VHS : Hellboy (Dol Slip)

Rating: - Awesome Comic Book based movie.
In 1944, the Nazis and German scientists with the aid of legendary Russian mystic Grigori Rasputin (Karel Roden) are conducting experiments in black magic. They have created a special dimensional portal machine that can summon a powerful demon god from another dimension to bring armageddon to the world but it failed. Paranormalist Professor Trevor Broom Brutterholm (John Hurt) and a band of soldiers discover a harmless baby devil-like demon with short non-sharp horns from hell as they raise him to be an avenging creature that defends people and destroys evil nicknamed Hellboy (Ron Perlman). Sixty years later, Rasputin has been resurrection as now he joins forces with zombie-like nazi soldier Kroenen (Ladislav Beran) and sexy Illsa (Biddy Hodson) as they must attempt to try to bring the demon god to create the apocalypse. Now it's up to Professor Broom's Beauru for Paranormal Research squad lead by Hellboy with the help of kind hearted, intelligent and telepathic merman named Abe Sapien (Voiced by David Hyde Pierce and played by Doug Jones) and gorgeous pyrokinetic woman Liz Sherman (Selma Blair) as they face off some deadly demons and try to save the world.

Superb horror comedy fantasy adventure from the brilliant Mexican director Guillermo Del Toro ("Blade II", "Pan's Labyrinth" and "Cronos") and based on the popular cult Dark Horse comic "Hellboy" by Mike Mignola who was one of the producers of this movie. It's faithfully adapts the brilliant comic book to life thanks to the director's vision, Ron Perlman was born to play the title hero and just fits the bill the right way! Hellboy's make-up was created by Rick Baker ("An American Werewolf in London") and the creature effects especially on Abe Sapien are fantastic. The film co-stars Jeffrey Tambor, Rupert Evans and Brian Steele as the entire cast gives out wonderful performances and there's good action sequences. I love how the film has a mix of fantasy with H.P. Lovecraft-esque themes to it and of course some good timed humor mixed in, this is one of the greatest comic book movies in recent memory and a true must see! i can't wait for the sequel this summer.

This 3-Disc DVD contains the unrated director's cut with never before seen footage not shown in the theatrical cut with hours of awesome extras. There's introductions on three discs, Audio commentary, composter commentary with Isolated Score, Branching DVD Comics drawn by Mike Mignola with Expanded tex from Guillermo Del Toro, "Right Hand of Doom" set Visits and Factoids, DVD-Rom extra of printable script, Script Supervisior's book and Director's Notebook. Two and a half hour documentary on the making of the film, Deleted scenes with optional commentary by Guillermo Del Toro, Motion Board-A-Matics, Animatics, Maquette Rotations Gallery, Trailers and TV Spots, Filmographies, Poster gallery, Weblink to Hellboy stuff, cast video commentary, production workshops, Make-up and lighting tests, Q&A Archieve: Comic-Con 2002 footage, A quick guide to Understanding Comics with Scott Mccloud, Director's Notebook, Photo Galleries, Mike Mignola Pre-Production Art, Conceptual Art Galleries, a replica of Rasputin's diary drawn by Mike Mignola and Comic Artist Pin-Ups makes this one of the best DVDs in recent memory, a must have.

Also recommended: "Superman 1 & 2", "Ghostbusters 1 & 2", "The Crow", "From Beyond", "The Dark Crystal", "Mortal Kombat", "The Mask", "Hellraiser", "Indiana Jones Saga", "Blade 1 & 2", "Batman Begins", "Sin City", "Willow", "Big Trouble in Little China", "The Mummy (1932 and 1999)", "The Mummy Returns", "Superman Returns", "X-Men Trilogy", "Rock and Rule", "Pan's Labyrinth", "Dick Tracy", "The Rocketeer", "Unbreakable", "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990 and 2007)", "Clash of the Titans", "Sleepy Hollow", "Batman (1989, Mask of the Phantasm and Returns)", "Hulk", "Spider-Man Trilogy", "The Fifth Element", "Krull", "The Monster Squad", "Heavy Metal", "Deep Rising", "Highlander", "Army of Darkness", "In The Mouth of Madness", "Phantasm", "Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai", "Men in Black", "V For Vendetta", "Constastine", "Underworld", "Van Helsing", "Vampire Hunter D & Bloodlust" and "Beowulf (2007)".

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Rating: - A superhero movie with large themes, well etched characters that you care for, and an epic comic book drama feel to it.
(1) Hellboy is an American supernatural action-thriller. The director of this tale is Mexican director Guillermo del Toro.

(2) The film based is on the Dark Horse Comics work Hellboy: Seed of Destruction by Mike Mignola.

(3) Released in 2004, it earned $60 million at the U.S. box office, and $100 million worldwide

(4) Hellboy comes into existence when Russian mystic Grigori Rasputin along with aid of the Nazi's on the shores of Scotland opens a portal to the otherworld of Ogdru Jahad, evil entities. Rasputin wants to unleash them on the Earth so as to destroy the Earth. At the time of the opening, due to the ensuing confusion and going of of a grenade when the Americans attack the nazi's, Rasputing gets sucked into the otherworld and a little demon baby with horns with one hand of stone and one normal hand happens to zip from the otherworld to the real world. He is raised by Professor Trevor Bruttenholm who becomes the head of the Bureau of Paranormal Research & Defense. 60 years forward, a grown fish boy only 20 something in demomn years , a fish-like being named Abe Sapien, who has very advanced psychic abilities, and Liz Sherman, a pyrokinetic who has yet to learn to control her pyrotechnic abilities and is implied to have unintentionally injured people when overly emotional team up against the re-emergence of Rasputin, and work to foil him plans of his unfinished task of unleashing the Ogdru Jahad from the other world. Incidentally the Ogdru Jahad can be unleashed only using the Stone hand of Helloboy which acts as the key to the lock.

(5) There is a nice ligh moment in the movie featuring a potential love trianlge between John Myers, Liz Sherman and Hellboy. The scenes of Hellboy getting jealous over John trying to hit on Liz provide a nice comic relief.

(6) Great Visuals. Outlandish and authentic comic book type production design. Great looking menacing creatures. This is not just a special effects super hero movie, its a superhero movie with large themes, well etched characters that you care for, and an epic comic book drama feel to it.

...Guillermo del Toro got it just right. Waiting for Hellboy 2: The golden army.


regards, Vikram

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Rating: - Good movie
Ive had this dvd sitting around for the past few years and I finally got around to watch it. I loved this movie. The colors are rich, the effects are top notch, and it has some pretty good action sequences. Guillermo del Toro is an excellent director. The dvd has four cartoons as extras and the Tell Tale Heart is pretty amazing. I thought the second disc was unneccesary. Still, a great buy if you like action movies.

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Rating: - Great Movies
Bought my husband the die hard collection, and Hell boy the movie great movies, I even liked them, and better yet if you have a nice surround system. Buying throug Amazon was fast and great service will for sure use the service again.

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Rating: - Blue ray to bad, Updated
Its a great movie, but on the wrong format. I'm surprise to see a movie on a format like (Blue-Ray) which might not remain in the market in a few years. If it was on HD I would have bought it.

Universal studios has a signed contract with HD-DVD which means Hellboy 2 is coming out on HD-DVD. Thats means Its not coming out on Blue Ray! So who gets screwed in the end; people who buy Blue-Ray. lol