Monday, July 21, 2008

Hellish to watch, and not golden

Movie • HELLBOY II: The Golden Army • 2008
As cute as this Hellboy guy is, and as cute as Ron Perlman is, I’m not getting this. How a sequel happened after the first snoozer is beyond me, but I’ve seen it happen. There are die-hard fans, and there’s serious potential behind an interesting set of characters and premise. So they had their chance to make it better (kind of like the Hulk), and they did indeed make it better; but they only made it slightly better than the first bad one (kind of like the Hulk).
While the set designs, costumes, CGI, make-up, and scenes were all brilliantly painted, and the patchwork of images and creatures were dazzling to watch, the story was plain and boring. Betty Bones was with me, and she actually fell asleep! She even had a bucket of brains to munch on!
I give Guillermo del Toro kudos for beautiful imagery, but please stick with non-franchise stuff. You probably lost control, and had to make the best with what you had. There is camp value. I guarantee I'll love this picture in about 20 years.
Nice tooth fairies, though. They were pretty close to the real thing.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hellboy 2 was fun; for sure that director has an amazing imagination, reminded me a lot of his work in Pan's Labyrinth