Van Helsing and the Unorthodox Monster Narrative

Rebecca Scheinert Monsters and Myths September sixteenth 2012 vanguard Helsing and Unorthodox Monster Narrative Monsters have become a regular fixture in the contemporary movie industry provided it is important to remember these supernatural creatures were born from ancestors in ordinal ascorbic acid mediaeval literature. These creatures were a cultural product of the accessible, scientific, and psychological concerns of a guild that had lost its faith in religion. Each daimon was a rumination of a ubiquitous fear that remains relevant today.In the 2004 film r eat upition of van Helsing, the director Stephen Sommers calls upon the famed vampire hunter from Bram Stokers genus genus genus Dracula to restore order to a world interweaving the plots of Frankenstein, and The Wolfman. The shooter of forefront Helsing has been stripped of any memory of his characters history and triumphs provided must seek to vanquish his enemy aided only my the folklore of nineteenth century Ea stern Europe. Without a sense of identity, Van Helsing accepts this task join by the beautiful Anna Valerious who is cursed by her ancestors promise to destroy Dracula.The dyad must face endless threats, apply knowledge of the occult, and confront their sexual demons to reach the climatic final battle with Dracula where they must bond to their disappearing benevolence in a world of the Tempters. Although Van Helsing and Dracula atomic number 18 dramatic foils for one another, their similarities become as app bent as their differences as the storyline develops. In this final prognosis from Van Hesling, Stephen Sommers employs and distorts conventional teras mythology to prove to its attestators that the dichotomy in the midst of hero and ogre is not mutually exclusive.Initially, the somatogenetic character of the injection is the vehicle that transports its viewers from the couch in 2012 to the recognised world of monster myths. The viewers credence of the telescope i s imperative because it invokes a willing suspension of disbelief from the listening in which the time-honored mythology of the classic monsters stories is embraced as historical fact (Tudor 121). The revulsion film genre employs setting conventionally to facilitate our entry into the fictionalization where the unbelievable characters and events are embraced (Tudor 122).For this particular scene, the auditory sense finds the characters in an archetypical gothic setting, the laboratory where Frankenstein was created (Van Helsing). In the Gothic tradition, writers built plots around restless spirits, everlasting monsters, and unresolved sins of the past that reappear to bedevil modern characters (Worland 12). Stephen Sommers browses the characters in their imagined place and time by interweaving Frankensteins middle-European village, Draculas Transylvanian mountains, and The Werewolf of capital of the United Kingdoms fog-shrouded setting into a location familiar to the genre co nsultation.In this scene, the nineteenth century stylized lab is tall and imposing with rich architectural detail. In the darkness of night, moments before midnight as indicated by the baroque clock, clusters of molest and blue electrical charges are the only source light. The midnight hour is ecumenic symbol for the time when monsters roam the earth while the men pause (Philips 515). The intelligible destruction in the laboratory conveys that it has already failed terrifically. The setting is a reminder that in gothic horror the stakes are graduate(prenominal) because the struggle is mortal and metaphysical (Worland 17).This elaborate laboratory is paradoxical setting because the events are occurring in a time with scientific knowledge entirely in a part of the world that remains unchanged by industrialization. Furtherto a greater extent, by combining Frankenstein and Dracula, the powers of science are directly conflicting with the apparitional themes of the legend of Dracul a (Tudor 87). While inside the burning laboratory it is evident that both science and religion have failed the characters. The integration of the monsters settings is only the first device Sommers plays with.Horror operates by and through the tried strategy of placing stereotypical characters in cumulatively eventful situations which is a structure the earshot expects through out the movie (Tudor 112). The genre hero is titled by Andrew Tudor as the expert and given the responsibility of bringing the world or disorder back to order. When we enter this scene in the shambled laboratory, it is undeniably recognized as disorder. Tudor goes onto say that Draculas traditional opponent, Van Helsing is the common ancestor of all of the genres experts (114). The original bestows VanHelsing with the efficiency and knowledge to vanquish Dracula provided was written as scholastic and eccentric as a fold to a vampires ruthless hex (114). Sommers introduces Van Helsing in this scene defeat ed by battle, fragile, limping, and gasping for breathe. Although he is introduced as man, the identifiable wolf scratches across his chest and the striking of the clock count on his trans spirtation into a werewolf monster. Sommers reminds the audience of the human expert and monster foil when Dracula enters as a flying monster and Van Helsing enters as a wounded human.The audience is aware they are grow for Van Helsing and weary of Dracula. Furthermore, Van Helsings monster is a werewolf, who are seen as demonic innocents entangled in a complex meshwork of ritualistic expectations (117). A werewolf is a sympathetic monster because the audience can compartmentalize the humanity from the lupine cruelty by his damp physical forms. Van Helsing reluctantly assumes his monster form writhing during his transformation. However, he embraces his fate by tearing off his jacket and engaging in battle.Van Helsings internal conflict between embracing his monster form to complete his task to vanquish Dracula and fearing the loss of his human suss out is illustrated when he frightens himself from his lupine form into his human form while strangulation Dracula. This narrative trick confounds an active audience who is inclined to remain trustworthy to the expert hotshot who has become what he is destined to destroy. In addition, the delineation of Dracula in the scene manipulates religious iconography to further the juxtaposition between religion and science that was introduced in the setting.In this scene Dracula exhibits the expected traits of a vampire when speaking in his human form. He is elegant deprive attractive scarce evil and manipulative (116). Upon discovering Van Helsing is now a monster as well he tries to coerce him into joining his fight. Dracula sees all monsters as equals on the side of evil united against humanity and the greater considerably, as a part of the same great spirited (Van Helsing). Dracula is a satanic character, the of the evil si de in the incessant battle between good and evil.This character parallel is supplemented by the physical characterization of Dracula in his monster form. Sommers employs the standard devil cladding with horns, wings, and red coloring as a universal symbol for evil. Dracula is charming and sophisticated in his human form but as a monster he is the hideous disconfigured archetype for evil. This proves to the viewer the homo can be monsters and the monsters can appear as humans. The naked nerve cannot discern between what is evil and what is good, even when the monster is as unadorned and Judeo-Christian devil.In these cases, Sommers is manipulating with the monster iconography by transforming orthodox characters. Monster iconography has actual through statements, repetition, and variations that the audience has come to understand (Worland 18). There is an expected viewer response of hatred for monsters and empathy for humans, which the director is playing upon. Through this devi ce, he makes the social commentary that any man has the ability to become a monster and at that place is a monster in all of us.At the same time, he is loyal to the narrative by making the expert an empathetic monster and Dracula a deceiving monster. Ultimately, the audiences psychological response to the scene is necessary for Sommers to manipulate the genres traditions and mythology effectively. Through out the scene at that place is a shock steering wheel of latent hostility construction and release. inside the smaller context of a singular scene, the microscopic shock cycle will build and release pressure, keeping viewers engaged until end (Tudor 109).There is relief with the grotesque and painful end of Dracula. Rick Worland titles this event a drab death that challenges the traditional conceptions of mortality and the social good (8). The audience does not feel sadness for the revolting murder of Dracula but they experience devastation at the loss of Anna. Although Annas death is more troubling to the audience, the producers do not let us see her bad death. Anna is mauled by Van Helsing as a werewolf as well but in a moment of suspense and equivocalness we can only see the back of the werewolfs body.While the audience abide byes this genre for the suspense and gore, it is still troublesome to see the end of the heroine. The audience can digest her death as a necessary pass and the final shock rather than cruel an unusual when they are spared the optic impact of her death. This can also be looked at through a Freudian perspective. Freud advocated a resonation of the return of any actions or desires repressed by the dominant social order through experiences such as ceremony horror movies or nightmares (Worland 15).All of the audience members have felt repression, whether it is from an external societal source or an internal repression of feelings or memories. The monster is a verbal expression of this repression. All varieties of repression can b e overcome by vicariously existing through this scene because the monster is both a triumphant hero and a defeated antagonist. In the end there is silence and the tension is released because both monster threats has been nullified. Antithetically, because of the dual bad deaths, the audience is left to think over if the ends justified the means.The audience has released their feelings of repression through the shock cycle but is left to contemplate the questionable victory and the tragic death long by and by the scene is complete. At the heart of this scene, Sommers challenges viewers to question the traditional protagonist and antagonist relationship in the movie and with the audience. He does this by presenting characters and settings that bring up expectations for the course of the scenes plotline. Then, by choosing a different path, there is a psychological response from the engaged viewer.Over the course of the brief scene, there are series of surprises that are not from t he blood and gore but from the distortion of century old stories. At the conclusion of the scene, the audience has worked through feelings of repression by witnessing the destruction of two monsters and the death of two characters but are more importantly inspired to question what the true manifestation of good and evil are. Works Cited Phillips, William H. Film An Introduction. Boston Bedford/St.Martins, 1999. Print. Tudor, Andrew. Monsters and Mad Scientists A pagan History of the Horror Movie. Oxford England B. Blackwell, 1989. Print. Van Helsing . Dir. Stephen Sommers. Perf. Hugh Jackman and Kate Beckinsale. Universal, 2004. DVD. Van Helsing . YouTube. YouTube, 16 June 2011. Web. 16 Sept. 2012. http//www. youtube. com/watch? v=jr60kvuKw3w. Worland, Rick. The Horror Film An Introduction. Malden, MA Blackwell Pub. , 2007. Print.