One of the first scenes in Van Helsing is a fight between the title character (Hugh Jackman) and evil Mr. Hyde in a bell tower in Notre Dame Cathedral. During a break in the struggle, Mr. Hyde grabs his head and shouts, “The bells! The bells!” The character seems to realize that he is making a joke about The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and the rest of the film is laden with equally obvious references to classic horror movies. Sometimes the cinematic tributes achieve a memorable visual effect--as in the case of the costume ball based on the one in the original Phantom of the Opera--but mostly they are highlights of old monster flicks clumsily dropped into a lackluster action movie.
    Based on the wily professor who battled Dracula in countless pictures, this Van Helsing is the top agent of an interfaith network of monster-killers operating out of the basement of the Vatican, circa 1895. Unable to remember his past, Van Helsing is sent by his superiors on a mission that promises to provide some clues about his identity. He must kill Dracula (Richard Roxburgh) before the Count tracks down Anna Valerious (Kate Beckinsale) and finishes off her family of vampire-hunters. It turns out that Dracula wants to use Dr. Frankenstein’s discoveries to give life to a vampire horde, and he also employs werewolves as servants, so that’s how the other Universal monsters get into the act. The Mummy is left out of the story, but writer/director Stephen Sommers already visited Imhotep in 1999’s The Mummy and 2001’s The Mummy Returns.
    Van Helsing is really more a James Bond movie than a horror film. The visit to the Vatican basement reveals a sort of Q’s lab where clerics of all faiths work on the latest anti-monster technologies. Van Helsing gets his quota of new gadgets and they come in just as handy as 007’s always do. The female characters further the Bond effect, being Eastern European babes (Beckinsale’s Anna and Dracula’s wives) with suitably exotic costumes and accents. Hugh Jackman does his best to make Van Helsing a tortured hero, but the dialogue doesn’t give him much chance. When Anna asks his character if he’s a holy man or a murderer, he responds that he’s “a bit of both.” It’s an obvious reply, and if you can say it without making the audience laugh, you’re overachieving.
    A more fundamental problem is that the computer-generated monsters aren’t really scary. Current computer technology has a hard time putting life in the eyes of its creatures, and the musculature usually ends up resembling claymation. (That’s why the least convincing monster in the film is Mr. Hyde, while the most plausible creatures are the hairy werewolves.) A lot of the action involves acrobatics at dizzying heights, but the humans’ uncanny ability to remain unhurt after slamming into trees and castle walls undercuts the scene-designers’ valiant efforts to induce fear of falling.
    There are some clever twists on monster lore, including a theory about why vampires don’t cast reflections (for them, mirrors are portals). Likewise, Kevin J. O’Connor’s Igor is an enjoyable character, offering an amusing spin on Dr. Frankenstein’s evil henchman Fritz, who was played with abandon in 1931 by Universal’s go-to guy for evil henchmen, Dwight Frye. In a scene reminiscent of one involving Fritz and the Frankenstein monster, Igor wantonly torments a chained Wolf Man with a high-tech torch. When Dracula asks why he keeps doing that, Igor looks puzzled at the question and replies: “It’s what I do.” The scene is a sharp but affectionate comment on the over-the-top underlings of old Universal monster films, but the other cinematic references don’t achieve the same pitch.
    Despite its many allusions to golden-age horror movies, Van Helsing more closely resembles the disappointing, overwrought monster rallies of the 1940s (House of Frankenstein, House of Dracula) than the subtle, chilling classics of the early ’30s.
                                                                             - Chris Pepus