Constantine: Critic Reviews

Viscerally, I feel shut out of the fun.

Keanu Reeves plays a haunted, expressionless traveler in an overblown theological thriller based on the DC/Vertigo comic book Hellblazer.

So where are we? In two hours of Dullsville, as Sinatra used to say.

Reeves wears essentially the same black wardrobe, does the same moves, shows off the same galling lack of acting ability, but with a slightly different haircut.

The screenplay by Frank A. Cappello and Kevin Brodbin is only interesting for a few characters, hardly the story.

Alternates between quiet, surprisingly dull scenes in which the hero and the girl talk in that italicized comic-book way about his past and orgies of computer pixels dressed up as gibbering fiends.

The actor's black-on-white getup makes it plain that Constantine is one 'whoa' away from Neo-dom, and that Constantine likely represents the start of another Hollywood franchise with diminishing returns in its future.

For all its spiritual angst, Constantine is about as silly as fantasies get.

Occasionally, Reeves forgets what movie he's in and strikes a Neo-like pose.

Constantine deals, at least in part, with its title character's attempt to cross over from hell to heaven. But there's no uncertainty about the movie's fate. It quickly heads south.

Takes itself just seriously enough to put on a good show. Reeves earns some theatrical redemption, the demons put a scare into the waywardly righteous, and there are plenty of evil-duders left over for a sequel.

Reeves, meanwhile, has confidently entered his self-parodic period.

Maybe some of the audience should wonder if they aren't performing the Devil's work by sitting so quietly through movies that turn wonders into garbage.

Reeves has a deliberately morose energy level in the movie, as befits one who has seen hell, walks among half-demons, and is dying.

Though the story is potentially fascinating and the visuals sometimes spellbinding, the movie itself is stranded in the purgatory of the second-rate.

This supernatural, super-noir thriller has been shot beautifully (by Philippe Rousselot), and directed with enjoyable, crazy-angled aplomb by Francis Lawrence.

Hellacious, audacious, visually stunning and deeply wiggy, Constantine is a miracle, a comic-book movie for smart people.

Admittedly, a big bunch of supernatural mumbo-jumbo, and it's also a cool looking big bunch of supernatural mumbo-jumbo garnished with a healthy dollop of religious cynicism.

Occult detective John Constantine (Reeves) has seen it all and responds to the most hideous threat with a puff on his cigarette and a self-assured leap into the abyss.

I deeply loathe the Heaven-and-Hell genre to which this cinematic comic-book spectacular belongs.

Blazes few new trails and bogs down in a confusing narrative muddle.

Great-looking but torturously slow.

It's a ponderous bore. Dull dialogue, dull situations and a serious lack of urgency hinder what should be a high-stakes slice of pseudo-religious heresy.

There is no person in movie history who has devoted more time to defending civilization from evil and obliteration than Keanu Reeves, or who has spent more time shifting between spiritual, perceptual and historical planes to do the job right proper.

You can just picture the meeting: A few guys in Prada suits sit around an L.A. boardroom table going, 'The Matrix meets The Exorcist, huh . . .? With Keanu? I like it. No wait - I love it.'