Van Helsing

Since a certain vampire film is all the rage right now and I am not participating in the frenzy, I thought I would pull out a creature film that I missed in the theaters from a few years ago. Hugh Jackman plays Van Helsing, a mercenary for hire that works for Rome in the 1400's. His specialty is hunting down creatures that are dangerous to the church, starting with Dr. Jekyll in the opening sequence. With Jekyll dispatched successfully, Helsing is charged with traveling to Transylvania to help an old friend of the church in destroying Count Dracula. As it turns out, Helsing has a pre-existing relationship with Dracula. He then must battle werewolves, Dracula's brides and children and even encounters Dr. Frankenstein's monster along the way. This is a fun little horror/action/drama but I couldn't help thinking throughout that the film didn't quite know what its genre was. It wasn't scary enough to be horror, and there wasn't enough real plot tension or acting to be dramatic. There was a bit of action, but not enough to carry the film. What there was a lot of was primal screaming [camera zoom to full face close up of {insert creature here} with hands to face and mouth open wide for maximum effect]. Most of the time, all I could think of was Craig Ferguson's immitation of John McCain during these screams, so you can see why they were not effective as drama, horror or action. Even so, this was a fun little romp through creature world without excessive blood and gore that is so common in creature films today. So if you like non-horrific creature films with a bit of action, this is the perfect film for you.
3 stars (out of 5)