Van Helsing (Blu-ray)

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Universal Studios is home to many famous monster franchises. Dracula, the Wolfman and Frankenstein are just a few. With "Van Helsing," the studio brings together some of their famous characters and re-imagines them in new environments and new settings that pay some homage to the original stories by Mary Shelley and Bram Stoker, but put the old monsters of black and white into a big special effects bonanza. Big, noisy and visually exciting, "Van Helsing" carries on the legacies of their classic monsters, but the film itself is hardly a classic. It was Universal´s opportunity to bring their long heritage of strong monster films into the modern age of the blockbuster, but while "Van Helsing" is a visually impressive film, it doesn´t have the heart or classic feel of the classic monster pictures that helped build the studio.

Revisiting this title on Blu-ray after watching and reviewing it on HD-DVD a few years ago found my watching of "Van Helsing" to be a little less critical than when I had last seen the film. Perhaps my continued enjoyment of Hugh Jackman´s career has me feeling a little less bitter about this effort that first capitalized on his newfound fame as Wolverine. The film is still not a classic and I´m not going to improve my scoring of "Van Helsing," but I guess I can now appreciate the fun it tries to have a little more than I once did. Viewing the summary of my review I found myself giving a near running commentary on the story and delved too deeply into details. I´m going to borrow the summary from my previous HD-DVD review and touch it up some to correct grammatical errors and add a little more flavor, but I apologize for the great amount of time spent discussing the story.

The film starts off on a good foot. Dracula (Richard Roxburgh) has employed Dr. Victor Frankenstein (Samuel West) to create a life from the dead. Frankenstein´s monster (Shuler Hensley) is ´born.´ With his services no longer in need, Dracula kills the good doctor and takes in the services of Igor (Kevin J. O´Connoer). The villagers decided they need to do something to stop the evil events going on and bring about a fiery end to the nights mayhem. This beginning sequence is shot with simplistic sets and shown in black and white film stock. It looks and feels just like those old films from the Universal Studios stable and gives the opening moments of "Van Helsing" a credible beginning and I did like the way in which Universal used the opening as a bridge from past to present. It was a nice touch.

The next scene is promising as well as we are introduced to monster hunter Van Helsing (Hugh Jackman) as he looks over a corpse of a young woman and finds a huge cigar near her lifeless form. A wide angle shot shows a monster of sorts climbing a church wall. Van Helsing is on the trail of Dr. Jekyll (Stephen Fisher). Van Helsing faces off against the bi-polar doctor and makes Jekyll aware that the church would like him brought in alive, but that Van Helsing has no problems delivering a dead doctor. Jekyll doesn´t expect to be captured or killed and a special-effects laden fight ensues between the monster hunter and his prey. This is an overblown scene that sets the pace for the rest of the film. Classic monsters with overbearing special effects and over the top action sequences are what "Van Helsing" is all about.

Van Helsing returns to the church and is given another assignment. It appears he has no recollection of his own memories and the church believes that a trip to Transylvania to hunt down Dracula may be the spark he needs to remember who he is. This scene introduces Carl (David Wenham), a friar who is quite good with invention and weapons. The scene plays out like a James Bond and Q scene and in some ways is better written and more entertaining than the spy equivalent as the humor works well here. The gadgets are far more technical and wondrous than the silver bullets and silver stakes classic horror audiences are accustomed to. They are devices that are required to augment an over-the-top action film and break away from traditional formulas that have worked for years at Universal.

The action is further stepped up when the beautiful Anna Valerious (Kate Beckinsale) and her brother Velkan (Will Kemp) are introduced. They are setting up a trap to bring down a werewolf. The trapping goes awry and a sad conclusion comes to meet Velkan. Upon returning to town, Anna joins the rest of the townsfolk in welcoming Van Helsing and a few vampire maidens (including the beautiful Josie Maran) with hundreds of bolts fired from an automatic catapult, some bloodletting and lets of action sequences. The vampire women are after Anna and Van Helsing stops them. After some more plot forwarding, Anna and Van Helsing become allies and set out on their war against Dracula.

Bigger and louder action sequences with increasingly exquisite and involved sets and over the top stunts are thrown at the viewer as the story progresses. The film is pure entertainment and if you are looking to solely be entertained by action, then "Van Helsing" has no problem delivering. However, the film is a huge stray from the classic creature films of a bygone era which are depicted in the film and as exhilarating as the movie is, it is equally silly. No better scene to drive this point home as the moment where Frankenstein is hanging below a bridge and is cut loose by Carl. He swings through a window and saves Anna. A few minutes later, he is done with his business in the room where Anna was and is ready to swing into action to help Carl. However, instead of being in a window below and in front of Carl, he is now quite high above Carl´s position and now behind him. I´m not even going to try to contemplate the physics involved in that one.

The final climactic moments find Van Helsing facing off against Dracula. Through careful exposition, it is revealed that the Count has only one mortal weakness. Fortunately, Van Helsing has become the only man capable of doing the deed and the two lock fangs in a heated and fervorous battle where the filmmakers deftly slow down the tempo for bits and pieces of dialogue. Its fun and its exciting, but it is a bit drawn out and designed more for showing off special effects than an effective combat sequence. In fact, the entire final act of the film is a continuous series of scenes that seem to be designed solely for the purpose of showing off some rather nice special effects and have the fastest possible camera movements. If you are looking for a story, "Van Helsing" is not it. If you are looking for a good rollercoaster ride and can´t make the trip to Universal Studios Theme Park, "Van Helsing" will suffice.

Video:

The 1.85:1 transfer of "Van Helsing" on Blu-ray is a vivid and detailed film that is identical to the three year old HD-DVD release, but this is not necessarily a bad thing. "Van Helsing" was an expensive special-effects driven film and it looks the part. Detail is strong throughout the film and while it is a minor step down from the best releases, it is solid. A good portion of the film takes place in the dank and dark world of vampires and fortunately, the black levels hold up nicely and present solid shadow detail. There are a lot of grays, blues and whites to showcase the icy and cold world of Transylvania. But the morose world of Count Dracula is brought to life with vivid reds, blues and greens. The hues are nicely saturated. The source materials used were in perfect condition.