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CINEMA - "VAN HELSING"
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Yet another monster slasher? Not really, but later for this. As the people were
bombed with massive advertisment for this movie as big posters hanging on any
walls and page filling adverts could be found in many magazines, I was quite
interested to check out the hype about this new movie that tries to reanimate
the vampire and werewolf genre, and as finally some reviews in several magazines
weren't that bad either, we decided to check it out and yesterday it was time
for another monster breakfast or better lunch...
We took the little cinema in Bad Klosterlausnitz therefore, not one of the usual
surround multiplex ass kicking cinema centers but therefore quite cosy and over
all not that expensive. Ok, we wondered really a bit as just 6 visitors, incl.
us finally were going to watch the movie, but as we know that from former shows,
this hasn't to be a bad sign... as the movie was running in heavy rotation for
about 3 weeks, 2 or 3 times per day in a small city with about 3.ooo people...
So what about the plot? Van Helsing is the hero in here, everybody should have
heard of him, as he is one of the big vampire hunters in the "horror history",
but our hero is named Gabriel instead of Abraham (the original) and he isn't a
classical fighter against the evil, nope, he is more like a James Bond of the
19th Century, and instead of Goldfinger and Dr.No he is hunting for Jekyll and
Hyde or Dracula and his brides. And what was the Secret Service for James Bond,
is now a religious order that supports him with knowledge, jobs and very crazy
weapons and so the hunt starts very quickly, as Van Helsing is sent by his boss'
to Transylvania to save Anna, the last survivor of her family, from Dracula and
his monsters...
I have to say that the movie doesn't cares that much about developping a deeper
story but is stumbling from one action scene to the next and so we start a quite
entertaining rollercoaster tour through the classical horror genre, including
dark places, high castles, mad professors, cruel creatures, dumb village people
and so on. But while the story goes on very fast, I miss hardly any real shock
moments, the whole thing comes more or less along like a very fast mixed comic
action adventure, the bad asses are too much overdrawn to be taken that earnest
in the end, as said above, the story goes on too fast to take time for some
frightening and shocking moments, Van Helsings little helper tries to bring in
funny moments that finally are a bit to deplaced and overall kill the last small
serious points... Ok, I have to admit, the monsters are looking quite ok and I
especially like the werewolfes but in the end the movie never matches to offer
such cruel moments as "American Werewolf" for example, that doesn't has to be
seen as killer horror movie as well, but matches it to include several very
stunning scenes...
What to say? "Van Helsing" isn't the killer movie it tries to be, it isn't
shocking or frightening in any moment, as it is running too fast to
develop nailbiting moments and is too foreseeable in the end, too.
For kids the whole thing may be harder tobacco (you can watch it
from 12 years on in Germany) but for mature people and esp. horror
and fantasy fans it may be wasted time and money as the overdrawn
roles destroy any horrible moment right in the beginning. In the
end just a James Bond conversion is left, technical on a quite high
level with all the effects and computer generated scenes, monsters
and places, but nothing more...
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