Hercules (2014)

Some sons of god can’t catch a break. Despite his name and rep, Hercules – son of Zeus – is weak on film. Twice in a row. Early in 2014 we got SyFy-worthy “Legend of Hercules,” a bargain-bin film that underwhelmed even the lowest expectation. Now I finally caught “Hercules” – starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and boasting Brett Ratner (“X-Men 3”) at the helm with a $100+ million budget – and it also is a resoundingly limp flick. Ugly CGI, flat characters, a pedestrian plot that makes H into a human mercenary with a heart of gold (boring!) but the brains of a dumb puppy, I sat stupefied that adults made this film. A hammy John Hurt –- the only reason to watch -- gets to scream, “Release the wolves!” Ratner and his crap writers want us to think Kraken, “Clash of the Titans,” I thought Hounds, “The Simpsons.” D

The Oxford Murders (2008)

There is much to laugh at in “The Oxford Murders,” a serial murder thriller mixing in philosophy, math, and Frodo (Elijah Wood) as a hunk of smooth manliness wooing the English ladies with spaghetti and meatball themed sex. Not intended as a comedy, this flick is hilarious. Wood stars an American student who puts all his life into entering Oxford U to study under John Hunt’s wild-haired fruit loop professor’s logic class only to learn after his arrival on campus that the professor has retired from teaching. The kid is stunned. Really? Adults wrote and directed. The adults are Jorge Guerricaechevarria and Álex de la Iglesia (real names?) and they dish up all the genre thriller clichés sprinkled with inane philosophical babble and algorithm riddles that only nerds must think clever, with Wood – I must mention this again – as the stud wooing woman thrillingly open to pasta experimentation. Might all this be satire? Dig Jim Carter’s inspector who slowly catches on that serial murderers kill multiple victims. Dud. D+

Hellboy (2004)

Guillermo del Toro’s “Hellboy” is among the best comic book adaptations out there. And why not? The Spanish master of cinema (he had “The Devil’s Backbone” behind him, and “Pan’s Labyrinth” before him) has a massive bright-red-skinned, sawed-off demon-horned, cat-loving superhero as his star, one who smokes – PC alert! – cigars.

Del Toro doesn’t shy away from the comic book tone, as so many others do to be as audience-pleasing as possible, he embraces it. He even has “Hellboy” comic books be part of the early plot as a young novice FBI agent (Rupert Evans) is assigned as a baby sitter to the prime agent of a top-secret super-natural subdivision of the fed. That’s the tough hero Hellboy, played by Ron Perlman, a character so bizarre to look at onscreen, one marvels still this film ever got made. Or produced a sequel. Perlman, by the way, gives a star-making performance, and clearly is having a blast as the center of attention. He’s the Hulk meets Dirty Harry meets Lucifer, as a misunderstood good guy, and the color of a red Crayola. John Hut, always good and just oozing majesty is Hellboy’s adaptive father, a scientist in love with the strange and unusual.

Part comedy, part horror and action, and all World War II Spielberg Nazis as bad guys opera, this film is a delight from frame one to frame last, because of del Toro’s love for the bizarre, and fantastical sci-fi nonsense. The main villain is none other than Rasputin (Karel Roden), or at least the comic book version of infamous Russian madman, over the top evil and yet grounded as one would expect from the guy who made “Cronos.” (Perlman starred in that gem and “Blade II,” too.) Del Toro’s onscreen pranks include “anything goes” sights in New York to an assassin with sand for blood, and a box full of kittens in need of rescue. (A box full of kittens!)

This is how you take a film from ink-stained comic book pages to the big screen, just go for it. Excellent special effects, makeup and art direction throughout, it’s clearly been inspired by the similar “Men in Black.” Great popcorn fun. A

Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008)

I was stoked for "Hellboy II: The Golden Army." The director/co-writer Guillermo del Toro is one of my favorite filmmakers, having made "The Devil's Backbone," "Hellboy" and the stellar "Pan's Labyrinth." But this sequel to the 2004 film about a demon hero trapped on Earth and doing good for the U.S. of A. is a let down.

It's a visual delight with some of the best makeup and VFX I've seen in years filling, but never overwhelming, the screen. Yet the first film's heart is missing this go round. Is it the near absence of the brilliant John Hurt as comic book hero Hellboy's adoptive father, who appears only briefly in a long and wordy prologue set in the 1950s? Or it that the villain elf Prince Nuada (Luke Goss) is just not that memorable? Nuada certainly wrecks havoc on New York City, notching up a high body count, but he never connects to Hellboy (the brilliant Ron Perlman) the way that the Rasputin character did in the first film.

Worse yet, once I learned that Nuada has an angelic, kind twin sister (Anna Walton) who shares any pain/injury with her brother, well, the ending is apparent. The lack of drama is surprising. The sister falls for Abe (Doug Jones), but that love is never challenged. What if the sister turned sides -- however briefly -- to save her evil brother and Abe was forced to kill her? Or what if Abe saved the villain, thus putting Hellboy in danger? Del Toro certainly offers the visual delights, fantastic mythology and spectacular action he's known for, but I sense we're on autopilot. A bit of a bummer. A great bummer. But a bummer. B