Tagline
Hell wants him. Heaven won't take him. Earth needs him.
Plot
Keanu Reeves plays the title character in this adaptation of the comic book called Hellblazer; John Constantine is a chain-smoking, heavy drinking exorcist. Doomed to go to hell when he dies, he fights evil in order to get on God’s good side and earn his place in eternal paradise. As a kid, Constantine successfully committed suicide to escape a life filled with either accepting that he sees demons, or electroshock therapy because his parents think he’s gone mad. When you kill yourself, there is no heaven, you go to hell instead. John Constantine was dead and in hell for two minutes, and what he saw there was so horrifying that he vowed to do everything he can to keep him from having to go back.
Being the cynical and sarcastic bastard that he is, he refuses to help police detective Angela Dodson investigate the suicide of her twin sister Isabel (both played by Rachel Weisz). Angela is convinced there is something weird going on, something she thinks John Constantine can help her with. She doesn’t want to believe in the supernatural, but in can’t deny its existence after Constantine shows her things. They find out that the demons are trying to gain access to our world. The demons need a ‘pure soul’ for that; Isabel. Together Constantine and Angela fight to prevent this from happening.
Acting
Rachel Weisz was definitely doing the best job in this film. The scene where she drowns in the bathtub to get a glimpse of hell is simple, but very gripping. Keanu Reeves has done better, but still portrays a very nice gloomy John Constantine. Casting Tilda Swinton to play the archangel Gabriel was a good choice. Her posture is very androgynous and fits the character nicely. Our personal favourite was Balthazar, played by Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale (husband of Gwen Stefani), who has a perfect face for such an evil being. The way he moves and talks made us shiver.
Verdict: People have complained that this film was a bad Buffy-meets-the-Exorcist combo that is a disgrace to the comics. We, however, don’t know the comic and enjoyed ourselves watching Constantine. It’s a decent film with good graphics and some very clever scenes.
Freaky fact: there were exactly 666 people at the premiere of this film in Norway.