I am already girding myself for the parade of discomfort that comes when I have a differing view on a film that has already been “positioned” by a few critics. Ironically, Variety, in fighting like mad and reasserting its ancient and currently unwarranted and illogical for studio “first” position, has become a definer of movie criticism again, even though the trade tends to miss the mark 90% of the time it goes particularly strong for or against a movie. It’s an interesting phenomenon. Todd and his minions are obviously well versed and think deeply about film. But whenever they get emotional – particularly Todd – they become remarkably misguided and lose focus completely. Yet, studios continue to indulge the tradition of letting the trades go first, often at their own cost, rather than allowing the open exchange of ideas start so that no one voice becomes defining.
Meanwhile, after being out for a few days when this film premiered at the LA Film Festival, I will be taken to task by those who disagree and want to disagree without having seen the film as mop-up boy, relegated to a discussion of why I have my opinions, as opposed to simply arguing opinion. Everything is either “contrarian” when you go against a small group of voices or “going with the crowd” if you are of a similar mind when you don’t see a movie “first.” This thinking becomes nearly impossible to fight when so many professionals really are either being contrarian or going along with the group. (not all, but many)
Of course, if you push to see a movie first, if only to keep your ideas about the film purely your own, you are obsessed with winning the race… because so many people are obsessed with winning the race. I would have to cop to having been one of them… about 5 years ago.
I should be as detached from the maddening crowd as, say, Manohla Dargis or Ken Turan or the lovely and talented and not heard from enough about the last 40 years of criticism Joe Morgenstern (detached though not unhinged, like Peter “You Can Quote Me About Hitler Being ‘The Best Ever One-Balled Jew Murderer Ever!’ So Long As My Name Is At Least 20% Of The Quote’s Type Size” Travers) and just put my head down and do the job. There is an elegant logic to that mindset. Interestingly – to me – it is quite the opposite of being a columnist or blogger, in which awareness of your surroundings is an absolute requirement of the job.
Anyway…
All of that seemed like an aside as I typed it, but it actually does match up with my concerns about Hellboy II: The Golden Army, which is a remarkably easy review to write…
Guillermo del Toro’s Hellboy II: The Golden Army is much less formal, much more comic book, and ultimately a bit less effective for anyone outside of its core constituency than the first film in the franchise. If you know these characters, I have little to add, other than to tell you that this time, Hellboy faces a dark nemesis who seeks to break from the honorable tradition of his magical forest family and to destroy mankind for its sins, but his sister, who doesn’t fight but has the power of a puzzle piece, gets in his way. Hellboy & Co. are there to clean up the messes the resulting monsters create or become. If you don’t know the characters, you should rent or buy the first film, preferably in Blu-ray, or skip this sequel altogether.
Okay…
Here is a bit more about what I feel.
Guillermo del Toro is truly a bright, beautiful light in the industry. For all of his genius in the imagination of characters and creatures, his real power is in the drama of the misunderstood or broken coming to a place of love and peace, often through violent means. His best film, The Devil’s Backbone, is also his least effect-y film, though it is a ghost story. The second film in that trilogy, which he will likely complete after The Hobbit, Pan’s Labyrinth, has more magical stuff, but also comes back to the emotions of his “Dorothy,” not just amazement at the beauty of his visual ideas.
Here, with a second shot at Hellboy, he was at first constrained by Universal on budget, then not unlike Jackson/Walsh, he expanded his vision – and budget – because of his skill and charm and the studio’s urge to ride his very special train to its natural end. But there can be a problem with getting what you want. And Hellboy II suffers, in my opinion, from too much of everything.
I will warn you if any spoilers are coming… and if you haven’t seen the first film, you might want to skip this from here on, since I presume if you are reading this, you have familiarity with that movie.
From the time we enter the Bureau for the first time in this film, unlike the original, there is a kind of Men-In-Black-ization of the movie, with other paranormal creatures in passed doorways or down long hallways. And right there I thought, “Okay… maybe.” But as the movie pressed on, I was more and more aware of the size of the visual palette and less and less interested in the storytelling, the basics of which were there, but often seemed like the afterthought.
In other bad words, Guillermo Goes Lucas.
Unlike Mr. Lucas, it is pretty clear that Guillermo can come back to his best self anytime he wants. He is still young enough and still bursting with new ideas enough that he can make the adjustment, just as Peter Jackson did after he went off the rails a bit with The Frighteners.
There were also two character points that really distracted me through the new film. The first is not a spoiler… the second is, and I will mark it when I get there.
Abe Sapian, still played by Doug Jones, is now voiced by Doug Jones. And the truth is, Doug Jones ain’t David Hyde Pierce. The odd thing is, I would probably have been fine with Mr. Jones playing the character outright had the movie series started there. But it didn’t. As a result, I was distracted every time he spoke… and he speaks a lot more in this film. Moreover, with Abe as a much more significant character this time around – yay! – Mr. Jones, presumably with the collaboration of GdT, has made Abe less balletic than in the first film. So Abe feels like a very different character… less of a marked contrast to Hellboy, which was kind of the beauty of him the first time around.
MINOR SPOILERS COMING…
The Fire to Abe’s Water, Liz Sherman, is now living with Hellboy. And it is, not unsurprisingly, difficult. That is exactly the kind of non-effects exploration that Guillermo is all about and able to pull off with great skill. But it is filed down here to a few minutes and, as the movie progresses, an odd disconnect of Liz from Hellboy and from the movie. Until she becomes the “must save Liz” object, the relationship doesn’t really move us… and when that does happen, it really does move us.
SPOILERS OVER…
The title character of the film, The Golden Army, is beautifully rendered with puppetry in the opening of the film, one of the truly elegant segments of work. But by the time we get back to it being real in the movie, The Golden Army feels like the ultimate red herring. We really don’t need to see them brought to life to get to the end of the story. And story logic actually suggests that we won’t. But of course, we will. And as with most of the big action in this movie, it is not a story driver, it is a set piece that’s really cool.
I know this is an odd distinction in big action movies. But the genius of the first Indiana Jones movies, for instance, was that every action sequence had to be fought past by Indy in order to get to the next part of the movie. It was the understanding of this that made the expedience of shooting the guy with the swords one of the great movie moments ever. It said, “We’re not just dragging you through set pieces because that’s what a movie is… if we can get right to it, we will.” And it worked brilliantly. In Men in Black, using the investigation thread to push the story, every alien they rousted led to the next alien which led to the big alien and the tiny universe… as well as to the education of Will Smith’s J. Here, not only in the end, but in earlier sequences, wonderous lifeforms seem to be thrown in Hellboy’s way just to have a great big beautiful fight. You can’t say they aren’t cool. But if you took out most of them, the story would remain exactly the same. And in one case, there is a remarkable lack of story logic, as – dancing around the spoiler – Hellboy being occupied means that a key object in the story is absolutely vulnerable to being snatched… 30 minutes before it is eventually, inevitably snatched.
Del Toro reconfigures his heroes in this film, from one central hero, Hellboy, into a real team of three; Hellboy, Abe, and Liz. He then adds an otherworldly interoffice antagonist who can do more than cower like Tom Manning or pine for Liz like John Myers. Cool. But he has the problem that you have with a lot of team stories… it’s still called Hellboy. And as a result, the other heroes have to do a lot of standing around, not acting, to give him the stage for his heroics. And in the literalism of a movie, it doesn’t work as easily as it does in a comic. Yes, they all ultimately participate… like I said, Guillermo is a genius, not a schmuck. But there is an awful lot of “why didn’t they do that?” in this film. A lot.
All that said, the movie feels more like a comic brought to life than anything since Tank Girl, which this movie reminded me of more than once, oddly. And I think it will play very, very successfully with the comic book loving audience. It almost feels like it was made for them and their tastes with a happy disregard for making a movie that is really accessible for a wider audience.
This doesn’t mean it won’t find a wider audience, especially on opening weekend. But in many ways, this is a narrowcast movie right in line with Universal’s summer of The Incredible Hulk and Wanted. I’m not quite as confident that we will see that same $50m – $55m start that the other two got… but then again, no one really saw that number for Wanted.
There are some remarkably beautiful things in Hellboy II. That was a given. And as I say, the rough hewn touches are manna from heaven for the geek boys. (And unlike my criticism of the two Marvel movies, I don’t actually have the slightest objection to them reveling in every minute of this one.) Liz is a very identifiable character for teen girls. And the performances are pretty great all around, though as I wrote, I prefer a more elegant Abe… but that’s just me.
I love the first Hellboy… even more so after watching it again from top to bottom in Blu-ray. I didn’t need more, just the next step. But we got a lot more. As a story, it’s a little too big for its britches and a little too small to be epic. There are always holes in any story, but there were some here that I just don’t expect from Guillermo, who seemed to be a little to distracted by all those wonderful toys. Wait ‘til they get a load of me, indeed.

Be Sociable, Share!

• 
•