroy evil in the name of God, and Van Helsing is the guy who does the dirty work. Many of you will know that Van Helsing is the name of the vampire hunter in Bram StokerÂ’s Dracula. The character in the film is an extremely loose adaptation of that character. He hunts monsters, thatÂ’s about where the resemblance ends.

Anyway, Van Helsing has no memory of his life before he started working for the cult and when the order tells Van Helsing that he must travel to the evil-tainted lands of Eastern Europe to save a family of gypsies from eternal purgatory, they dangle the possibility of finding out who he really is in front of him. Of course he goes, and thatÂ’s where the film really begins.

ItÂ’s a ratherÂ… schizophrenic film. It really doesnÂ’t seem to know what it wants to be. When it starts, the Universal logo becomes black and white, and weÂ’re taken into a very kitsch scene chronicling the birth of FrankensteinÂ’s Monster. This scene is, as I said, very kitsch, itÂ’s pretty much comedy. As the film goes on, it starts to take itself more seriously, and by the end it wants to be tragic. DoesnÂ’t work particularly well. Having said that, it is evident that Stephen Sommers loves the source material heÂ’s adapting. The film is imbued with a sense of glee, and it is pretty much a live action cartoon. Which suits me fine, I love cartoons. But it does definitely have an element of cheese in it and that will put many people off. This isnÂ’t helped by the dialogue which is average at best, and bad at worst.

Performance wise, itÂ’s a mixed bag again. Richard Roxburgh (Moulin Rouge, Mission: Impossible II) plays Dracula well over the top, hamming it right up. ItÂ’s probably best he did, the script wouldnÂ’t have allowed it to be carried seriously, but still, if you donÂ’t like cheese, you wonÂ’t like this. Kate Beckinsale (Underworld) is satisfactory as the heroine and Hugh Jackman shines in the title role. In X-Men and X-Men 2 we got a glimpse of Jackman playing the action hero, and he was good. But here the spotlight is directly on him and he fits the action man role to a tee. He really does carry it off well. The pity is that this film isnÂ’t good enough to take his talent and propel him to superstardom. Bad luck Hugh, try again next time.

Visually, the film is a treat. There are some huge, lavish set pieces, ranging from elegant ballrooms to black, cold Transylvanian vistas. The costumes are equally well made. The special effects are good too. IÂ’m sure many people will say that they (especially Hyde at the beginning) donÂ’t look real. And no, they really donÂ’t, but itÂ’s progress. The Wolfman looks especially good. IÂ’ve never seen computer generated fur look so good, which is cool, because it means if they can do a good Wolfman now, theyÂ’ll be able to do a great Beast in X-Men when they want to. Money was poured into this film, and it shows. The music is also very good, itÂ’s a soundtrack that will be worth getting on CD.

All in all, I really enjoyed this film. I like to eat up cheesy action films, and I liked the way it was like a live action cartoon on steroids. ItÂ’s just a shame that the dialogue and directing was sub-par, because those elements could have elevated an average film to be a great film.


(Edited by Maffrew 07/05/2004 14:31)