Rating: Summary: Woohoo! My Favorite Superhero. Review: Initially, I really had no desire to see this, but WOW! I was hooked. For a big red guy with horns he was actually kinda hot!
The fact that they tied a love story into it just made it that much better! i was amazed at the storyline. It will always fascinate me how people come up with this stuff. I haven't had a chance to buy it yet but I cant wait until I do. This is the first superhero movie that I really liked (dont get me wrong, Spiderman was cool.
Rating: Summary: Good for the comics fan Review: It's another comic book rendered into live action. On the whole, it's pretty good. The (...) are the bad guys, our flawed Hellboy is the hero, and he gets the hot female lead in the last scene. Yes, I said hot.The pace is good, the attitude is bad (that's good), and the effects are good. The visual presentation helps move the story along. For example, almost the entire first sequence is bluish monochrome with two colored exceptions: Our Hero is red, and the Evil Babe's lipstick is red. That tells you who to watch. OK, it's not subtle, but this is a comic. I'll look elsewhere for subtlety. (BTW, I've never read Hellboy comics. I probably won't start, even though I liked the movie. Lots of other comics are good, too, and my preferences lie in other directions.) Maybe you like comics. Maybe you like action movies based on over-the-top characters. Maybe you want a flick that's exciting enough, but where people stay mostly dressed and the gore is kept under control. If so, the movie has a fair bit to offer. Go ahead, enjoy.
Rating: Summary: A PRE-RELEASE REVIEW Review: Just saw the trailer for this movie which will be released on April 2, 2004. A little background, this movie is based on a popular Comic book series by Mike Mignola. When a Nazi mystical experiment goes awry in 1944, the target of a wizard's spell, the child of Satan, Hellboy, is wrenched from his home, and adopted by the U.S. agents who intercept his arrival. Raised as a force of good, Hellboy grows up to be a full-fledged demon in the form of a man, complete with fierce red skin, a tail, a giant armored glove, and two large circles where his horns should be (if they ever grow back, Hellboy is quick to break them off). Now, the adult Hellboy, an investigator of the paranormal, is sent on a mission that brings him back in touch with the evil genius that started it all... that Nazi wizard (and just who is *he* anyway?). Accompanying him along the way are other agents, including Liz, a pyrokinetic woman Hellboy has feelings for, and Abe Sapien, a mysterious amphibian hominid... Ron Perleman of Beauty and the Beast Fame will play hellboy and looks pretty good in the part. The director Guillermo Del Toro is the same guy who did Blade II so he has some experience with comic adaptions. Looks to be very special effects laden, but it looks very interesting.
Rating: Summary: More Like 4.5 Stars..but Still a Great Comic Book Movie! Review: Ron Perlman is Hellboy and makes the movie worthwhile even if it wasn't any good. But have no fear because the movie is really good. No other actor I can think of is more perfect for this part and I was happy to finally see him get a starring role in a movie, rather than the side-kick or bad-guy part of norm. His eyes, voice, and sarcastic personality really shine through all those layers of awesome make-up. Rick Baker did the make-up effects and that alone promises greatness in that department. The love story between Hellboy and Liz was funny and sweet, not sappy like the one in Spiderman. Everyone cast seemed like they fit the part, especially John Hurt (the mentor) and Liz (Selma Blair). The special effects for the most part are great, with only a few scenes standing out as just average (the underwater egg hunt & the blue fire). All in all, I had a blast with the action scenes and remained interested in the plot, which was fresh and new for this type of movie. Not being one who has read the comics, I still haven't figured out all of the plot or who some of the bad characters were suppose to be. But since I plan on seeing it again real soon, I will be sure to pay more attention to the story rather than just the overwhelming visuals. This is easily one of the better Super-Hero films of the last few years! "Second Date...No Tongue."-Hellboy
Rating: Summary: Masterpiece Review: The Director's Cut is only for those who liked Hellboy, but didn't really love it. The Director's cut is magnificent. You truly begin to understand the movie. All the underlying, implied scenes are masterfully expanded upon. You truly get to see what a genius Guillermo is.
In my opinion, I think he purposefully made the original Hellboy bland and 2 dimensional, because this one made the characters more 3 dimensional. If you thought the characters already had real emotions behind the larger than life prowess, than you'll think that you almost know them and what they are doing.
There is finally a true sense of place, because every scene is easily illustrated with the location name. You understand the mythology behind everything, as the entire story is compounded with facts such as more behind Sammael, a little more on Kroenen, and also a very interesting scene of Rasputin getting a haircut. If you weren't very attentive, then this scene will immediately let you know that you're not watching the same movie.
The movie is allowed a sense of kind freedom, as the moments of levity and freedom are enhanced, which in hand make the moments of sadness and strife that much more compelling. All i know is that i'm only halfway through the movie and i'm already writing this review. I don't care if he added a ton more after the point I am at, I just know that right now, this director's cut is amazing.
Rating: Summary: My man del Toro Review: They got it right! THEY GOT IT RIGHT! Rejoice, for Guillermo del Toro has proven himself to the masses! My heart was pounding as I prepared to go see "Hellboy," because I was still smarting from the lame-brained mess that was "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" and it seemed to me that maybe Hollywood just couldn't handle a graphic novel adaptation that wasn't about a typical Marvel superhero. But what to my wondering eyes should appear but a spot-on, beautifully made film that hit all the right notes. Del Toro is one of the most stylish directors out there, and he has remained true to Mike Mignola's literary vision. This movie rocks. "Hellboy" begins during WWII, when a group of Nazis attempt to open a portal to a nightmare realm and release some nasty, Lovecraftian gods. Their plan is foiled by Allied troops, but a cute little baby demon manages to slip through the portal. Found and raised by the kindly Professor Broom (John Hurt), the demon grows into a massive, bright red, cigar-chomping fellow played by an excellent Ron Perlman. Hellboy works at the Beareau of Paranormal Investigation, where he lives in a cluttered little apartment, has several dozen pet cats, and eats his weight in pancakes every morning. His sidekicks include Liz Sherman (Selma Blair), a young woman haunted by ability to generate fire; Abe Sapien (Doug Jones, voice by David Hyde Pierce), a fey, psychic human/fish hybrid; and John Meyers (Rupert Evans), a rookie FBI agent who forms a bizarre love triangle with Hellboy and Liz. Unfortunately, the Nazi villians from earlier are still around, still trying to bring about the Apocalypse. The trio of bad guys includes an Aryan femme fatale named Ilsa (Bridget Hodson), a sword-wielding assassin named Kroenen (Ladislav Beran) whose body has been turned to dust by constant self-surgery, and the infamous Grigori Rasputin (Karel Roden), who didn't die when the history books say he did, and who is now a supernatural occult being with a whole lotta power. Hellboy and his friends are soon leaping from rooftops, prowling through sewer tunnels, battling an army of slithery, tentacled beasts that mulitply as fast as you kill them, and finally heading to Moscow for a showdown in a subterranean lair with the kinds of booby traps that Indiana Jones has wet dreams about. All this action is instilled with a sense of fun and recklessness: characters fly through the air and fling each other into walls, just like in the comic book, and there's always lots of expendable FBI agents and security guards ready to die horrible deaths so our heroes won't have to. "Hellboy" has a great energy and a great visual flair. Many of the images are ripped straight from the comic books. The plot has been altered and some of the characters are changed (in the comics, Kroenen is a talking, fully-realized character; in the movie, he's been reduced to a silent special effect), but I was amazed at how much this film echoed its origins. Props to everyone involved -- cast, crew, special effects technicians, the whole bunch. I can tell that they had lots of fun making this, and that it was a labor of love. Never fear, Hellboy fans, this movie will not disappoint you. And if you're not a Hellboy fan, hey, give it a try anyway. Guillermo del Toro is my hero.
Rating: Summary: "For her I'll cross over... and then you'll be sorry" Review: This is a really great movie, because it takes so many things from various HELLBOY stories(and not just of Seed of Destruction) and captures the look and feel of the comics. Thoroughly recommended for any fan of a good action movie, superheroe movie, and specially for any HELLBOY or Mike Mignola fan. The best comic inspired movie yet (I even liked it better than Spider-Man 2 and X2, even though I was a fan of those properties YEARS before I was a fan of Hellboy). A trully great film and a must buy DVD (tons of extras). A++
Rating: Summary: Finnaly!!!!!! a Superhero with human feelings and conflicts Review: This is a unique story, for a number of reasons, our central caracther Hellboy despite being a supernatural being have issues regarding his origins, his father, love , his aspect , good and evil, the figth against the bad ones etc. his vulnerability is evident. The Nazi forces return at the present time after in 1944 their confabulation with evil dark forces to take control of all the world nations are frustrated thanks to the aliated forces and specially U.S.A. army and a very experimented expert in paranormal area from the American goverment , being almost a baby demon Hellboy is adopted and raised by this expert and becomes the only father figure our hero have, inside the headquarters of this goverment division in charge of paranormal activities Hellboy grows up with Selma Blairs carachter and falls in love with her , Selma is a girl that have her own supernatural powers , she can explode and throw fire from her hands if her emotions are out of her control , if she feel anger or if she feel love with intensity , they form a unique couple but she have her doubts anyway and for this reason Hellboy experience human conflicts , however the central problem will force them to realize and decide quickly what is gonna happen with this issues before be too late because evil forces are back and will try to complete what they meant to finish in 1944 and then the civilization as we know in this days would be so different and chaos would reign.
This is a stunning film , again proudly Tapatio director Guillermo Del Toro have offered to us a masterpiece in comic based films and transform the story so we can relate to it at leat in the human emotions facts wich never before superhero stories gave to the public and this is refreshing for a change.
HM
Rating: Summary: Please, Guillermo, Old Fellow, Go Back to Making Real Movies Review: This movie presupposes a somewhat Lovecraftesque demonology where we are to imagine that a host of evil slimy tentacled things live in a dimension beyond us and are always in danger of seeping through. Here an evil alliance of Hitler and Rasputin (You heard - remember it's a comic book adaptation!) open a `portal' to this world of scary goobledeegook and, before the goodies can shut them down, in comes, not a host of evil things but a cute wee demon baby. Cut to the present day when baby, adopted by now very elderly John Hurt, the guy in charge of the FBI's supersecret paranormal defence outfit, has grown to manhood as a monstrous, indestructible, fireproof (This will come in handy for his love life.) odd-looking red thing played by Ron Perlman. The FBI keep him in reserve to fight off attacks from occult forces. Which is handy because in the meantime...
I seem to have seen a lot of this cgi-drenched stuff lately. There was, let me see, `League of Extraordinary Gentlemen', `Van Helsing', `I Robot'. All garbage as you may have noticed yourself. This wasn't quite garbage and was certainly significantly better than the aforementioned turkeys but surely a bit disappointing given its authorship which had me very much wanting in advance to like it more. I first noticed the existence of Guillermo del Toro in the late 90s when `Mimic' seemed to be one of the neatest and most effective horror movies I'd seen for ages. Then he followed that with the brilliant `The Devil's Backbone', not just scary as hell but beautiful and deep. Looked very much like an interesting new guy at work in movieland. Then what he does is follow `The Devil's Backbone' with erm, `Blade 2'. Which I watched just because it was Del Toro - and it wasn't bad as such stuff goes. And now this. And it seems a sequel on the way. Such films are OK maybe but Mr del Toro's talents are surely horribly wasted on them. But, in any case, I'm down on cgi. I also just watched the `Ginger Snaps' movies with their super cheap guys-in-wolf-costume effects, which can't compare to all this high-tech spectacle and yet is so much better, so much more real than these movies that feel like cartoons with their lifeless computer-generated armies of monsters. This is better than most I stress (though not as good as Ang Lee's brilliant `Hulk', the glorious exception to my general whinging here) but has that same lifeless feel. I guess it's technically well put together and generally well acted. But if I ask myself, honestly, Is it remotely scary the way `Mimic' and `Backbone' so memorably were? - the answer has to be `No.' If I ask, Is it exciting is the Spielbergian way we look for in straight action films? - the answer is really `No'. Partly because Hellboy is just too tough, too indestructible. It's a no-brainer that, yes, sure he's going to win this fight scene. And the next one two. So a bit boring all in all. And the end is a bit feeble and something of a cop-out.
Rating: Summary: Great lead character...in search of a better story Review: This was a thin concept that never made enough use of its star - Ron Pereleman. An indestructible demon brought to Earth by Nazis during WWII (which overlapped with the "Occult Wars"), Hellboy was found by American soldiers and raised by a kindly professor (John Hurt) to fight evil. Though he can clear tall buildings in a single bound and utter no more than "oh, crap", Perelman brings out a decidedly human side to the character. HB has been working for our side - specifically the kind of super-secret organization that exists only in comic books or movie adaptations of them. We first meet HB through the eyes of John Meyers - a young transfer from the FBI, who finds that his new job involves following HB around and making sure to have plenty of candy bars around for the right moment. Though HB seems to have things under control, two problems nag him. The first is his unrequited love for Liz (Selma Blair) an emotionally scarred fire-starter (she doesn't like the word "pyrokinetic"). His larger problems involve plans to complete the world-destroying plot that began with HB's arrival on Earth.
I really wanted to like this movie, mostly because Perlman brings surprising earnestness to his role of demon who likes kittens and can't get the girl. The best thing about comic books is that they work as great ensemble pieces (a team of heroes, or a solitary hero working against a great villain). Unfortunately, the script gives HB little support. Rupert Evans as Myers can do little more than follow HB around, and keep him supplied with mounds of pancakes and gallons of chili, and there aren't enough scenes between Perlman and Blair or with his Hurt. There's a scene midway in which Jeffrey Tambor, HB's reluctant boss, reminds him that theirs is a team effort - yet much of their back-up is anonymous. Even the villain is generic - the kind of old-world sounding occult dude we had enough of in "Underworld". The basic plot riffs on Lovecraft, but so did "Ghostbusters" 20 years ago. In the end, HB becomes little more than Perlman v. CGI, a match that underrates the talents of both Perlman and his character. HB is still nothing if not satisfying, though you never get past the sense it could have been so much more.
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