PZ Myers. 2004 Jun 02. Van Helsing. <http://pharyngula.org/index/weblog/van_helsing/>. Accessed 2008 Dec 04.
Posted on M00o93H7pQ09L8X1t49cHY01Z5j4TT91fGfr on Wednesday, June 02, 2004
Van Helsing
I saw Van Helsing last night. My excuse is that Morris is a one theater, one screen, one showing per day town, so when I'm jonesing for a movie fix, my choices are limited. I went in with my expectations sinking somewhere below the level of the Abyss, and it met them. Here are a few of the things that went wrong in this movie.
- The first scene is a recreation of Colin Clive's gibbering, scenery-chewing "It's...ALIVE!!!" moment from James Whale's Frankenstein. Unfortunately, the actor playing the part of the insane doctor was a well-fed, pudgy fellow who looked embarrassed to be saying it. I won't call it an homage; it was clueless heresy.
- In two incidents, horse-drawn carriages crash, burst into flames, and explode.
- Most of the bad guys and a few of the good guys speak in those cheesy Transylvanian accents. I wanted earplugs.
- Machine-gun crossbow.
- Bad architecture. What's with these medieval castles that are all vertical spires, built on towering remote mountain peaks connected to the rest of the world by only a slender stone bridge across an unfathomably deep chasm?
- Everyone is a trapeze artist. All that bad architecture also happens to be draped with mysterious cables that have no purpose other than for heroes to grab onto, cut, and swing to the rescue. Once, I could have stomached, but every battle had to have one, two, or three people or cows demonstrating their amazing aerialist abilities.
- Oh, yeah: if you were on top of a ten-story building and wanted to get to the ground quickly, and you saw a rope attached to the roof of another ten-story building a hundred and fifty feet away, would you think it practical to swing down to the ground? There's a simple physics problem somewhere in this situation.
- CGI everywhere. Obvious, overused CGI.
- The vampires had faces like silly putty—every time they expressed an emotion some gonzo computer geek somewhere had to distort their expressions and make their fangs do the hula or something. I felt like slapping Dracula with a newspaper to see if he'd pick up an image of Snoopy on his cheek.
- The plot was absurdly elaborate, involving using Frankenstein's life force to animate the undead progeny of Dracula and his brides. Vampire procreation apparently involves, at some point, the extrusion of slimy, pebbly-surfaced bags of green snot that just lie around forever, tacked to the furniture in the castle. These disgusting drupelets are then regarded with affection by the vampires. Imagine decorating your house with 400 hundred years worth of used condoms and tampons; that's close to the effect.
- They should have just hired Peter Boyle to play Frankenstein's monster. It was done in his same style.
To be fair, the movie did have some good points.
- Kate Beckinsale in a leather bustier and crotch-high, skin-tight, high-heeled boots.
- ...
OK, one good point, but it was a doozy. Almost rescued the whole show.
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Hmm, I'll definitely have to use a free movie rental to see this one. Two advantages: I won't feel like I'm wasting my money, and I can imbibe sufficient alcoholic beverages to make it entertaining.
#: Posted by on 06/02 at 12:24 PM
- Hey, I liked The Abyss! ^_^
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At least you agree with me (visual beast that I am) that any movie with Kate Beckinsale in it, in or out of costume, can't be ALL bad.
That said...I still won't pay to see nonsense...maybe video.#: Posted by on 06/02 at 02:20 PM -
OK, wait, hold the phone. I'm not going to step up to defend this picture - it's a bunch of hooey - but PZ, you are being a bit unfair. It does indeed fly into the face of everything sensible. Can we talk about shooting a grappling hook through a tree a quarter of a mile away, and being able to carry the coil? Or the continual nonsense with characters landing on ten-foot arch bridges after falling off ledges hundreds of yards distant? Or the ... well, no, the whole thing was ludicrous.
BUT. To be fair, the opening Mr. Hyde scrap does pretty clearly set out the rules: there will be no dependable physics, characters can not be hurt, people will bounce, blades will cut faster than can be imagined, etc. etc. It does set itself out pretty clearly. It's James Bond under steampunk power, that's all.
I fault it mostly for being crappy on so many other levels.
And what is it with Kate Beckinsale with the bad vampire/werewolf flicks? First Underworld, now this. I liked her better in Laurel Canyon, when she was indescribably lovely. Which she is. In leather too. -
Wait, two other bits:
1. I thought the carriages bursting into flame was screamingly funny; it was a total film in-joke, as in "you know, cars don't do that either."
2. If you felt this way about Van Helsing, stay far away from The Day After Tomorrow. That one is downright insulting, in classic Emmerich style. -
Hey, I know I was being unfair. Life isn't fair. And it was a pretty bad movie.
Whether I see The Day After Tomorrow depends entirely on whether Kurt, the guy who runs the Morris Theater, books it. -
Come on now. We've all had some precious green snot containing a vital life force tacked onto our furniture at some point in our lives...
#: Posted by on 06/02 at 04:04 PM
- This is the one film I've seen at the cinima in the past 5 years! Even if any of it was good (I don't remember any good bits) the ending obscures them all. Was that supposed to be satirising cheesy endings? I don't tend to watch cheesy films, but surely they can't be this awful?
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Whoa. You haven't been to a movie in five years, and this is the one you picked to end the dry spell?
That's just tragic.
I could have said how bad the ending was, but I didn't want to ruin the movie for everyone motivated by my review to run out and see it. -
I only went to see this one because some friends dragged me out to watch it.
I've just remembered though that I did see two films at the cinima in a field they had at Glastonbury Festival last year: Donnie Darko and Bowling For Columbine. It was freezing because it was in the middle of a clear summer night and I was in Shorts and T-Shirt. I missed the first 15mins of Donnie Darko though because R.E.M had just playing. Sorry, I'm rambling on someone elses blog. -
Kate Beckinsale in a leather bustier is actually two good points! And why waste time with the film when you could go to http://www.livejournal.com/users/cleolinda/93639.html ?
#: Posted by Jeremy Henty on 06/02 at 05:48 PM
- Umm, Joe? You really can't miss the first 15 minutes of Donnie Darko. Trust me on this one.
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No, but you can safely miss the remaining 80 minutes.
You forgot the whole "two full moons in three days" thing. Not that I've seen it; it was pointed out to me in a review, which means that I now CAN'T see it because I'll find that gaping plot-hole far too distracting from the get-go. -
The moons bothered you, and the plane engine didn't?
Let's just say we disagree on that one; I found it delightfully obscure and a great ride, and I can see where others would find it less so. Van Helsing is still pretty bad, and someone needs to do something proactive to Roland Emmerich before he directs again. - Darko was OK. I watched it once and that was enough. It just took itself far too seriously and thought it was way more clever than it actually was. By the end I was yelling "Yeah, it's a time paradox. I GET it already. Star Trek's been doing it for 30 years!" Well, I wasn't literally yelling, that would've made me look insane. The writing was quite poor too, and the characters flat and trite. And I was wondering what the hell Barrymore was doing crowbarred in there until I saw her name in the credits under "Executive Producers". So yes, let's agree to disagree.
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In two incidents, horse-drawn carriages crash, burst into flames, and explode.
You say that as though it were a bad thing.#: Posted by Mrs Tilton on 06/03 at 02:56 AM