Wicked Good

Comic book-inspired `Hellboy' puts the fun back in fighting evil.

MovieReview

SUN SCORE

***

It's not easy being Hellboy, what with the pointy tail, the horns that constantly need to be filed down and the comic books that try to make you look good, but never get the eyes right.

But it's easy to like Hellboy the movie, especially if you're willing to accept the very comic book-ness of the whole endeavor - the oversized heroes, the chronic need to crack wise, the monstrous villains, the world that plays by its own rules.

For in its outlandishness is this movie's very real charm, as writer-director Guillermo del Toro (Blade II) spares no outrageousness in bringing the popular Dark Horse comic to the screen. Yes, the story gets a little caught up in itself at times; those unfamiliar with the Hellboy universe may be scratching their heads. But the movie has energy enough to whip past such obstacles, and a star in Ron Perlman who's perfectly cast (he specializes in making menacing look soulful) and ceaselessly watchable.

Hellboy comes into this world seriously on the wrong side of the tracks. In the waning months of World War II, things are looking so dim for the Nazis that they'll try anything, even an alliance with the devil himself.

And so they recruit Rasputin (apparently that mad monk was more the essence of evil than a real person) to act as their go-between.

The plan: open a portal to hell and bring forth a devil spawn to wreak havoc and make the world more to the Nazis' liking. But some American soldiers get in the way. Soon the baby devil is in the hands of the good guys, who adopt him as their own.

Cut to the present. Hellboy (Perlman) is in his mid-20s, we're told (hell spawn don't age as fast as we do), and he's a good guy - in the nature vs. nurture debate, Hellboy comes down decidedly on the side of the latter. Still, he's not exactly cuddly. He's foul-mouthed and ill-tempered, with horns he's constantly shaving down.

He's also bright red, virtually indestructible, the most effective secret weapon in the arsenal of the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Development. He has a thing for cats (as pets, not food). And he's fiercely loyal to his "father," Professor Bruttenholm (John Hurt), the researcher who snatched him from the Nazis.

Good thing he's on our side, too, because Rasputin is back. And he's got a bunch of tentacled, slime-spewing, spiritually immortal monsters to help him.