Ninja Pajamas, and other good things.

If ever given the choice between seeing Blair Witch 2 and Van Helsing, promise me, dear readers, you'll go to Blair 2. At least that movie is funny. Van Helsing, with a surprisingly generous Tomato-meter rating of 25%, tries too hard to be at once campy and fun, dark, mysterious, and serious - to be everything to everyone. It ends up looking like Tim Burton and Jim Carrey's love child with the unfortunate side effect of combining the worst possible genes from some not-so-promising parents. Much like Hellboy, about a billion dollars out of the billion and two dollar budget went toward special effects and high profile casting, leaving a buck each for story line and post-production editing. Truth be told, they could have cut that to $1.50 with the same end result if they had given both the crayons and the scissors to one five year old, instead of bribing two. If you don't mind paying $8 to be dazzled by eye candy, by all means, go see it. If, however, you would like anything cohesive or believable, even Beavis and Butthead bring more to the table. As far as vampire movies go...boy. God. I really need to get a government grant for public education on the subject of vampires. What a waste of a good concept. See, I'm so repulsed by this movie, I can't even write cohesively! I may have actually lost some of my soul (not to mention my life and about 7 brain cells) watching this horrible movie. On the plus side, Hugh Jackman got on with his bad self and did the best he could with what he had, and Kate Beckinsdale looked refreshingly different - more like a gypsy queen than Snow White. She still can't act worth shit. Had it been my movie, I would have used that extra fifty cents to get Yakov Smirnoff to teach her a passable Russian accent. If this movie was a car it would be: The MGB - gets a lot of attention, but breaks down every 4.5 minutes.