Web Toolbar by Wibiya Bears and Bullets: Movie Review: Hellboy II: The Golden Army

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Movie Review: Hellboy II: The Golden Army

Directed By: Guillermo del Toro
Starring: Ron Pearlman, Selma Blair, Seth MacFarlane

Amidst the same - and I stress this right down to the exact detail - crowd of socially-debilitated nerds that attened the midnight showing of The Incredible Hulk, my friends and I awaited the latest comic book adaptation of Hellboy II: The Golden Army. In the realm of film's comic book heros, Hellboy is more of a cult-object than the mainstays of, say, Spiderman or the X-Men. The first installment, Hellboy (also directed by del Toro), maintained relative popularity, but was cast in the shadows of the other comic book icons (see above), despite the film's accuracy to the original comic series.

In the newest addition, the main attraction is not so much Pearlman and his enjoyable role, but how del Toro has quickly become Hollywood's best visual-director. The creatures, known well in the real world (Goblins, Elves, etc,.) do not crumble into the stereotypical shapes of unearthed legends, but however resemble the much admired work Guillermo has accomplished in his last project, Pan's Labyrinth. In a simple meaning, Hellboy II is visually astounding. The CGI isn't over-used and over-exaggerated, and del Toro uses imaginative costume design far superior than any other director that can come to mind. His direction makes the film well-worth itself on it's own.

Ron Pearlman, on the other hand, makes Hellboy one of most pleasing and credible hero's that have ever made it into film. The character's human-taught nature, despite the look, makes him more attractive than most other hero's, but Pearlman has brought one other feature to him that makes him stand out even more; humor. Frankly speaking, Hellboy is the funniest comic book hero (and series) I've ever seen on screen.

Another appeasing character makes his debut into to join the Hellboy crew is a bodiless smoke screened German titled Johann Krauss, who is voiced oddly enough by the creator of Family Guy and American Dad, Seth MacFarlane. I personally found his role appealing too, but just felt the necessity to point out that this is MacFarlane's first ever work in cinema, and he's already the 5th lead in the movie. Other than Krauss and Hellboy, the film's only for-naught appeal are the other character's and their personal anguishes, which in all rights aren't bad by any means, but they just pale in comparison to the guy with the Red Right Hand (that's a reference too - find out where).

Score: 8.6 out of 10

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