SYNOPSIS
John Constantine has been to hell and back.
Born with a gift he didn’t want, the ability to clearly recognize the half-breed angels and demons that walk the earth in human skin, Constantine (KEANU REEVES) was driven to take his own life to escape the tormenting clarity of his vision. But he failed. Resuscitated against his will, he found himself cast back into the land of the living. Now, marked as an attempted suicide with a temporary lease on life, he patrols the earthly border between heaven and hell, hoping in vain to earn his way to salvation by sending the devil’s foot soldiers back to the depths.
But Constantine is no saint. Disillusioned by the world around him and at odds with the one beyond, he’s a hard-drinking, hard-living bitter hero who scorns the very idea of heroism. Constantine will fight to save your soul but he doesn’t want your admiration or your thanks -- and certainly not your sympathy.
All he wants is a reprieve.
When a desperate but skeptical police detective (RACHEL WEISZ as Angela Dodson) enlists his help in solving the mysterious death of her beloved twin sister (also played by Weisz), their investigation takes them through the world of demons and angels that exists just beneath the landscape of contemporary Los Angeles. Caught in a catastrophic series of otherworldly events, the two become inextricably involved and seek to find their own peace at whatever cost.
Review by
MAURICE BROADDUS
Most people associate horror with demons, Satanism, and witchcraft or slasher-type films. This being the case, few can understand how a horror film could possibly communicate the Gospel. From now on, whenver I'm confronted with this question, I will merely point to the movie Constantine and quote, “only in the face of horror do you find your noblest self.” This was easily the most theologically rich movies I have seen in a long time. It was like a tour of Dante’s Inferno—if Dante chain-smoked, that is.
“Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them, ‘Every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand.’” Matthew 12:25
The character of John Constantine was created by comic book deity Alan Moore (The Watchmen, From Hell, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) during his run on the comic book Swamp Thing. The character was spun into his own series called Hellblazer (its definitive runs being under Jamie Delano and Garth Ennis), where Constantine became a noirish anti-hero in every sense of the word. Think of him as an exorcist-cum-hard boiled PI, casting out demons in his own name and under his own powers, relying on his ability to cheat and con them. He gets by playing one demon against another, even father against son. That becomes the sticking point of the character: somehow, in what should be the simplest cases of black vs. white, good vs. evil, Constantine manages to muck up the waters to an often frustrating shade of gray.
I came in fully expecting to hate this movie once I heard they had made Constantine American rather than British. (Look at how the Americanization of The League of Extra-Ordinary Gentlemen helped gut the original comic material when translated to film). Casting Keanu “he of the wooden acting school” Reeves rather than Sting (the actor of choice when the movie was originally proposed over a decade ago) or even James Marsters (Spike, from Buffy: The Vampire Slayer/Angel) made it nearly impossible for me to give this movie the benefit of the doubt.
But I was pleasantly surprised.
If you didn’t know anything about Constantine, then at first glance, this almost looks like The Devil’s Advocate, part II. Reeves continues to be drawn to the science-fiction/horror world. Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Johnny Mnemonic, The Matrix trilogy. I can see what drew him to this spiritual kinsmen of Neo, John Constantine. We all often feel like him, trapped somewhere between heaven and hell. Unsure if there is a plan to this life, because we can’t see much rhyme or reason to what happens here, we struggle to make it from one day to the next. Constantine's struggle is shared by Detective Angela Dodson (Rachel Weisz) who’s investigating the apparent suicide of her twin sister. The difference between them is that Constantine, who is suffering from terminal lung cancer, labors under the knowledge of where he is destined to go when he dies. And it ain’t pretty. Dodson, meanwhile, is not even sure she believes in the spirit world, never mind an ultimate spiritual destination.
There is quite a bit about this movie that will/should make people uncomfortable. (The comic book always had that disturbing/“this feels wrong” sort of quality to it for me.) This movie, however, redeems the comic in a lot of ways. It focuses more clearly on the heart of what makes Constantine resonate with me. It reminds us of a world we like to pretend isn’t there, either from lack of belief or an all too real belief in it. The movie presents a positively Medieval view of Heaven and Hell. “Behind every wall, every window” this battle between Heaven and Hell wages, with Constantine caught in the middle. The reality of this constant battle, that Constantine had been witness to since his childhood, overwhelms him to the point of suicide. According to Constantine, God is a disinterested spectator, “a kid with an ant farm.” He and the demons vie to see who will rule Hell and take over the Earth. So Constantine merely capitulates to what he already sees as a foregone conclusion.
“Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord did we not prophecy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles? Then I will plainly tell them, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers.’” Matthew 7:22-23
His suicide lands him squarely in Hell, but he doesn't stay there for long. His body is resuscitated, and his spirit pulled back to earth. Even so, the awareness that Hell is his final destination alters Constantine's life to the point where his entire focus becomes trying to buy his way into heaven. Serving God in his own way and on his own terms, he “deports” those demons who intrude into our plane. Even though he knows why he is going to hell (because he tried to take his own life), he still wonders if, perhaps, he goes to church enough, prays enough, tithe's enough; perhaps he might, as W.C. Fields put it, "Find a loophole."
So Constantine finds himself caught in the Great Detente. In a scenario reminiscent of the opening chapter of the book of Job, God and the devil have made a bet of sorts. The angels in heaven and the demons in hell are not allowed to directly interfere with humans. Both sides are reduced to little more than “influence peddlers.” A balance must be maintained. Satan’s son, Mammon (if God could have a son, so could Satan, the movie posits) seeks to blow the balance out the water by fully entering our plane of existence. He aims to use the Spear of Destiny, the sword used to pierce Christ while He was on the cross, to do it.
Ultimately, this is a story about faith. Constantine is a man without faith. After all, what good is faith when he knows full well that there is a God and a devil, and that both were out to get him? He has plenty of head knowledge, but it doesn't translate into a heart knowledge that impacted his life (other than a sense of self-preservation). He lived life to keep his butt out of Hell just a little bit longer.
Plenty of other touchstones abound. The movie takes place in Los Angeles, the “City of Angels”. Billboards read “Your time is running out” and “Got Faith?” In a “baptism” scene, Det. Dodson gets a glimpse of what it means to be united in death, burial, and resurrection in her brief sojourn to Hell.
Overall, this felt like a good introduction to the world of Constantine, where we learn the rules and vocabulary, to a world we hadn’t seen. So, much like Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, there’s a lot of exposition, but if has the feel of the beginning of a franchise. Visually exciting, there was no shortage of imagination from first-time director, Francis Lawrence (best known for music videos). The scenes in Hell look right out of the pages of a Middle Ages art book. This was definitely one of the more satisfying horror movies/comic book translations in recent memory. Not quite The Matrix, not quite your standard horror movie, hopefully the movie won’t frustrate too many viewers with its "innovative" theology and it's refusal to tie up all the loose ends.
