Re: Hellboy R-rated film reboot announced
The problem is that the source material never really struck me as particularly R-rated, if at all. ...
Exactly my impression. To me it always was a blend of Lovecraft, romantic ghost stories (no, not a guy called Sam creating pottery, but late 19th century short stories and novels) like Frankenstein and Dracula, Action Adventure alá Indiana Jones (I know, I know, 1930ies+ serials...), Scooby Doo-esque antics, steam punk, X-Files etc. with clearly defined baddies (who does not love to see some nazis and their ghosts punched and pommeled into their krauteating kissers?)
Fun. R-Rated sounds like a lot of unnecessarily violent visuals.
We had watched HB1 with my bonus daughter just two weeks ago, and despite the violence in it she loved it. The acts of violence like Kroenen killing Broom or the guards ending up as snacks for Sammael or the guide being sacrificed to conjure Rasputin were IMO showing very, very subtly, elliptical story telling of violence at its finest. It is a harsh contrast to all the head shots and brains flying at you even in TV shows nowadays. Violence for the sheer wow factor of the fx is violence p*rn, nothing else. That being written, I do wonder what an r-rating is going to add to the already very rich texture of a Hellboy movie.
By the way, the origin story of HB and his relationship to broom was IMO shown so damn perfect and heart warming that this is IMO going to be very, very tough to best for a reboot. But I am a sucker for how Supes came to Earth and was found by the Kents in Superman:The movie, so I guess it may be just a sentimentality or softness on my part re
rphan demon prince and foster father, and a new telling of his origin may be possible.