Quick Review: Hellboy II- The Golden Army

Remember the first time you saw Godfather II? If you’re like me, you were amazed at how Coppola improved in every aspect of filmmaking, turning out a sequel that improved ten fold on a movie that was already pretty damn good. Hellboy II is Guillermo del Toro’s Godfather II. Here the director not only takes a huge leap forward in the world of the big red ape, but he also takes a huge leap forward from his previous film Pan’s Labyrinth.

Both the original Hellboy and Pan’s lacked a bit of soul. One because of studio interference and the other because it appeared the director was more focused on gore and picture then story. Hellboy II has got soul in spades and it doesn’t come at a cost to the visual style that del Toro is famous for. A large part of that soul comes from the apparent lack of studio insistence that there are more normal folks in Hellboy’s world. In the first film we got Rupert Evans mugging about, but here he’s been cleverly shipped off. Instead we get much more screen time with Abe Sapien, now both voiced and physically acted by the immensely talented Doug Jones, Selma Blair’s Liz Sherman, and new comer Victor Klauss (voiced by an indistinguishable Seth MacFarlane). In short, the freaks are large and in charge. Jeffrey Tambor’s bureaucratic paper pusher is the lone “normal” human in the flick and his one dimensional character from the first film, has also been flushed out a bit. Ron Pearlman seems to have fully embraced the horns in this second film as his Hellboy drives the story in both tone and action.

Allowing the freaks to run the movie is a smart choice and a clear sign del Toro was given creative freedom. Thankfully this freedom wasn’t a determent as it was in Pan’s. Here del Toro has created a truly unique world of magic, fantasy, and reality. The three aspects blend together in perfect harmony. Take the troll market sequence or the initial arrival of our heroes in Ireland. You never feel like del Toro is overindulging or showing off. He’s using these tools and images to tell a story that echoes Pan’s but improves on it exponentially. Gone is the gore and sadness but the darkness and remains along with a healthy dose of humor and action. The visual and vocal tone of the film never strays and to say it’s a gorgeous piece of celluloid is insulting it. Cinematography and art direction Oscars should be set aside this very minute.

Perhaps the only negative about the film is that we may never see this world again. With work beginning on two Hobbit films, del Toro has a plate that’s not only full but overflowing. That’s at least a six year proposition, which means the third Hellboy film that’s tantalizingly set up may never see the light of day. That might be ok though as we all remember how Godfather III turned out.