 Van Helsing: A scooper over at Ain't It Cool News recently got a chance to screen the first 10 minutes of the upcoming monster flick, Van Helsing, starring Kate Beckinsale and Hugh Jackman. Here's what he had to say about the footage. Warning: SPOILERS AHEAD...
The movie starts with the famous Universal logo, which, while turning black and white, turns into a fireball of a torch, which belongs to the mob outside a castle. Inside, Dr. Frankenstein awakens the monster while the mob tries to break in to kill it. After the successful awakening we can see Count Dracula who - as we find out - financed the whole endeavour, apparently because his three brides wanted him to (?!?). Since he doesn't need the Doctor anymore, he kills him (his jaws/teeth reminded me a bit of Fright Night). In the meantime the monster gets rid of the straps on the table and flees with the body of his "father" to the nearby windmill. The mob follows him and puts the windmill on fire. The mob panics as the count and his three brides fly towards the windmill. Apparently they arrive too late, as the windmill collapses.
Cut to Paris at night (now in color), where Van Helsing removes a Wanted Poster (I think it was him on it) and walks into Notre Dame where a very tall (think Hulk) Mr. Hyde is expecting him. After a long fight, including a huge church bell and the loss of one of Mr. Hydes arms (as soon as it is cut off, it turns into the arm of Dr. Jekyll), Hyde falls to his death from the top of one of the towers of Notre Dame. The people in front of the church scream murderer to Van Helsing as the body lying on the floor now belongs to a mere mortal (Dr. Jekyll, of course).
In addition, another scooper at the same site gave his own take on the footage he saw...
opening sequence is in black&white - dr. frankenstein, his creature and count dracula are introduced in a very james whale like scene, the creature comes to life, dr. frankenstein and dracula have a fight over the creature and it all ends at the burning mill, where the creature and dr. frankenstein seem to burn in the flames - cut to van helsing, now in color - he has a fight in paris with mr. hyde and certainly wins it with his pretty cool boomerang like weapons. The effect work wasn't finished, the sound only a rough overlay, blablabla, but all in all it was a very, very cool opener for the movie, first the b/w intro and then a cool fight with a very, very, very cool hugh jackman. |
