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'Hellboy' begs the question: When will it end?
Rupert Evans (left) and Ron Perlman
Revolution Studios Distribution Company
Director: Guillermo del Toro
Stars: Ron Perlman, Rupert Evans, John Hurt
MPAA rating: PG-13, for sci-fi action violence and frightening images
They command so much time and focus that it's a wonder we're not all wearing pinwheel caps and fantasizing about Spider-Man meeting Frodo, Pokemon and the whole Skywalker clan.
There must be a way of applying the Atkins diet to the international obsession with sci-fi fantasy.
"Hellboy," which will be minting box-office dollars, is nicely produced but highly derivative of countless earlier works, from "X-Men" to "Beauty and the Beast" -- not so coincidentally starring Ron Perlman, who also stars here.
The new film was written and directed by Guillermo del Toro ("Blade II") from a story he co-conceived with Peter Briggs, based on the Dark Horse comic created by Mike Mignola.
The Oct. 9, 1944, prologue set in Scotland finds a young semi-pacifist soldier named Trevor "Broom" Bruttenholm (Kevin Trainor) helping an Allied military unit thwart a plan by Russian monk-mystic Grigori Rasputin (Karel Roden).
Rasputin -- doesn't he get around? -- has gone Nazi. His arsenal includes the tentacled creature Sammael (Brian Steele) and the blade-handed Kroenen (Ladislav Beran).
Slipping through a hellhole portal before it can be disabled is a horned, devil-tailed red imp nicknamed Hellboy, who is adopted by Broom.
Cut to the present. Professor Broom (now embodied by John Hurt), who seems to be the only character in the story vulnerable to death, is 60ish and still running his Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense.
"There are things out there that go bump in the night," Broom says. "We're the ones who bump back."
After 60 years, Rasputin is back in business. Where's he been, watching "Star Search"?
The now-adult Hellboy (Perlman as this week's lovelorn Beast) subsists on one brand of candy bars.
He has allies including FBI agent John Myers (Rupert Evans), antagonistic government bureaucrat Tom Manning (Jeffrey Tambor) and telepathic merman Abe Sapien (Doug Jones).
Oh, yeah, and emotionally unstable pyrokinetic Liz Sherman (Selma Blair), who ogles John while the gently jealous Hellboy pines for her.
While Hellboy, self-consciously cool in his asides, repeatedly battles Sammael ("hound of the resurrection") and Kroenen, the film endlessly begs a question Hellboy himself finally verbalizes: "Didn't I kill you already?"
Bingo! If every creature is either indestructible or capable of infinite reproduction, what's the point? Where's the risk? Is there a suspense medic in the house?
