Van Helsing [Blu-ray]
(Stephen
Sommers , 2004)
Review by Leonard Norwitz
Production :
Theatrical: Carpathian Pictures/Stillking Films/The Sommers
Company
Video:
Universal Studios Home Entertainment
Disc:
Region: FREE
(as verified by the
Momitsu region FREE Blu-ray player)
Runtime: 2:11:37.931
Disc Size: 44,216,150,472 bytes
Feature Size: 36,286,445,568 bytes
Average Bitrate: 26.99 Mbps
Chapters: 28
Case: Standard Blu-ray case
Release date: September 15th, 2009
Video:
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Resolution: 1080p
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video
Bitrate:
Audio:
D TS-HD
Master Audio English 4565 kbps 5.1 / 48 kHz / 4565 kbps /
24-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz / 1509 kbps / 24-bit)
DTS Audio French 768 kbps 5.1 / 48 kHz / 768 kbps / 24-bit
DTS Audio Spanish 768 kbps 5.1 / 48 kHz / 768 kbps / 24-bit
Dolby Digital Audio English 192 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 192 kbps
/ Dolby Surround
Dolby Digital Audio English 192 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 192 kbps
/ Dolby Surround
DTS Express English 192 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 192 kbps /
24-bit
Subtitles:
English, French, Spanish, none
Extras
• Audio Commentary with Director Stephen Sommers &
Editor/Producer Bob Ducsay
• Audio Commentary with Actors Richard Roxburgh, Shuler
Hensley & Will Kemp
• Van Helsing: The Story, The Life, The Legend (58:09)
• Track the Adventure (34:36)
• Bringing the Monsters to Life (10:02)
• Dracula's Lair is Transformed (2:91)
• The Music of Van Helsing (9:41)
• The Art of Van Helsing (5:10)
• The Masquerade Ball is Unmasked (25:29)
• You Are in the Movie (4:29)
• Bloopers (5:39)
• Monster Eggs (1:53)
• D-Box Motion Enabled
Exclusive to Blu-ray:
• U-Control
• BD-Live 2.0
Comment:
The Movie: 5
Van Helsing is one holy terror of a movie.
Before there was James Bond, there was Van Helsing. If you
haven't seen this movie, you might not have been aware of
that. And instead of working as a licensed killer for Her
Majesty's Secret Service, Van Helsing was in the employ of
His Holyness' Secret Service. You probably didn't know that
either. What the Hell – I don't really mind that Van Helsing
isn't the Victorian-principled scientist that we know by way
of Bram Stoker or countless Dracula movies. I don't even
mind that, as writer/director Stephen Sommers envisions him,
Van Helsing is a virile, if ageless man, adept with all
manner of weapons and modes of transport. After all, if he's
going to be working for the Vatican, he needs his own
version of Q-Branch. And contrary to all but one 007 movie,
if memory serves, the present Q – a timid soul here named
"Carl" (David Wenham) comes along to help explain what Van
Helsing may not understand.
So who are our new hero's assignments, as if we didn't know?
We come into the story after some years of apprehending –
alive if possible so as to save what may be left of their
souls – all manner of monstrous creatures, most recently one
Mr. Hyde, who is maybe three times the mass of his alter
ego, and a good deal more agile. These guys usually resist
capture, making for considerable work for our special
effects team.
Before Van Helsing (Hugh Jackman) sets off on his next, most
challenging and most dangerous assignment: Dracula himself
(Richard Roxburgh), we learn something about this man that
will drive the plot further on into the movie – that Van
Helsing is the victim of massive amnesia, from which he is
only slowly and sporadically recovering. He doesn't even
know how old he is or who he was before he became Van
Helsing. I shall reveal nothing further about this, as it
becomes one of the few interesting turns in the movie.
What would a monster movie be without a girl, in this case,
not one in distress - at least she doesn't see it that way –
but a heroine in her own right? This would be Anna Valerious,
played by the delicious Kate Beckinsale, who so proved in
Underworld how hot she could be in spandex that it was an
obvious, if ill judged idea to put her in something very
like, except for a silly embroidered blouse, just to ensure
we understand her rural roots, I imagine. It is the
Valerious family (shouldn't that be "Valerius" I kept asking
myself?) that Van Helsing is sent to protect, as Anna and
her brother, Velkan (Will Kemp) are the last in a long line
of Dracula hunters, the only ones in the vicinity that have
ever presented a threat to this most tasty villain. But no
one knows where he sleeps, let alone what evil lurks
therein.
Enter, now, Frankenstein's monster (Shuler Hensley), hiding
out from humankind who would have him dead if for no other
reason than his very monstrousness. Van Helsing and Anna
come across the monster quite accidentally and learn that he
knows an important secret about Dracula, one that would aid
in Van Helsing's pursuit of the 450 year-old blood-sucker.
I think this movie would have had a chance if it only didn't
take itself so seriously even when it cracks wise - as when
Marishka, one of Dracula's brides, gives out with a Bela
Lugosi imitation. It is almost as if Sommers himself doesn't
get the gag. Or maybe there were just one or two too many
familiar monsters. (Where are Abbott & Costello when we need
them!) And did I mention that there are not just one, but
several Wolfmen? Then again, perhaps the movie is simply too
loud, too often, heartless, with too few hints of the
eroticism that should be front and center of Dracula's
interest.
As for the cast, Hugh Jackman is smartly cast, but he is too
much in his own shadow to do anything interesting with the
part. Richard Roxburgh – I still can't get over that this is
the same actor who plays The Duke in Moulin Rouge – does
well enough with what he is given as Dracula, but is all to
often undermined by the director. What does it mean, for
instance that Dracula starts walking the walls just as he
begins to gain whatever sympathy he might have with the
audience when he exclaims "Why can't they leave us alone? We
kill only our fill, and less than our share." The line is
played for laughs when it shouldn't be. And when one of his
brides chastises Dracula for his apparent cavalier attitude
to the loss of one her sisters, he replies "No! I have no
heart. I feel no love. nor fear, nor joy, nor sorrow. I am
hollow... and I will live forever." It's an important and
telling revelation about the man, and wasted on a moment of
relatively insignificant import. Van Helsing could have been
a fun movie in the vein of – dare I say it – The Fifth
Element - or a serious one, such as V for Vendetta, but the
script is misdriected with good lines in the wrong places or
read with the wrong tone. The fault, dear reader, is not the
actors.
Image: 7/8
NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were ripped directly from the
Blu-ray disc.
The first number indicates a relative level of excellence
compared to other Blu-ray video discs on a ten-point scale.
The second number places this image along the full range of
DVD and Blu-ray discs.
Considering that Van Helsing rises and falls with its
special effects I would have expected to see the results
more clearly. The dimness comes out of the near perennial
night that pervades, but some, I believe, derives from how
the CG are melded into the live action. In any case, while
textures are pretty well described when there is sufficient
light to make them out, the dark of night threatens to
devour many a scene whole. On the other hand, considering
that much of the action takes place at night, at least we do
not have to suffer with noise. I was not alerted to
artifacts, enhancements or blemishes, but compared to the
likes of X2: X-Men United, Underworld, or any but the first
of the Harry Potters, the image here can get downright
smoky.
CLICK EACH
BLU-RAY
CAPTURE TO SEE ALL IMAGES IN FULL 1920X1080 RESOLUTION
Audio & Music : 7/8
While a little on the thick side, Alan Silvestri's galloping
score drives the action with awesome, punchy mid-bass power
and treble percussion. The Blu-ray has the advantage of a
lossless DTS 5.1 mix that permits us to hear whatever
subtleties and dynamics the soundscape has to offer, and
while there is plenty of wow, the sound remains strangely
front-directed – again, as compared to similar movies. In
the attack on the village by the flying vampire brides, the
masquerade ball and in Dracula's lair with its surrounding
electro noises, there are isolated location cues fragments,
but it is generally the immersive music score that grabs our
attention and draws us into the action. In other scenes,
like the villagers' attack on Frankenstein's castle and the
swirling of hundreds of vampire bats, the surrounds are busy
as expected. The
Momitsu
has identified
it as being a region FREE disc playable on
Blu-ray
machines worldwide.
Operations : 7
The menu is laid out like other Universal Blu-rays. Arrows
tell you which way to direct your remote, and the bonus
feature instructions are detailed and intuitive. The chapter
menu includes buttons for U-Control in case you want to
approach those functions from that point.
Extras : 7
Universal has imported the extra features previously found
on the 2-Disc Collector's Edition DVD: starting with the
same two commentaries by the director & editor (lively,
informative and entertaining observations about production
details) and the actors that play Dracula, Frankenstein's
Monster and Velkan (funny and irreverent). "Van Helsing: The
Story, The Life, The Legend" at nearly an hour (with a Play
All option) reveals the actors discussing their characters
in legend and as they appear in movies over the decades,
including this one. "Track the Adventure" is a half-hour
segment that covers the locations used and some of the set
design that created their versions of them. " Bringing the
Monsters to Life" is just what you'd expect: a look at the
CG, mattes and miniatures that created the monsters in their
context.
"Dracula's Lair Transformed" is a clever piece that employs
time-lapse photography to show how the main set morphs into
the various sets required for the movie. "You Are in the
Movie" is another clever piece wherein a videocam is mounted
on the main frame of the shooting camera so that we can get
a view of things from the point of view of the camera. It's
a trick that quickly outlives its point, since the
perspective is always ultra wide-angle.
"The Masquerade Ball is Unmasked" is one of the more
interesting pieces here in that it soberly follows the
creation of the ballroom scene from inspiration ("I'm
thinking of something like Cirque du Soleil") through the
choreography and rehearsal to set design. Composer Alan
Silvestri discusses his music in "The Music of Van Helsing."
"The Art of Van Helsing" is a varyingly presented series of
drawings and paintings of the monsters and heroes for the
movie. There's also a little piece titled "Monster Eggs"
consisting of a few gags and candids.
U-Control permits PIP access infrequent, clear, but brief
cast & crew interviews and behind-the-scenes footage.
The weakness of these Extra Features (save the U-Control
PIP) is that, though they cover the territory, they are
generally murky in their 480i/p presentations. There are no
HD features.
Recommendation : 6
If you can approach this movie with a humourful attitude,
seemingly unintended, and low expectations I think you have
your best shot at enjoying the two hours or so of mayhem.
I'm still aghast at Ms. Beckinsale's absurd costume that she
wears through a good deal of the movie – what are those:
bloodstains on her blouse? No new Extra Features here and
none in HD, the sound is dynamic and the image satisfactory.
Leonard Norwitz
September 10th, 2009
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