Every once in a while a movie comes along that is universally hated and/or dismissed automatically. It shows up in a few theaters and then disappears quickly and quietly. I try to make a point of seeing those movies, maybe just to see where all the hatred is coming from or to figure out why the movie was made in the first place. Does this mean that I saw Jonah Hex? Yep. Battlefield Earth? Right again. The Country Bears? How could I not see The Country Bears? People in animatronic bear suits trying to stop evil banker Christopher Walken from forclosing on their music hall? Sign me up!
Which brings me to Dylan Dog. It's based on an Italian comic book, apparently. I didn't know that when I saw it, but everything these days is based on a comic book from somewhere that somebody loves, which leads to all the hatred because it's not exactly how they pictured it would be. Since I didn't know the history of the character, it just reminded me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Not that smarmy, snarky TV show either - I'm talking about the original movie here.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. Here's the setup. Dylan Dog (Why "Dog", Italy? That makes no sense as a last name. Unless it's Dylan Dog the Bounty Hunter! Now there's a movie idea!) is a private eye who is a sort of policeman for the monsters who live in New Orleans. There's vampires, werewolves, zombies and such all living there, because, c'mon, it's New Orleans. He's retired, but he gets pulled back in like Al Pacino in Godfather III due to a case of a werewolf killing a human. If he's not careful, it could lead to a war between werewolves and vampires, plus there's an artifact that's been missing for hundreds of years that, if found, could bring back the demon Belial. Belial would kill all the monsters - even the zombies, who are generally nice and quiet and keep to themselves. Oh, and there are rumors of a monster slaying human on the loose as well.
Phew, that's a big story. But not a big budget, alas. So instead of a special effects free for all, a lot of time is spent on Dylan's assistant, Marcus. Marcus is like the Shia LeBeouf character in Constantine, except when he dies he doesn't stay dead, he just gets more annoying. Why is this type of character popular? Who identifies with a screechy, loose limbed, knock kneed, snarky little boy-man? Who thinks they're funny? And who ever thought that one character saying "No", over and over until the edit shows them doing what they said "No", to in the first place is funny? It's not, and the character's not, but they're both here in this movie, which is sort of a drag.
There are some clever bits concerning zombies in this movie (support groups, body shops) and when they could afford it, the effects are as well done as possible. Just please, don't cast a pro wrestler as a character with actual lines (Kurt Angle - no thanks), and I know it's a detective story, but not all detective stories need voiceovers.
Even with all those complaints, it's still an ok time waster. Brandon Routh doesn't have his vegan powers anymore, but he does as well as he can with the straight man part. Peter Stormare chews up the scenery as head of a werewolf clan of meatpackers, and Taye Diggs (Seriously, what did Taye Diggs do? He's awesome! Put him in better movies!) is pretty awesome as the head vampire. It's not as bad as people say, and it is sort of a spiritual successor to the Buffy movie, so if you liked that, you should check it out.
No comments:
Post a Comment