Hellboy 2
My bro and I got out to watch Hellboy 2 on Sunday night, and I'm having a hard time figuring out how to describe it.
I think my best explanation of the movie is that it's like a bunch of pearls on a string -- lumps of beautiful, shiny, and fundamentally useless content all arranged in a line with virtually no contact between each individual section.
The story is almost painfully linear -- by the time the opening credits are actually rolling, you can probably guess 75% of what's going to happen in the movie. And beyond being linear and predictable, it's not even well told. The little narrative section at the start was clunky and awkward (although visually very pretty), the "love story" between Abe and [name redacted] felt forced, and a lot of plot points were sort of rammed in to other scenes in a very awkward way (the revelation about Liz, for example). The entire Angel of Death bit... That bit was so fundamentally unnecessary that it felt like the movie had suddenly grown a tumour.
The actors did a decent job, with the exception of Ron Perlman's inability to display any emotion in any circumstance. Hellboy himself is a pretty cool customer so it's not too surprising, and I'm sure the Hellboy makeup also didn't help, but still, you'd think he'd be able to show some emotion beyond mild annoyance.
One particular nuisance for me was the relationship between Hellboy and Nuada. I can't help but feel that there's a lot missing out of the movie that would help explain what the hell was going on there; as it was, the interactions between the two made very little sense.
One highlight of the story, at least for me: tooth fairies. Creepy as hell. Awesome. The rest of that section could have been handled differently, but the tooth fairies themselves... brilliant.
The visuals were fantastic. It was a very, very pretty movie. I can't think of a single scene in the movie that wouldn't count as eye candy, which is why I'm conflicted. The story is so weak that I can't say I actually like the movie, but it was so damn pretty that I really want to watch it again.
Overall... Being pretty can only make up for so much empty-headedness. I think I'd have to give it 2.5 stars out of 5, although I will say that despite my low rating, it's still worth watching once just for the visuals.
I think my best explanation of the movie is that it's like a bunch of pearls on a string -- lumps of beautiful, shiny, and fundamentally useless content all arranged in a line with virtually no contact between each individual section.
The story is almost painfully linear -- by the time the opening credits are actually rolling, you can probably guess 75% of what's going to happen in the movie. And beyond being linear and predictable, it's not even well told. The little narrative section at the start was clunky and awkward (although visually very pretty), the "love story" between Abe and [name redacted] felt forced, and a lot of plot points were sort of rammed in to other scenes in a very awkward way (the revelation about Liz, for example). The entire Angel of Death bit... That bit was so fundamentally unnecessary that it felt like the movie had suddenly grown a tumour.
The actors did a decent job, with the exception of Ron Perlman's inability to display any emotion in any circumstance. Hellboy himself is a pretty cool customer so it's not too surprising, and I'm sure the Hellboy makeup also didn't help, but still, you'd think he'd be able to show some emotion beyond mild annoyance.
One particular nuisance for me was the relationship between Hellboy and Nuada. I can't help but feel that there's a lot missing out of the movie that would help explain what the hell was going on there; as it was, the interactions between the two made very little sense.
One highlight of the story, at least for me: tooth fairies. Creepy as hell. Awesome. The rest of that section could have been handled differently, but the tooth fairies themselves... brilliant.
The visuals were fantastic. It was a very, very pretty movie. I can't think of a single scene in the movie that wouldn't count as eye candy, which is why I'm conflicted. The story is so weak that I can't say I actually like the movie, but it was so damn pretty that I really want to watch it again.
Overall... Being pretty can only make up for so much empty-headedness. I think I'd have to give it 2.5 stars out of 5, although I will say that despite my low rating, it's still worth watching once just for the visuals.