Once upon a time (if I can remember a book I only read once, 30 years ago) there was a man named Van Helsing. He was an elderly scholar, from the Netherlands, I believe, and he joined with a small group of English heroes to help defeat a horrendous threat to England from the wilds of distant Transylvania. ⁽¹⁾

CGI has morphed this minor character into an angel named Hugh Jackman and given him the task of helping rid Europe of its multitudinous and various monstrosities, from the horrendously CGI-enhanced, a la The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Mr. Hyde (here played by Robbie Coltrane in a somewhat less sympathetic role than that of Rubeus Hagrid in the Harry Potter films) to the bloodthirsty Wolfman (here more a genre than an individual).

Those who have seen the “Mummy” films, also by director Stephen Sommers, will appreciate that the traditional horror of the genre has been somewhat enhanced by a fair dosage of tongue-in-cheek humor. Much of this is provided by Van Helsing’s sidekick, Karl (Faramir — I mean, David Wenham), a Catholic monk — excuse me, not a monk, a friar, as he will be the first to tell you, friars not being quite so restricted in their extramural activities as monks. If we looked at this film as a takeoff on James Bond movies rather than horror movies, Karl would be playing the role of “Q”.

Van Helsing, victim of a horrific case of amnesia, despite which he has become Europe’s premier monster-slayer, is sent by a secret arm of the Church, along with Karl, to Transylvania to help save a noble family from eternal damnation because of a vow it took to destroy monsters, and which it, now down to two members, has not succeeded in fulfilling. By the time they reach the village where much of the action takes place, there has been (apparently) a futher decrement in the size of the family, and a sudden attack by the Brides of Dracula on the village threatens to finish the job. Luckily, Van Helsing is on hand with his gatling crossbow.

As to the characters, none is particularly memorable. Van Helsing in particular is something of a cipher, largely due to his lack of a past. X-Men fans were fearful that this film would make Hugh Jackman such a star that the salary he could command would make a third X-Men film impossible. Well, I suspect that such will not be the case; this film is not guaranteed to contribute more to Jackman’s fame than did Kate & Leopold. The hat he wears is more memorable than the man. Kate Beckinsale as Anna is little more memorable. One must admit that Richard Roxburgh’s Dracula is considerably more impressive than the CGI one that shows up mainly for fights. (Is Roxburgh the only actor with the distinction of having played both Sherlock Holmes and his arch-nemesis Moriarty?)

The whole movie is a roller-coaster ride of battles, flight, Tarzan-like swinging on chains and ropes, carriage races and the like. Expect no great literature here, but don’t expect to catch up on your sleep during the movie, either.

⁽¹⁾ Distant Transylvania is, of course, no wilder than the Willamette Valley of Oregon, as my friend Ionel, who comes from a village just outside its largest metropolitan area, Cluj, can testify. Its biggest problem is that it contains two quite different ethnic groups (Hungarians and Romanians), each of which believe that they should be in charge, to the chagrin, of course, of smaller local groups such as Gypsies, Jews and Germans. Vampires are generally found in Transylvania, as elsewhere, only in romantic novels. This film, of course, gives us a Transylvania which is not only wild but geographically so vertical that, as one wag once said about the Ozarks, “a good realtor can sell both sides of the same acre.”