Van Helsing is a 2004 action horror film written and directed by Stephen Sommers. Hugh Jackman plays the monster hunter Gabriel Van Helsing. Kate Beckinsale plays Anna Valerious. Universal Pictures distributed it, and it runs 132 minutes. It grossed $300.2 million worldwide against a budget of $160–170 million. Critics were not kind. Neither are we. Van Helsing holds a Metacritic score of 35 out of 100, which works out to 3.5 of 10.
Trailer, via Universal Pictures At Home.
A Hunter With No Memory
Van Helsing works for the Knights of the Holy Order, a group that protects mankind. He cannot recall anything before he was found nearly dead on the steps of a church. He wants pardon for sins he cannot name, and he wants his memory back.
The Order sends him to Transylvania. His orders: destroy Dracula, and keep Anna and Velkan Valerious alive. They are the last of an ancient Romanian family. An ancestor vowed his descendants would kill Dracula or spend eternity in Purgatory.
That vow is the film’s whole engine. A curse, a family, a hunter with a blank past. Sommers wrote the script himself, and he built the movie as an homage to the Universal Horror Monster films of the 1930s and 1940s. He is a fan of those pictures. Our view is that fandom is not the same as craft.
Every Monster, All at Once
Van Helsing does not want one creature. It wants the whole shelf. The film packs in Count Dracula and other vampires, Frankenstein’s monster, Duergar, Mr. Hyde and werewolves. That approach echoes the multi-monster pictures Universal made in the 1940s, among them Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, House of Frankenstein and House of Dracula.
The cast is deep:
- Hugh Jackman as Van Helsing
- Kate Beckinsale as Anna Valerious
- Richard Roxburgh as Count Vladislaus Dracula
- David Wenham as Carl
- Shuler Hensley as Frankenstein’s Monster
- Kevin J. O’Connor as Igor
- Alun Armstrong as Cardinal Jinette
- Josie Maran, Elena Anaya and Silvia Colloca as the brides Marishka, Aleera and Verona
That is a lot of performers. In our reading, very few of them get a character worth the screen time.
1887, Then 1888, Then a Blur
The film starts in 1887 Transylvania. Doctor Victor Frankenstein, helped by his assistant Igor and by Count Dracula, creates a monster. Dracula kills Frankenstein when he refuses to go along with the vampire’s designs for the creature. Igor watches without feeling — he is on Dracula’s payroll. A mob storms the castle. The monster runs to a windmill with Frankenstein’s body. The mob burns the windmill, and the monster seems to die.
A year later, in 1888, Van Helsing goes to Notre-Dame de Paris. He kills Dr. Jekyll after a brawl with Mr. Hyde. From there the film jumps to the Order’s Vatican City headquarters, then to Transylvania, then to Frankenstein’s castle.
In Transylvania, Anna and Velkan try to kill a werewolf under Dracula’s control. It falls into a gorge with Velkan, biting him as he shoots it with a silver bullet. Van Helsing and Friar Carl, a weapons inventor, reach a village and join Anna’s fight against Dracula’s brides. Marishka dies there. That night Velkan comes to Anna to warn her about Dracula’s plans, turns into a werewolf and escapes.
Van Helsing and Anna chase Velkan to Frankenstein’s castle. There they find Dracula’s plan: duplicate Frankenstein’s experiments and give life to thousands of his undead children, with Velkan as the conduit. That is a strong idea for a monster movie. Our complaint is that it drowns in noise.
What the Budget Bought
The film cost $160–170 million. It returned $300.2 million worldwide. On paper, that looks like a win. It is not a defense of the movie and should not be read as one. A large worldwide gross against a large budget tells you what was spent and what came back. It says nothing about quality. It says Universal paid for a great many monsters and put them all on screen.
The tagline is “The one name they all fear.” That is the ambition in five words: one hunter, every monster, a name that scares them all. The film cannot carry it, in our view.
Why the Homage Collapses
The 1930s and 1940s Universal films worked because each creature had room. Dracula had a castle and a mood. Frankenstein’s monster had a body and a tragedy. Mr. Hyde had a divided self. Van Helsing throws them together, and our view is that it gives none of them air. We read that as volume standing in for reverence.
The brides are three names and three costumes. Marishka dies in the village fight. The others fly around. Hensley’s monster is a body the plot needs. O’Connor’s Igor is a servant with a secret.
The Knights of the Holy Order is, to this paper, the film’s one real idea. A hunter with no memory, working off a debt he cannot name, hoping for pardon he cannot earn. That is a character. Sommers has him and then spends him on set pieces.
The Metacritic score is 35 out of 100, or 3.5 of 10. This is not a case of critics missing something. Nothing is hidden here. Our read is that the film is an expensive, restless monster parade with no monster that lingers.
Van Helsing is worth one look, in this paper’s view, mostly to see how much money can buy so little. It is not a hidden gem. It is not a misunderstood cult item. It is a 2004 action horror film that had a star, a budget and a library of monsters, and used none of them well.
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