Van Helsing - The London Assignment

The next bold experiment in marketing comes out of Hollywood in the form of this prelude to the fully-realised action movie Van Helsing. Here in this 32 minute animated short, we are introduced to Van Helsing (a Knight of the Holy Order®™) and his sidekick Carl (a monk or something) as they pursue an evil by the name of Dr. Jekyll. It seems someone with a surgeon’s knowledge is cutting up women in Whitechapel (where have I heard this before?) and the chief suspect would appear to be Dr. Jekyll, chief surgeon to Queen Victoria (okay, that part’s new).

For anyone familiar with the Spawn comic book saga (not the laughable live-action film version) or the animated series, there will be some familiar rings throughout as religion and those two inexorable bookends of comic book writing, God and the Devil, get regular referrals.

Basically it’s a bunch of aggressive stunts and animated quips totalling practically zero story and not a lot of insight into what we’ll be facing in cinemas. The Universal monsters have all been taken out of their retirement homes for a new spin and this has me feeling quite nostalgic. You see, my very first review for DVDnet was Universal’s original Dracula from 1931 and he gets to make an updated return to form. The movies have all been dusted off and given swish new covers and are available on DVD shelves now (in creepy green) to fill out the whole theme as well. Ah, the sound of the cash register… there’s nothing like it.

"Just lie back, close your eyes and uh… think of England."

The animation style here is from the same studios that brought us the Kill Bill episodes of the history of one Lucy Liu. This is of a nice style with plenty of deep shadows and such, but the animation seems stilted and jerky in parts, obviously made at great speed to beat the tide of the film’s release. It’s an interesting enough tale and we get to learn a little about the characters but, as I said, there’s little here save for a string of unlikely action sequences. The genuine voice cast gives us the dialogue though, which is a good thing and helps tie everything into a neat package.

For anyone who is bursting at the seams to get their hands on anything Van Helsing related, then this will probably satisfy for an hour or so (including the extras), however for everyone else there’s nothing here we need to see to improve upon the movie. Wait for that and catch this as part of a box set or two-disc release afterward is my advice (if they do that).

Well, there’s nothing to fault this disc or film. It looks quite perfect. The colours are rich and well saturated and it looks just like a film completed this very year (2004) should look on DVD. Delivered in the aspect ratio of 1.85:1 without enhancement it also looks quite cinema-like with the bars and such, but don’t let that fool you; this is TV quality animation for the most part. There are some nice moments of 3D mapping with characters interacting with 3D environments, but the mobile 3D, being a steam train, looks very pre-dawn-1996-PC-game. That stuff is pretty disappointing actually and again looks rushed.

Happily there’s a tasty Dolby Digital 5.1 surround mix here that does get around a bit which is surprising given but 30 minutes of air. The subwoofer supports the soundtrack in okay fashion, though this differs from the heavier metalfest we should expect from the live-action film. It’s a quite traditional comic book score of dramatic ups and downs created by John Van Tongeren and works like wallpaper works. Invisible, but you know it’s there.

Dialogue is loosely scripted and voiced by Hugh Jackman, David Wenham and Robbie Coltrane for the most part. There are, though, some familiar animation stalwarts floating about in John Di Maggio (Bender from Futurama) and Tress MacNeille (also from Futurama, as well as The Simpsons) and Dwight Schultz, who is better known for being Murdock in The A-Team.

There’s only three and the cash register is wetting itself.

Van Helsing – Behind the Screams (haha) is a 28:26 sell job on the picture and is a better than average making of. Hosted by Josie Maran (she plays Marishka, Bride of Dracula®™ in the film but can’t for the life of her deliver an autocue) we get plenty of soundbite interviews with various cast members and special effects masters. There’s also some fascinating insights into shooting the film in an old village in which the largest suspension production for flying cameras ever used was created. Plus, director/writer Stephen Sommers (the crappy The Mummy and its demonspawn sequels) speaks in depth about his genius in recreating someone else’s hard work. He’s so clever.

The Making of the Van Helsing Game is a 6:52 sales pitch to get you to buy the game. You really should buy the game because everyone will want to buy this game. It’s buyable and it’s a game and you can buy it.

Finally, there’s a trailer for the Vivendi game! That you can buy.

If all things Van Houten are your bag, then git the kids and git on down to your DVD store tout sweet. If all things Van Halen aren’t your bag, why are you still reading this review? (In fact, why are you reading this in the first place?)

There’s nothing here you need for filling in the blanks regarding the film when it comes out (in much the same way as The Animatrix: Last Flight of the Osiris wasn’t necessary) and this is strictly one for the collectors. Collectors of, well, I dunno what they’d be collectors of… maybe something like movie monsters or Hugh Jackman (but then they are one and the same).

My advice: Save your money.