Hellboy (2004)
I’ve heard the same thing over again by friends who saw Hellboy–it’s OK. Good not great. Yet Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth made me want to check out his earlier movie for myself, since Hellboy II is out this summer. I’m glad I did. I think Hellboy may have been plagued by misplaced expectations. Hellboy is a monster movie. The villains are occult-obsessed Nazis (think Raiders of the Lost Ark). The antihero is a giant red demon who smokes, quips, and shaves his horns down. Oh, and he likes kittens. This is not a movie for deep analysis. This is a fun movie. A silly movie. The look is the thing, and it looks terrific. The characters are engaging and interesting, except perhaps for the newbie, observer character. The plot, such as it is, fizzles out at the end. But that’s compensated for by the cool effects of Selma Blair’s character’s pyrokineses.