Review: Hellboy
Cigar chomping, demon stomping Hellboy hit the big screen, and hit it big. Read dugh’s review of the Big Red in action.
Living in Hell
Review by dugh
The movie Hellboy, starring Ron Perlman, is based on the Dark Horse comic book created by Mike Mignola. Like so many comic book origin stories this one starts with the Nazis. After all it makes sense that comic books, which came of age in the 20th century, would deal with the first Great Evil (with a capital E) of the same century.
If you like raw action, fast adventure, macabre creatures, dry humor, spectacular effects, good story, villains you love to hate, and heroes with flaws then you’d be an idiot not to go see this movie. Hellboy is a demon found and raised by humans and given the choice to be good or evil. Immensely powerful and able to withstand great amounts of damage he is the ideal candidate to fight other dark creatures which, conveniently enough, is his job at the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense. As the trailer taglines say, “There are things out there that go bump in the night. We are the ones who bump back.” In Hellboy’s case I would say “thump” or “whump” would be a better description.
I’m not going to go on about the effects or the story or the character development or any of the crap you can read in any other review by real critics. I will say that I hope they make more movies with Hellboy. We need heros.
Hellboy is the kind of hero that will raise a half rotted corpse from the dead just to ask directions. He’s the kind of hero who tries talking to the evil mindless minion of hell before pummeling it to death. Hellboy is jaded, bitter about being “different”, and crushed by his secret love of another. Hellboy is as human as any of us and yet so much more interesting. He has red skin, well-manicured horns on his forehead, can eat more in one sitting than most could eat in a week and smokes cigars. Best of all Hellboy is the kind of person who will make the right choice even if it is the suckiest thing in the world for himself.
Don’t go see Hellboy if you expect to be knocked off your feet by an Oscar contending movie. Do go see Hellboy if you want a bit of fun and action and a hero who goes thump in the night.
Buy movies and other items mentioned in this review: Hellboy (on DVD).
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September 9th, 2010 at 6:48 am
Well done a review of a movie that I liked but didn’t quite know what to say. I was a little biased I didn’t like the comicbook the art was a little to woodblock print for me but after seeing the show I think I will give it a chance.
Doug is right what made Hellboy work were the villians they were flat out creepy the guy who won’t die. What can save a so so comicbook movie is killer villians and kick ass fights Hellboy had it all over that even though the secondary character development was a little thin Abe and the firestarter. I am holding out for a sequel that will do it justice now that the origin/milieu building information is out of the way. Good movie all around. Peace Jon E
September 9th, 2010 at 6:48 am
i’ll agree with jon e that they could have used a bit more character development in some spots… one of the best scenes for character was where he was spying on liz and whatshisname with the kid. i think they could have done a little better with some of the monster scenes. the resevoir confrontation was great for building up the threat of the monsters… but i felt a bit let down with the final fight… oh well.
September 9th, 2010 at 6:48 am
Agree with everything above. I want to know why the “new guy” (who obviously made an impression on all of us as we don’t know his name) was hand chosen to hang out with Hellboy. I want to know more about Abe. I want to see more of this series. I read one of the graphic novels the other day and it was pretty good, so maybe we will see more, but only if the box office picks up a bit. I am sure the producers haven’t made their money back yet.