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| From https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYPAYoYK3Qvp7dJ781BCymxFv8LpARsM1Cm_0YqWoNyv98KzVw5hz4dOGQ89JCAF2PtwiLg1g-Ln7Ra1AlsTju3iwnAPkF4yDA9oc913PkYAKTW_xQ7an4J2YyrdfeLZZJH6c8Jz8UjboK/s1600/Van-Helsing-2004.jpg |
Dir. Stephen Sommers
Czeck Republic-USA
Film #20 of The ‘Worst’ of Cinema
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| From http://www.mattfind.com/12345673215-3-2-3_img/movie/q/a/p/van_helsing_2004_1920x1280_300240.jpg |
It seems logical to start
reviewing blockbusters like this as well as the art films and cultish (or
forgotten) movies I have covered so far. I have reviewed the Nicolas Cage film Drive Angry (2011) but that was an attempt at a grubby exploitation
film from the past than the phenomenon known as the blockbuster, B- (and even
C-) movie material that, whether a good film or not, has the budget of an
A-movie, and an illustrious choice of actors and people in the technical and
production areas of filmmaking to draw from. It is ironic to say this since a
lot of what these movies consist of – the explosions and action sequences, the
quick pace jumps in the plot to new dangers and situations, the gratuitous
special effects – are not that dissimilar to everything from old classic
Hollywood serials from the Poverty Row studios to straight-to-DVD pulp. Dare I
say that a lot of these films, especially with Van Helsing, are not that different from Sharktopus (2010) or even the rip-offs like Transmorphers (2007) aside from their streaks of seriousness and
the fact that, with their budgets and production staff, they cannot be made cheap
because of the craftsmanship behind them. That’s a pretty controversial statement
to make, but if a blockbuster is great, then I will celebrate its existence. This
is more of an acceptance that for all their cost to be made and their stars
they are just expensive, or over expensive, B-, C- or even Z-level ideas made
into movies. Some are good, some are masterpieces, but like the other grades of
movies, a lot of them are poor. These ones should not have the privilege of
countless DVD releases, or be the premier releases for new formats, considering
today’s review was viewed on a late HD DVD player, and never to be discussed about
in ways to suggest they were unforgettable signposts in cinematic history when
even the ordinary public, not stuck-up snobs like myself, though they were bad
on their release.
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| From http://image.hotdog.hu/user/sajuri/magazin/van_helsing_2004_1920x1280_823447.jpg |
This is significant with Van Helsing because it was an attempt
to celebrate the classic horror films of Universal
Pictures – B-movies that have yet grown to become important within the
canon of global cinema and pop culture, and with James Whales’ Frankenstein
(1931) quite justifiably so. At the right age demographic for the film when
it came out, I remember how much promotional and tie-in material was released for
Van Helsing, signalling how it was
one of Universal’s most important films
for that spring – a videogame, an animated side story released for domestic
viewing, and more interestingly, a grand scale re-release of the studio’s classic
horror films on double bill DVDs. I never saw the film at the cinema, missed
the tie-ins, and sadly never investigated the re-releases of the classic films
until a long while afterwards. Viewing this long after its release again - a
film I read about in the magazine Total
Film when I still read that magazine - is like viewing something through
the glass of a museum exhibit which I grew up side-by-side with.
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| From http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100420182518 /werewolf/images/8/88/The_Wolfman_from_Van_Helsing.jpg |
Without memories of his past
aside from a nobility to fight for good, Van Helsing (Hugh Jackman) is the top man for a religious organisation that rids
the world of evil beasts, warlocks or scientific follies. Sent to Transylvania
he must protect the gypsy princess Anna Valerious (Kate Beckinsale), one of the last of a family that have offered
their souls’ ability to go to Heaven to destroy the accursed Dracula (Richard Roxburgh), while the Count
himself plans to bring to life his undead offspring with the creation of Dr.
Frankenstein. If one doesn’t view
the film as a continuation of the classic Universal horror films, but its own
reinterpretation of mythological and literary beings, then this could have
worked. As with a lot of blockbusters of the fantasy and horror genre, as was
the case with Son of the Mask (2005),
one can see the production team – costuming, set designs, location scouts – do their
hardest to make something memorable. Like many genre films thankfully, there
are grains of great ideas and images within the film. One that stands out is
that the organisation Van Helsing works for is not just a Christian one, but in
scenes of the technological and weaponry workshop, has Muslim and Buddhist
members working together, depriving the
viewer with a tantalising concept both of these religious groups, in a
beautiful way, unifying together as equals against evil, and that a Christian
based character like Van Helsing could have gone against Asian mythological
demons and ghouls with their own set of rules and weaknesses. The look of the
film feels too stuck between the classic Universal
horror look and a glitzy blockbuster shine at points but in just the scope and
surface look of the film, it shows what it could have been.
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| From http://old.rapidimg.org/images/jB28g.jpg |
Sadly the film is bad, and I am
blaming most of it on the script for the core flaws. I feel guilty saying this
as director-screenwriter Stephen Sommers
dedicated this film to his father, but his script for Van Helsing is everything wrong I have encountered in blockbusters
put together. It’s far from the worst film I’ve seen generally, let alone in
this season of reviews, but still another example of incredibly generic and
tedious plotting, compromised further by having to match the beats and pace of
a blockbuster of that period of the early 2000s. Its biggest problem is that for
a film with a two hour and six minutes long length, it is empty and lacking in
even basis genre tropes and pops. A key aspect of Jackman’s character, of having nightmares of a long distance past,
is spoken of but never conveyed or shown at all for the viewer, making it far
more egregious than even the infamous porpoise line from the Adam West, feature length version of Batman (1966) which played that moment
for intentionally surreal hijinks. It may have been something looked into in
the animated spin-off from the film, but considering how obscure that has
become now, that would have been a terrible business decision on Universal’s behalf in leaving your
audience in the dark. There are so many coincidences, logic holes and inconsistencies
in the film that it’s impossible to enjoy the second or third time someone
manages to crash into a room by accident to save an ally from being attacked by
a monster. It’s not enjoyably ridiculous as Turkish Star Wars (1982) or Batman
& Robin (1998) for myself as, justifiably, such films are closer to the
intentional surreal structures of films like Luis Bunuel’s The Phantom of
Liberty (1974); their random tangents just by their appearance in the narratives
have an effect on the viewer even if they were unintentional and do not have
the deep messages and quality of a Bunuel
film. Van Helsing is just a mess without
any of the fun of other ‘bad’ films which have an unexpected and imaginative, exquisite
corpse nature to their haphazardness.
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| From http://skirmisher.com/uploads/images/van%20helsing%20vampire.jpg |
The extensive use of computer
animation is a severe issue as well. I am willing to give a lot more leniency now
for CGI, especially if one views blockbusters as the B-movies they truly are. The
problem is that, not only has it ostracised trades such as stuntmen and
practical effect artists from most areas of cinema, but like other technical
tools, laziness in the use of it undermines a film badly. If one has to fight
against a low budget or the limits of the technology of the time, or purposely
plays with the artificiality of computer effects, it is more acceptable for me.
Van Helsing has great ideas, such as
how men literally rip their own skin off when they transform into werewolves,
but it feels at lot of times that the CGI was being used as a white undercoat
on the film’s canvas than the vast array of colours and textures that need a creative
person to use them effectively. Like the plot too, there are too many inconsistencies
to the logic of the film, how creatures die or move, and how everything is put
together. Small, picky thoughts they may be, when I should just turn my brain
off and ‘just enjoy the movie’, but even the simple mindedness of pulp
entertainment must have logic to it or be so dreamlike in its mood to be able
to work for me. The most memorable of fiction for me, not just cinema, must
have an inherent logic to it, from the truly abstract plotting of fairytales
such as The Snow Queen to the flawed
yet visually arresting anime adaptation X
(1996). The concepts and subtexts to them all are vastly different to each
other, but they must have their clear personalities to work. Van Helsing on the other hand feels
compromised.
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| From http://www.shotpix.com/images/52505920878991389105.jpg |
It is like a lot of Hollywood
films that have the potential, and still have traces of a great movie within
them, but feel planed down to the point that they feel brittle and collapse to
pieces the moment you feel bored with them. Personal taste does dictate your
opinions subjectively on films like this, but Van Helsing should have been a blockbuster that fully embraced the
Gothicism of the films it was reinterpreting, even if it’s of a very different
genre and tone, through mood and their supernatural mysteries. What we ended up
with was a tedious film over reliant on not very good CGI craftwork.
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