Keanu Reeve’s project, “Constantine”, looked as though it had some very good things going for it. It is another DC Comic movie, it had what appeared to be a worthy enough plot, and its special effects looked pretty astounding. All of this held to be true for about the first half of the movie, wherein I was impressed by how well it seemed to be developing. The plot was actually developing fairly well, the characters seemed interesting, and several times I had to just revel in how cool the effects were. I overlooked the cheesy one-liners which Hollywood just has to incorporate with all modern films (ones like “Constantine, John Constantine”). I even followed the poorly designed part of the plot where someone in Mexico finds a lost Nazi treasure from WWII and then wanders off with it in hand.
But instead of using the good parts which the movie was being built with, the makers decided to finish it by relying on anime and comic references and throwbacks which the average movie watcher would never catch. An example of this is taken from the anime series “Trigun”; they borrowed the priestly figures cross shaped gun, and decided to put it in the film, which really did not impress me when Keanu Reeve’s wielded it. Even if you did miss the cross references, how the makers incorporated them made it so there was no room for the movie watchers’ imagination to do anything; instead everything was given to the watcher. Plus, with the cheesy dialogue and sidekicks, it felt like they had simply thrown a comic book onto the big screen rather than adapting it for the big screen.
As the one-liners continued, and the plot deviated from any sort of Catholic or Christian thought (which it was supposed to be based on), I gave up on any real cinematic value within “Constantine” and just enjoyed the fights while laughing at how monotone Keanu Reeve’s sounded in the most dramatic of instances. My suggestion to you who still want to see “Constantine” is this: wait until it’s cheap at the local Wal-mart, convince a buddy to get it, jack it from them, and see it at home for free. At least then you can be disappointed from the comfort of your own home without your own money spent… and if you like it, just keep it until your friend steals it back. Thank God that friends have no late fees.