Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
AICN and The American Cinematheque are going to be presenting a screening of CONSTANTINE at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood on February 14th. What better way to spend Valentine’s night, right? We’re going to have director Francis Lawrence there, which should be a blast, and I may even cajole another guest or two into showing up. We’ll see. For now, here’s a review from the press screenings held last week in LA. I talked to one of the guys working at Meltdown Comics on Sunset the other day, and he really loved the movie. He was pretty critical walking into it, too. Let’s see what today’s reviewer thought...
Hi--
Thought you might be interested in my review of Constantine. It's my first review, so be gentle...
I just got back from an advance screening of Constantine. I've been reading about John since he first showed up in Swamp Thing during Alan Moore's stint as writer. After hearing about the changes and Moore having his name removed from the credits, I was leery of actually paying to see it.
Warning, contains spoilers!
But I was wined and dined (well, fed popcorn and soda) and seated in a comfy, comfy seat all for free, so that does make it well worth the price. As seating isn't guaranteed at a screening, even if your name is on the list, I hoofed it to the Grauman's 6 on Hollywood Blv. about an hour and a half early, armed with books. There were a handful of people there already, so we took our place in line. Close to showtime, they let us know that due to the amount of press that showed up, there would only be two rows open for non-press. We were in that cut, so we got issued our refreshments and taken upstairs to a private entrance to the two VIP rows up above the common masses. If you ever wondered how celebrities manage to see movies without being mobbed, wonder no longer. Each row was wide with a ledge in front of it and the back row (ours) was high enough over the other one that their heads didn't even come up to the top of our ledge, much less obstruct the view. The chairs were in pairs, huge overstuffed leatherette seats that rocked and padded middle arm rests that raised to make it a generously sized loveseat for two. I'll miss those chairs! There was even a private lounge/bathroom.
Oh, you want to hear about the movie? So pushy!
Keanu just can't seem to get the hang of this acting thing. He was obviously trying hard, I'll give him that. At least I didn't have to listen to his attempt to butcher an English accent.
The changes? John Constantine isn't an Englishman, it's set in Los Angeles and he's the product of a nasty childhood only because his clueless parents had him studied and subjected to such fun things as shock treatment for his seeing what most people can't. As a teen he rather understandably tried to commit suicide, but was brought back back by modern medicine. For this crime he's damned to hell when he dies.
In a Mexican ruined church in the middle of a desert, a scruffy, unwashed fellow who hangs around such places for fun finds a buried treasure of a fancy ass spearhead that makes him invulnerable and starts on a beeline to Los Angeles, wreaking cars and leaping over barbed wire fences on the way.
Meanwhile, back in stately LA, John, chain smoking all the while, gets called in to cast a demon out of a girl in a crowded tenement, which he does by casting it into a huge mirror that he tosses out the window and onto the cab of his driver/wannabe apprentice, Chas. Yup, Chas! Instead of being the put upon, hen-pecked friend that John guilts or blackmails to drive him around he's been turned into an eager puppy who idolizes John. Poor Chas...
After being horrified at managing to shoot another bad guy, a LA police detective, Angela Dodson, played by Rachel Weisz, dreams of her twin sister jumping off of the roof of a hospital to crash artistically through a skylight and into a pool. She goes to view the scene of the crime and has her first run in with John who'd there to get the bad news about his lung cancer. You didn't think a movie these days could have a hero who chain smokes and gets away with it, did you? Not bloody likely. I know it's a plotline from the comic, Hellblazer, but it still rings with a bit of 'I told you so' smugness here. It's far from the last of the bits that are lifted from the comic and fitted into a patchwork plot, while still leaving out some of the best lines and John's basic nature.
He runs into the detective again at the church, where she's gone to argue with the priest about her sister not getting a catholic burial. Suicides are damned, remember? John's gone to argue with Gabriel (Tilda Swinton) about being likewise damned. Swinton is the best thing about the movie. Her androgynous, snooty, sanctimonious portrayal of the archangel is spot on. John is SOL, since he's only doing good to earn a Get Out Of Hell Free card, and he knows there's a God, so he can't have faith. And this is supposed to be the good side? I wouldn't mind, but the movie keeps trying to push the forces of God as the heroic side to be on, instead of just admitting they're each just as shifty here.
Basic plot: Heaven and Hell have a truce. Neither side is allowed to walk the earth, only use 'halfbreeds' to influence and whisper in the ears. The son of Lucifer, Mammon, wished to bring about his own Apocalypse as foretold in the sections only in Hell's edition of the Bible. Don't you wish publishers would mark abridged editions? He just needs the Spear of Destiny, see above, and a powerful psychic to break through.
Detective Dodson's twin sister was the first psychic so guess who's the first on the list to be a doorway? She admits to John that she made herself stop seeing the unseen as a child. His cure when she wants it back is to mostly drown her in his bathtub. That is just the sort of thing John does...
John's contact for relics and information dies a familiar death for long time readers of Hellblazer, and John manages to pop together from the deader's odds and ends in two minutes flat a huge, gaudy cross-shaped gun that would have the real John laughing until he'd pissed himself.
Random bits: Hell is a CG Hell, full of scuttering, long limbed demons, rusted cars and a neverending blast furnace wind, sort of like Phoenix in the summertime. Baron Midnight looks more like a pimp, instead of a Voodoun hougun. There's more tangled Catholic doctrine then at a church social, and the use that the aforementioned gun comes to is a rip of a scene in Blade.
Satan is played as a pervy old guy in a messy white suit that looks like he took time off from offering candy for a peek at their panties to underaged girls to show up. I never understand why evil is so often shown as ugly. Beauty is such a better lure, and Lucifer is supposed to have been the loveliest of the angels. Maybe it's just me, but I'd have been happier with someone like Julian Sands playing Ultimate Evil. It would have shown how little difference there is here between him and Gabriel here.
It was better than expected, but it could have been so much better. If I'd gone to a bargain showing looking for a couple hours entertainment and an excuse to eat popcorn, I wouldn't have been completely cheated, but I've had to pay for some true dogs. It was better by far than League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and From Hell, also both based on Alan Moore's comics, but it wasn't the John Constantine I know, except in flashes. The cinematography is trying for artistic but occasionally it tries so hard it's very obtrusive. Okay, the bit with the cat amused me greatly, but I already knew that about cats.
And the scene at the end of the credits is lacking a great deal of profanity on John's part...
Tiirz
I know next to nothing about the character from the comics, so I’ll be watching the film without any preconceptions, and I’m curious to see if my reaction is different because of that. So far, word of mouth on this one runs from decent to pretty darn good, and I’m excited to be seeing it in a couple of weeks.
"Moriarty" out.
