David Tesic
A&E Assistant
When I first heard a movie called “Constantine” was in the making, I assumed it would be a historical movie based on the life of the Roman emperor Constantine, who was the first ruler to legalize Christianity in the Roman Empire during the 4th century.
Then I found out the movie was actually inspired by the DC/Vertigo comic book series, “Hellblazer,” which intrigued me.
The film draws heavily from the legend of the spear of destiny, the weapon that was plunged into Christ’s ribs while he was on the cross at Calvary. According to the legend, the person who possesses the spear of destiny can rule the world. The last person to supposedly possess the spear was the German Nazi ruler Adolf Hitler, who committed suicide soon after the spear was taken away from him.
First and foremost, I would like to say that I was really bothered by the religious topic of “Constantine.”
The idea of the movie was quite creative, but the filmmakers obviously didn’t realize that this could be a potentially touchy subject to make a movie about.
I happen to strongly disagree with falsely portraying religious issues to a religiously uneducated public. Having said that, I will set it aside and talk about this movie as if it was about just another meaningless topic.
In this day and age when there are movies about all kinds of things, it is understandable why the creators of “Constantine” came up with the idea for this movie. It’s pretty hard to be authentic anymore, so they had to make a movie about a subject that most people fear. And not only is the topic itself creative, but the way in which it was portrayed was also creative and original.
The greatest thing about this movie is the actors. It is almost as if the filmmakers found the perfect people to play these roles.
There is no actor on the face of the Earth who could play the role of John Constantine as well as Keanu Reeves. He’s a nice guy with a bad attitude. He appears to be really tough, but he has a good heart.
Reeves already received a lot of credibility for a somewhat similar role in the “Matrix” films, so it wasn’t difficult to find the perfect Constantine.
And since co-star Djimon Hounsou appeared in “In America,” his most remarkable performance to date, I was waiting for the day to see him in another outstanding role. He definitely met my expectations in “Constantine,” where he played the role of Midnite, the character who guards the balance between heaven and hell.
Another remarkable performance was given by Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale, who played the role of Balthazar, a humorous demon who wants to destroy Constantine. Rossdale is the perfect image of a demon. He is good looking on the outside and rotten on the inside.
Although Satan didn’t get a lot of screen-time in this movie, he was still portrayed well.
Peter Stormare’s Satan seems to be goofy, but he is actually very intelligent and that is a uniquely honest portrayal of Satan. He disguises himself so that people can’t recognize him. An extra detail that really added to the effect of Satan’s disguise was a stark white suit.
The only actor who didn’t meet my expectations was Tilda Winton, who played the role of the angel Gabriel. Maybe it is because I was offended by how disrespectfully the film portrayed an angel of God, but the acting also left a great many things to be desired.
This movie displayed remarkable computer graphics and showed creativity in the way the camera angles were positioned. The special effects and cinematography really added to the overall effectiveness of this eerie movie.
All in all, when I managed to forget about the fact that there are a lot of biblically inaccurate elements in this movie, watching it became a very interesting experience.
I certainly wouldn’t recommend it to anybody who will be greatly bothered by the inaccuracy of the biblical details, but, if you know the true story and are aware of the facts, then the overall movie-watching experience will be an entertaining one.
02-24-2005
