Van Helsing (2004)

Van Helsing. A classic monster hunter movie, it even had screaming maidens and a strange Vampire Bride/Siren hybrid, frankly I’m not sure what it was. And sure, the female lead was supposed to be an empowering woman, but all she did was sit around screaming and crying about her dead brother. The film includes a number of notorious monsters (Frankenstein’s monster, the omnipresent Count Dracula, Jekyll and Hyde) each of which suffers a more horrifying death than the last. Dracula’s brides are vicious killing machines, especially when it comes to the local villagers, who probably dream of escaping icy Transylvania and its hauntings.

Van Helsing arrives in Transylvania, with his trusty sidekick Carl, and almost immediately the village is attacked. Dracula’s brides, Marishka, Verona and Aleera, seem to care about nothing more than their ‘children’ and drinking blood. Stepping aside from usual vampire habits, the vamps in this film don’t burn in sunlight (but they don’t sparkle either), and no, they don’t appear in mirrors either but that’s for completely different reasons than their slight case of death.

Personally, I don’t like this film, but from what I’ve heard, barely anyone does. It’s been described as “a hollow creature feature that suffers from CGI overload” and I can’t really disagree. The main character, Van Helsing, was your typical monster hunter, handsome, holy water wielding, mechanical crossbow shooting and, who could forget, werewolf. The female lead, Anna Valerious, was everything a girl aspires not to be. She spends nearly the entire film wailing about how her brother died and, admittedly, she did have some great moments, like when she screamed upon finding the cocoons. My favourite scene was where she died, she isn't worth of the name Anna. As stated above, the film used far too much CGI, and they could’ve had a quality film had they not done this. It strayed from the usual clichés, for example, Dracula doesn’t seem to drink blood as much as his minions and the vampires all died in different ways, not just Death by Sunlight™ or Death by Stake Through Heart™. However there are about five full moons throughout the duration of this film, and I seriously doubt that it is set during five consecutive months mostly because this film was only two hours long. Also, as vampires can only be killed by werewolves (or Vlad, at least can), I'm getting a certain Wizards of Waverly Place vibe, even though this show was released about three years after Van Helsing (2004).