The episode of The Black Sheep covering Van Helsing was Written and Narrated by Andrew Hatfield, Edited by Brandon Nally, Produced by Lance Vlcek and John Fallon, and Executive Produced by Berge Garabedian.
Some of the movies we talk about have opinions fueled by nostalgia if they are good or reputation if they are bad. Of course, everything is subjective when speaking about how you feel about a movie. It can be tied to events in your life that make you happy or sad. You can enjoy it on the strength of an actor, writer, or director you enjoy being involved or hate it for those exact reasons on a creator not being your favorite. Some things are irrefutable though such as box office or critical appraisal. Van Helsing (watch it HERE) was the culmination of what Stephen Sommers had been working towards with tales of fantasy like The Adventures of Huck Finn and The Jungle Book as well as monster movies like the creature feature Deep Rising and the first two Brendan Fraser Mummy movies. While it did very well at the box office, it is not held in very high regard. Compared to the Tom Cruise Mummy flick and the other attempted reboots like The Wolfman and Dracula Untold though, it’s a hell of a lot of fun.
It’s easy to overlook now but Van Helsing was a, excuse my choice of words, monster of a property. It had action figures, animated spinoffs, a comic spinoff, and even a video game released on PS2, Xbox, and Gameboy Advance. The PS2 and Xbox got a Devil May Cry like affair that is somewhat of a hidden gem amongst that console generation and while the GBA version had to be drastically altered, it too is a fun time if not a much shorter outing. I miss getting those kinds of same name but completely different games on various consoles. As I said before, Sommers had made some really fun movies with Deep Rising and the Mummy flicks and while Deep Rising was supposed to lead to a Kong revival before Peter Jackson entered the picture, we are left with a really fun Treat Williams vehicle. RIP sir. The first Mummy movie is quite possibly the best we’ve ever seen from that character in his own film at least. I respect the older Universal ones and the first Hammer outing is a classic, but the Brendan Fraser ones are just too fun. Unfortunately, this would kind of put a halt to his mainstream career and 5 years later G.I. Joe would really end it. His most recent film is the 2013 small release movie Odd Thomas. With the re-emergence of Brendan Fraser, the last couple years, we are long overdue for the return of Rick O’Connell and a new adventure.
While Sommers is kind of a one man show with his writing and directing, the movie stars a bunch of at the time up and coming talent and some Sommers regulars. Gabriel Van Helsing is played by Hugh Jackman who had found ridiculous success as Wolverine in the first X-Men movie 4 years prior and was actually filming parts of X2 and this concurrently. The Oscar nominee and triple threat is kind of a mix between old Hollywood and new and is a bit of a national treasure, even if he isn’t even ours. He doesn’t have any other horror under his belt but has made some truly wonderful films in multiple genres that stand more than stand the test of time.
Kate Beckinsdale plays his partner and love interest Ana Valerious. Beckinsdale has done a lot more horror and that’s not even including the Underworld series that she is most famous for. She also did Haunted in 1995, Vacancy in 2007, Stonehearst Asylum in 2014, and The Disappointments Room in 2016. Richard Roxborough plays Dracula, Shuler Hensley is Frankenstein’s Monster, David Wenham is… Carl… you know Carl, and Kevin J O’Connor is Igor. Roxborough has been around for what seems like forever and still appears in big ticket movies like Elvis. He also has the distinction of being the bad guy in back-to-back flops with 2003’s League of Extraordinary Gentleman and then this. Kevin J O’Connor is a frequent collaborator of Sommers, and the role of Igor was written with him in mind specifically. In a cool nerd moment, some of the movie was actually filmed on the lot where some of the original Universal Monster flicks were filmed.
The movie opens up with a wonderful black and white prequel chapter set in Transylvania where Frankenstein, Igor, and Dracula are creating a monster. Frankenstein’s Monster to be exact. Dr. Frankenstein goes against Dracula’s wishes, and he is killed for his trouble. Everything here is fun from the performances to the way it’s shot to the make-up and effects, more on that last piece later. The monster grabs his creator’s body and dies as everything goes up in flames. We then cut to full color and are introduced to our namesake hero and his luxurious hair. Van Helsing is hunting a murderer who happens to be Mr. Hyde and as much as I liked the black and white aesthetic and practical effects, here is where Van Helsing earns probably its biggest offense. The CGI is just atrocious. It’s worse today watching in 4K than it was when it was released 19 years ago. CGI in general seems to go through ebbs and flows with a lot of stuff in 2023 not really looking up to snuff either.
I’m glad to get that out of the way early because it’s a recurring issue and one of the only really bad parts of the movie experience. The other questionable parts are some of the accents, it’s a little too long, and yeah, some of the acting too isn’t perfect but what are you looking for here? Acting was actually something that could be overwhelming powerful in the older monster movies and even some of the scenery chewing in the Hammer Films but in 2004, we were looking for blockbuster action and this movie doesn’t disappoint. After he dispatches the villain, he is sent to Transylvania by the Vatican, more specifically The Order, to kill Dracula but also protect a pair of siblings that are the last of a line of a prestigious family. Van Helsing is in the order and has been forever because he was dropped at a doorstep and has no memory of his family and fears he has sin.
Ana and her brother Velkan are the velarious siblings, and they are trying to kill one of Dracula’s soldiers, a werewolf. They seem to succeed but Velkan is bit and lost in the river where he and the creature fell. Velkan will of course now be used by Dracula for his main scheme which is to bring his own experiments to life which will turn the tide in monsters versus humans. We get the next main set piece with Dracula’s brides attacking the village and Van Helsing, with the help of his friar and new age blacksmith Carl, defend the people and slay one of the vampires. It’s a cool sequence to see them out fighting during the day and bad CGI aside, a theme you expected, it’s another fun action set piece. Say what you will about Sommers scripts or even his characters, but the man knows how to direct action. G.I. Joe isn’t a good movie by any stretch if the imagination but even that has some great action going on.
Ana is warned by her brother of Dracula’s plan, but he changes into a werewolf and flees so as to not hurt his sister. Van Velsing and Ana head to the castle and confront Dracula who explains that Van Helsing is his forever rival. Dracula tries to unleash his brood, but they fail because he actually needs Frankenstein’s Monster, who Van Helsing and Ana stumble across. The design and performance of the Frankenstein Monster are particularly unique. It’s almost like a mix of Robert DeNero from Kenneth Branagh’s version mixed with the late, great, Peter Boyle from Young Frankenstein. The performer is Shuler Hensley, and he has actually played the creature on film and stage before.
Carl does some digging and finds out that there is an eternal battle between werewolves and vampires, or more specifically, Dracula and all lycanthropes. They are the only thing that can kill him, and it’s later revealed that he has a cure for lycanthropy, something that Van Helsing needs after being bit. A trade is arranged of Ana for the Monster and both Van Helsing and Dracula assume it to be a trap. Van Helsing doesn’t even bring his trade chip but Dracula has his minions get him anyway. The story continues on with both Igor and the remaining vampire brides being killed and Dracula reveals that it was Van Helsing that originally killed him. He offers to restore his memory but Van Helsing refuses and kills him again.
All of Dracula’s creations die, which would have probably been extra frustrating for Dracula as he just used Frankenstein’s Monster to get them back to life, and Ana uses the cure on Van Helsing, but he unfortunately kills her while still in wolf form. It’s an ending that you may not see coming, especially as the movie was meant to be a franchise from the start. Carl and Van Helsing head off for more adventures and Frankenstein’s Monster gets on a raft to flee Transylvania.
Plans for a franchise were scrapped in the first couple weeks of release as the critical lambasting came in and while it made 300 million on a budget of 170 million, that wasn’t enough for the studio to pursue anything in the future. All the toys, comics, games, and animated spinoffs be damned. The movie suffers from more than a few issues to be sure, first and foremost that awful CGI but it isn’t enough to ignore the movie. It’s overlong but has all of the heart and excitement that The Mummy had. It takes itself seriously in the sense that it’s pulp and the stakes within the movie are very real and important, but it goes out of its way to remind you that its just a big dumb popcorn movie. It should be viewed along with the old classics and even stuff like Monster Squad.
From the different creatures throughout, Mr. Hyde, the Monster, Dracula, the brides, werewolves, and even Dracula’s little Jawa minions to the love and respect for the movies that came before it, Van Helsing misses the mark on a lot of aspects but is the last best Monster Mash we received and may ever get again. Even a failure can be fun and rewatchable and Van Helsing deserves to be reappraised and shown to a newer, younger generation to keep them interested in the classics.
A couple of the previous episodes of The Black Sheep can be seen below. To see more, head over to the JoBlo Horror Originals YouTube channel – and subscribe while you’re there!