There's been plenty of movies based on comic books, and especially in recent years, but there hasn't quite been a hero like Hellboy before.

Based on comics created by Mike Mignola, Hellboy is a spawn of Satan who is brought to Earth during World War II but instead of being evil is raised by a kindly scientist and eventually is made part of a top secret "task force" who are brought in to qwell "monster" activity. Well things start to get hairy when Rasputin (Karel Roden) who's been resurrected to continue his efforts to rule the World.

Great character actor Ron Perlman finally gets to star in a movie (and a big-budget Hollywood movie, no less!) as Hellboy and he's the best thing about it bringing our hero a nice sarcastic wit and doing extremely well under tons of make-up. It's just too bad that scripter/director Guillermo Del Toro (who in my opinon hasn't helmed a truly great movie since coming to North America) has under-developed his main villain, there's a bit too much silly CGI moments, and the finale is pretty weak - but that's not to say it's all a loss as Del Toro brings this a great comic book flavour, the effects are above average (I'm not a huge fan of CGI, but here they work), and there is a couple of decent action sequence (especially in the subway); it's just that I found the story to be a little bit too muddled and trying to hard to be complex when really this should've just been a mindless rollercoaster ride.

The character itself is good and here's hoping they can improve on him when the planned sequel arrives. (Chris Hartley, 8/15/04)

Directed By: Guillermo Del Toro.
Written By: Guillermo Del Toro.

Starring: Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Jeffrey Tambor, Karel Roden.