Redwood Pack in Need

Brough to my attention by westly ... Abandoned Wolf Hybrids In Need.

I don't know the folks personally (at least I think I don't), and I'm just passing this along without doing more than a cursory check.

Today

Went out this afternoon to see Constantine (since I knew dark_fang wasn't terribly interested in it). I followed DC's Hellblazer for a while, so I had some passing familiarity with the character.

No real spoilers follow.

It's nice eye candy (LA Hell is pretty, in a burning-cinder sort of way); the first part of the movie is interesting. Keanu Reeves comes on screen, and it's *still* interesting. It's stays pretty interesting until Constantine/Reeves threatens a demon with the Last Rites.

It goes downhill pretty quickly from there, though it still bounces a bit (it's still pretty when Constantine finally sits in the chair. No, that's not a spoiler). Constantine channels Neo and talks with Satan/the machine at the low point, which unfortunately is sitting where there should be a climax. The movie shudders to a halt, gasps out a bit of humor, and here come the credits.

Pluses - neat demons, picturesque hell, proper gritty feel. Pretty half-breed angel (whose wings come and go) and half-breed demons that like to torment young children; all interacting with a humanity that can't really see them as they are. A very nice feel and atmosphere, at least until we go from dealing with little bits of personal hell to a we-gotta-save-the-world action flick.

Minuses - CG that occasionally is just too much; if you thought floating blobs of Klingon blood in Star Trek was too much "look at what we can do" there's a scene with glass shards that's worse in Constantine. A major battle with a group of demons that could have been lifted from either Blade movie, down to the 'bad guys' crumbling and burning as they die. Satan looks like Hannibal Lecter from Manhunter with a skin condition, and many of the half breed demons can pass for zombies. The director has no idea how to properly cut your wrists (or decided not to show the correct way to impressionable suicides). Worst - it morphs from a fairly dark flick to a we-gotta-save-the-world action flick two thirds of the way through.

See it matinee (or on a big projection screen) for the neat stuff. It's better than End of Days at least, and the first 2/3rds is more like Jacob's Ladder with a big FX budget.