Constantine

Let me say this up-front: I’m a huge fan of the “Hellblazer” comic book, especially the long run by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon. So I was more than a little nervous about this movie. But at the same time, I also like films like this, even when they’re not connected to any existing franchise.

“Constantine” feels like it both took too little from the comic books and not enough, which is a neat trick. There’s likely a heck of a good movie on the cutting room floor or, more likely, in previous versions of the scripts that were sliced and spliced together to make the theatrical version of the film.

Keanu Reeves plays LA detective John Constantine or, as he says it, “John Constantine, a-hole.” That’s a cute line, but it points to one of the major problems with the film: It’s Schwarzeneggerized. Dialogue in the movie, for the most part, consists of clever catch phrases (and we know “John Constantine, a-hole” is a catch phrase because a riff is done on it by another character within the first minute of Reeves saying it in the movie). Is he an a-hole? Hard to tell: In the comics, he certainly is — John Constantine in “Hellblazer” will sacrifice small children to save a city, or sell someone else’s soul for a marginally improved chance of defeating an enemy. In the film, Reeves’ Constantine is mostly just moody, but we never heard him say “I’m Neo, a-hole” or “I’m either Bill or Ted, a-hole” in previous movies, despite his Constantine not being dramatically different from any of his other roles. But it’s a cute line, so we’re stuck with it.

In the comics, these clever bits that Constantine says are spaced out over several issues and we see a lot more of his street level grungy street magic. He’s not a cool guy, he’s a failed human being who happens to pull a rabbit out of his hat and save the day, once in a while, but at great cost to everyone around him. In the movie, we get all the cool bits and none of the context. This is Neo in wool instead of leather and using magic instead of virtual reality.

Likewise, the story, involving the Devil’s son, angels and demons involved in a cold war on Earth and twin psychics, is very authentically “Hellblazer” — specifically, it hits a lot of the moments in the Ennis/Dillon run — but where it should explain, it skims and where it should move quickly, it broods on arty sequences. As a result, the actual plot of the movie comes suddenly at the end, and it feels as though most of what came before was unneeded, and it probably was.

Having said that, the film looks like a million bucks, whether it’s cinematography, special effects or costuming. You can certainly see where they spent the money they saved on having a solid script doctor come in and clean things up afterwards.

Those interested in the subject matter — a war between Heaven and Hell in a modern urban landscape — would be better advised to pick up the Ennis/Dillon “Hellblazer” paperbacks (all of which are available here at Amazon) instead. “Hellblazer” fans would be advised to rent this, at most.

Someone, someday, will make a great gritty supernatural thriller set on the mean streets of London. “Constantine” isn’t it, and isn’t even a particularly satisfying appetizer for that film.

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