Mar 062008
 
four reels

Long ago, mankind attempted to wipe out the fair folk and take Earth for its own. To save themselves, the goblins made an indestructible, clockwork army that would kill all men, but the king of the fey had a change of heart and pulled back the army. The prince (Luke Goss) saw this as a mistake, and went into exile. In modern times he has returned to gather the three pieces of the crown that controls the golden army, and unleash it on humanity. When, he kills everyone at an auction as part of retrieving the first piece, the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense is called in. Hellboy (Ron Perlman), Liz Sherman (Selma Blair), and Abe Sapien (Doug Jones) are back, joined by their new boss, the ghostly Johann Krauss (John Alexander / voice: Seth MacFarlane).

The second Hellboy film feels much like the first, but avoids the problem of so many sequels; it is neither a copy nor simply “bigger” and “louder.” It jettisons Hellboys’s portal character—Myers—and brings in Krause as a new semi-antagonist, but the big shift is in mythology. Hellboy was Lovecraftian. Hellboy II is high fantasy immersed in faerie lore. These aren’t the gentle fairies of Disney. The film is filled with the twisted, sometimes beautiful, often mesmerizing, but always dangerous faeries of the tales invented to frighten children into behaving.

Director Guillermo del Toro demonstrated his knack for the faerie world and its bizarre creatures in Pan’s Labyrinth. Here, he takes it far further. There’s the giant, furred, Mr. Wick with his mechanical hand connected by a chain. There are the tooth fairies that will devour your bones while you are still alive. There are the raven-masked guards. There is the legless goblin, the rock giant, the angel of death with eyes upon her wings, and the denizens of the Troll Market. They are the stuff of nightmares, but the coolest nightmares that call to you in the night.

The story kept my interest. The actors are marvelous; Selma Blair steps up her game and Ron Perlman continues to totally own his character. The villain is sympathetic, our heroes become deeper and more complex in a film that presents morality in shade of gray and black. But it is the world-building that is the star of the show. This is a film to see on the big screen, but then own at home so you can pause it to examine the incredibly inventive universe.

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