HELLBOY (2019) MOVIE NEWS & REVIEW

Hellboy (2019) movie

Genre              |   Action Fantasy

Classification   |   MA 15+

Running time   |   121 minutes

Released         |   11 April 2019

cast

David Harbour ... Hellboy
Ian McShane ... Professor Bruttenholm
Milla Jovovich ... Nimue the Blood Queen
Daniel Dae Kim ... Ben Daimio
​Thomas Haden Church ... Lobster Johnson

director

Neil Marshall

writer

​Andrew Cosby ... (screenplay by)
 
Mike Mignola ... (based on the Dark Horse Comic Book "Hellboy" created by)

cinematographer

Lorenzo Senatore ​

music

Benjamin Wallfisch ​

film editor

Martin Bernfeld

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box office result

Worldwide               $? million

Australia                 $? million

North America        $? million

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the best dialogue

Ben Daimio: I thought we were supposed to be fighting monsters, not working with them.
Hellboy: Who are you calling a monster, pal? Have you looked in the mirror recently?

Hellboy: Sorry! Did I interrupt?
Nimue the Blood Queen: On the contrary. You've arrived just in time.

Hellboy: [Police Officer shoots] Heeeeey! I'm on your side!
Police Officer: Sorry!

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HELLBOY (2019) MOVIE IMAGES

Images

Posters

Images

Posters

HELLBOY (2019) STORY SYNOPSIS

​Based on the graphic novels by Mike Mignola, Hellboy, caught between the worlds of the supernatural and human, battles an ancient sorceress bent on revenge.

HELLBOY (2019) MOVIE REVIEW

Reviewed by Mark Geraghty   |   Review date 11 April 2019

Pop ​Movee Rating

“Hellboy” fans hoping for an extension of the Guillermo del Toro films may feel a little short-changed by this third feature film, featuring STRANGER THINGS’ David Harbour in the lead role, as prolific television Director Neil Marshall takes his adaptation down the DEADPOOL (2016) path of ultra-violence laced with sardonic humour...

The 2004 HELLBOY and 2008 HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY feel like a labour of love for everyone involved in making them, but this 2019 version doesn’t appear as though the same care and attention has been paid to either the characters or the film’s story.

In place of del Toro’s “boutique” approach, this latest installment, written by Andrew Cosby, opts for an uneven blend of off-beat, gore-laden comic book vignettes punctuated with lavish helpings of CGI (of varying quality).

No one expects any incarnation of Hellboy to be subtle, but neither is there a need for an unnecessary indulgence in over-the-top violence that has little-to-no artistic merit and visualises gratuity to such an extent that in most film markets around the world the film has received the equivalent of an “R” rating; limiting its audience potential and, as a consequence, also limiting the potential for a sequel (as intimated in the film’s post-credit sequence).

It’s as if Marshall and his production team were so consumed with making this HELLBOY such a bad-ass movie (based upon Mike Mignola’s Dark Horse comic), they forgot they were translating the comic book into a different medium in an attempt to expand the character’s audience potential; not marginalize it.

For goodness sake, “Hellboy” fans want to see more feature film adventures…

It’s admirable to be “true” to the source material, but moviegoers don’t expect heavy-handed (no pun intended) adaptations of material that has already been covered in the comic books. One of the reasons comic book fans like seeing film adaptations of their favourite characters is the opportunity to see them do something different in a different medium...

The 2019 HELLBOY needed to be “different” and it needed also to differentiate itself from its comic book origins to attract a new audience.

This has not happened.

Andrew Cosby’s screenplay is based predominantly upon the DARKNESS CALLS and THE WILD HUNT comic book stories…

The new film provides offers a quick catch-up of the character’s origin, but also weaves in key plot elements and characters from THE WILD HUNT series that was originally released between December 2008 and November 2009.

Arthurian legend features heavily in the story, providing an opportunity for a vast amount of the latest HELLBOY to be set in England, but not much else sets it apart...

David Harbour does a solid job as the titular character. Ron Perlman’s two outings as the character created a high benchmark for Harbour to match, but, on balance, Harbour manages capture the ironic wit along with the “loose canon” elements that are key traits. It’s hard to judge a performance that is built around prosthetics and CGI, but audiences at least will walk away from HELLBOY with the feeling that, with Harbour’s performance, they have seen a different take on a familiar character.

Unfortunately, Harbour’s performance is where the DEADPOOL (2016) effect is most obvious...

The character cracks-wise, even in the most dire of circumstances. Harbour doesn’t break the Fourth Wall like Ryan Reynolds, but his dialogue is delivered in a manner that is as much about talking to the audience as it is his fellow characters.

Yes, that was always part of Hellboy’s schtick, but it’s hard to escape the feeling that this film is following a template; not an organic story.

Ian McShane is entertaining as Hellboy’s “Father”, Professor “Broom” Bruttenholm. McShane has become one of the first choice actors for films looking to cast an upper-crust English character to play against a larger-than-life action hero (or anti-hero in the case of HELLBOY) since he appeared as Winston in JOHN WICK (2014).

Like Harbour inhabiting “Hellboy” compared to Perlman, McShane has no less difficult path to tread; following in the shoes of the wonderful John Hurt...

In terms of looks, McShane and Hurt are very different, but, when you listen carefully to their voices, there’s a lot of similarity. Both men sound like they’ve sucked back on about a hundred cigarettes during a night of Scotch-fuelled mayhem and now, confronting the morning after, have just downed a “three raw eggs & tabasco sauce” cocktail as the ultimate hair of the dog!

Daniel Dae Kim, as Daimio, and Sasha Lane, as Alice, provide solid support to Harbour, but both characters end up being consumed in a whirl of CGI as Hellboy battles Milla Jovovich’s Nimue in an effort to prevent her from literally releasing Hell on Earth.

Despite an effort by Cosby to develop a kindred connection between her and Hellboy, like so many villains, Nimue ends up a one-note character, motivated by a singular need to “destroy humanity”.

Judson Scott delivers a line to Ricardo Montalban’s Khan in STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN (1982) where, in a moment of Khan’s utter determination to wreak his revenge, Scott’s character asks his leader to contemplate an alternative;

“We're all with you, sir, but consider: we are free, we have a ship and the means to go where we will. We have escaped permanent exile on Ceti Alpha V. You have proved your superior intellect and defeated the plans of Admiral Kirk. You do not need to defeat him again.”

Montalban’s character responds - seething - that Kirk “tasks him” in his quest for vengeance and that, unfortunately, is the problem with screen villains, even great ones like Khan.

The question of the “Villain” fraternity must be asked, “What do you intend to do after you’ve achieved your goal?”

But it’s not really a question for the “Villain”...

The problem lies with the writer. It seems a great many of them haven’t ever considered the question…

If they had, perhaps Milla Jovovich’s Nimue in HELLBOY might be less of a pastiche of a hundred other cinematic baddies.

Fans of Mike Mignola’s comic book series won’t be disappointed by Neil Marshall’s feature film adaptation, but they will form only a small part of the audience HELLBOY is intended to reach.

Unfortunately, classification boards around the world will have more impact on this film than any part of the actual filmmaking process.

Did this HELLBOY need to be R rated when the previous two films were comfortably within the M classification?

The answer will depend on who you ask, but, for whatever reason, the creative forces driving this project felt a more violent approach was the right way to go…

Sure, R rated comic book films seem to be resonating with audiences, but there’s a huge difference between putting Ryan Reynolds in the Deadpool suit and layering David Harbour in vast amounts of prosthetics, having him alter his voice and expecting the same kind of result as the “Merc with the Mouth”...

The people putting up the finance for HELLBOY might come to regret the apparent free-reign the film’s source material and the recent audiences embrace of R rated comic book film adaptations has exercised over this latest installment.

HELLBOY MOVIE (2019) USEFUL LINKS

Hellboy (2019 film) - Wikipedia
​Hellboy (2019) - IMDb
​Hellboy (2019) - Rotten Tomatoes​

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