There’s been a lot of talk lately about the upcoming big-screen G.I. Joe. The executives at Paramount are reportedly trying to find a way to remove any pro-American attitude from the popular toy line/cartoon series. It’s come down to two competing screenplays—one by the writer who scripted the conservative Swordfish, and the other from a team who wrote the crime drama Four Brothers, in which political correctness wiped any suspense from the script.

But it looks like director Stephen Sommers will be helming the project, and that’s encouraging. He wrote and directed Van Helsing, which struck in the night to become 2004’s greatest film metaphor on modern warfare.

The film starts as a James Bond parody—set in 1887—complete with lengthy opening sequence. We then see monster-hunting Gabriel Van Helsing getting briefed on his new assignment for a mysterious religious order. He’s sent off to Transylvania on a mission to find a missing prince. Also, it would be nice if Van Helsing could find the time to kill Dracula.

As it turns out, Van Helsing manages to kill one of Dracula’s three flying vampire brides within minutes of arriving. Things almost go differently. Our hero arrives to the village, where the locals quickly demand that he turn over all of his neat weaponry. That’s when the femme vampires sweep down to get some fresh blood. After a fun action sequence, Van Helsing finds out why the townsfolk didn’t care for his lethal luggage. They’re all angry with him for killing the vampire.

In fact, it’s been 100 years since anyone in Transylvania has killed a vampire. “Vampires only kill what they need to survive,” explains one angry villager. “One or two people a month. Now they will kill for revenge.”

Meanwhile, back at the castle, the remaining vampire brides are equally outraged: “Why can't they just leave us alone? We never kill more than our fill and less than our share. Can they say the same?”

Don’t take that moral outrage seriously. As Van Helsing will learn, Dracula has been quite busy with those three gorgeous women for 400 years. He’s got a castle full of catatonic offspring that he’s trying to bring to life. These countless creatures are going to wake up hungry, too—so it’s convenient that there’s a village below that’s full of complacent morons.

Fortunately, Van Helsing will end up saving those worthless Transylvanian lives. Don’t worry about the abortion issue, either. As Van Helsing explains, Dracula’s children are, reasonably enough, already born dead.

That’s not giving away too much of the film. There’s plenty more plot afoot, with turns by a werewolf and Frankenstein’s Monster. Most critics agreed that the film offered plenty of entertainment, and the ones who called it soulless may have picked up on how Van Helsing could’ve been called Commander-In-Chief: Vampire Hunter.

Personally, we thought Van Helsing was a comeback for Sommers, after The Mummy Returns being his first disappointment after 1998’s Deep Rising and 1999’s The Mummy. Other film critics keep invoking Sommers as one of the major figures behind bad CGI-driven filmmaking. G.I. Joe will show if the director truly has a daring spirit. If nothing else, the guy can sure make a family film about monsters—and it’s good to have one of those around for Halloween.

Make it your own: Another fine DVD going for cheap—unless you’re looking for the Van Helsing Collector’s Edition, which includes the Universal studio’s recent remasters of the classic Dracula, Frankenstein, and The Wolf Man. That was a neat idea, but all those classic Universal monsters also got their own box sets that year—and it seems better to enjoy those vintage films on their own than having them paired with Van Helsing. We like Van Helsing, but we’re not delusional.

 

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