Where to begin... Well for a start I have to say that when I heard that one of my favorite actors was slated to play a Vampire Hunter (Cough, cough, ) I had high hopes. Hugh "Logan" Jackman hunting the most fearsome of nightwalkers, Vlad Teppes Dracula. Unfortunately, 3 or 4 minutes into the movie, I knew that I was in for a huge letdown. At the start of the film, Van Helsing has never even seen a vampire before, but he does have an impressive record of killing cheesy "monster movie" monsters. But I digress. The opening scene is a replay of Frankenstein (the whole "It's Alive!" bit) when suddenly Dracula shows up for some reason. Now, I was willing to accept the "Dracula funded Frankenstein experiment" spiel that followed, and the chase to the windmill and subsequent burning of said windmill was actually enjoyable. However, at the moment Frankie's monster spoke, I knew this was going to be a long two hours.
WARNING, SPOILERS AHEAD: IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW ABOUT THE PLOT OF THIS MOVIE, SKIP TO THE NEXT PARAGRAPH!!! That statement is pretty laughable, considering the subject. Anyway, the lame-o story revolves around Van Helsing, the only cool character in this stink fest, and servant of a secret division of the Vatican. He kills abominations for the Vatican, but the Vatican refuses to support him openly. Thus, when his victims return to their human forms, all the common people know for sure is that he killed someone. Van Helsing is also troubled by strange dreams, including fighting in battles in ancient Rome. He has no recollection of his past beyond being found by the church near death and nursed back to health a few years past. He wears an all black ensemble of wide hat, leather trench coat, and long brown hair. He fights with blades and crossbows, and almost always looks cool doing it. All in all, he is a cool character with a lot of potential and style. So, having this character fight the likes of Mister Hyde, Frankenstein's Monster, a very Bella Legosi Dracula, His white-skinned but Indian dressed wives, and hundreds of crappy CG imps feels, to me, like asking someone to tap dance on a tight rope wearing speed skates. The Good guy and bad guys clash worse than hot pink and royal blue. All of the villains are one dimensional caricatures of what the original monsters represented. The aristocrat who drains the life out of the common people to slake his own thirsts is now a family man who will stop at nothing to bring his dead children (the aforementioned Imps, don't ask me why) to life, the mindless lackey of a mad scientist is now a greedy little troll who loves maiming animals, and the werewolf just plain looks stupid. So the plot goes as follows. Dracula commissions Dr. Frankenstein to create his monster, in the hopes of using the technology to bring his vampire children to life, since the children of vampires are born dead. The creature is thought lost in the infamous windmill fire. Then, Van Helsing is ordered to kill Dracula. He goes to Transylvania and meets the daughter of some gypsy king or something like that, she's mostly in the movie to look at anyway. Her brother is bitten by a werewolf and then bites Van Helsing who receives the antidote just before the transformation is complete and right after killing Dracula in his Demon form (since he got his powers in a pact with the devil after The Left Hand of God killed him centuries ago). By the way, Van Helsing is the same LHOG who murdered Dracula. So in effect he killed him twice. Confused yet?
Well, overall, the true crime of this film is the fact that it is called Van Helsing at all. The name is famous and a vampire hunter of the Van Helsing line should be fighting VAMPIRES, not Mr. HYDE. If this movie would have been called "stupid excuse for a lot of cheesy special effects" I may not have hated it as much as I did.
But alas it is not.
One thing I forgot to mention, whoever wrote the script must have been pretty drunk when he wrote some to the "One Liners". Here is one Gem I can't seem to beat out of my skull. As she kills a vampiress, the gypsy chick says "If you're going to kill someone, Just kill them, don't just stand a round talking about it" Imagine that sentence with a really poor Romainian accent, and you should have some idea of how crappy the dialogue was.
Oh, one last thing. If you have seen Blade II, Interview with the Vampire, Vampire Hunter D, An American Werewolf in Paris, and the Crow, you have seen about 80% of this movie already. If you have seen Indiana Jones, James Bond, and The Thing, you've seen the other 20% as well. Remember the UV flash-bang from Blade II? Well Van Helsing's friar buddy makes one (this is 1785 or something remember). There is a bit where VH and the Friar are walking around in the Vatican's secret lab and talking about new inventions, which, considering the friar's accent, plays a lot like Q giving 007 a rundown of his new gadgets. Almost nothing about this film is an original Idea. The only original idea I can think of is the "vampire kids are born dead" Idea, but it is a pretty stupid one, so it hardly counts.
The flabbergasting thing is that they are already planning a sequel. My question is, what the heck is he going to fight this time, Captain Kid? (Hey Abbot!)
2/10 (the two is for the fact that I laughed myself to tears at how bad it was. It is good in the same way that Big Trouble in Little China is good.
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