Though Hellboy is filled with vfx images, Edward Irastorza managed to keep costs down by using previs and scanning Ron Perlman’s image. All images © The Orphanage/Sony Pictures 2004.

Hellboy is probably the most fun of all the recent comic book adaptations. Ron Perlman brings a sort of “awe shucks” sensibility to his portrayal of the title creature — a devil spawn yanked from the cosmos by Nazis during WW2, but raised by Americans and trained to fight evil in today’s world. Though the film is loaded with dark moments, such as when Hellboy faces his inner demons or does battle with cosmic creatures, much of the story is funny and even light-hearted, unlike the quasi-Freudian treatment of the Hulk, and the more conventionally dramatic adaptations of X-Men and Spider-Man.

Indeed, director Guillermo del Toro cites Hellboy’s gentler side as being one of the elements that first drew him to the material. “Hellboy is such a fallible super-hero, almost too human. Normally in Hollywood you don’t want to see your hero vanquished, you don’t want to see your hero fail, and the great thing about Hellboy is his humanity and fallibility. Before he takes responsibility for himself people even die under his command. He uses his powers for very petty things — stealing a beer, throwing a rock at a guy who’s talking to his girlfriend.” It is a tribute to del Toro’s artistry that he is able to pull off these contrasting elements, and create one of the most entertaining films in recent months.

Lovecraft Lives!
For horror fans, Hellboy presents something very special: it is the first film that shows monsters similar to those described by H.P. Lovecraft in the Cthulu Mythos tales. “The Lovecraft style was Guillermo’s thought in the beginning,” explains Edward Irastorza, vfx producer on Hellboy. “He always sent people in that direction. Early on, Guillermo had discussions about Lovecraft with me and Blair Clark [of Tippett Studios] and we followed through with it.”

del Toro explains that his Lovecraftian vision came from the comic itself. “There is an aspect that I enjoy in the work of [Hellboy creator] Mike Mignola, and that is that his vision of hell is a cosmic one, which he shares with H.P. Lovecraft. In the movie a character says, there is a dark place where evil slumbers and waits to return. And that is basically the premise of the entire Lovecraft mythos — that there are entities out there that want to return and repossess earth — cyclopean entities, to use a Lovecraftian term.”

Hellboy creator Mike Mignola’s vision harkens back to H.P. Lovecraft’s work.

Innovatives in Animation Style
Most of Hellboy’s fights are against Sammael, a bizarre octopoidal beast that, like the hydra, multiplies when killed. The creature’s angular body movements, created by the Tippett Studio, recall the stop-motion work of Ray Harryhausen. “I’ve always wanted to make sort of a Ray Harryhausen movie for a new generation,” del Toro says. “I remember as a kid seeing Jason and the Argonauts and just flipping at the creatures. I met Harryhausen two years ago and one of the first things I said to him was, we’re doing Hellboy and I would love to bring you in as an advisor on the style of movement. But he said movies today are too violent and too full of sex. I laughed and said, come on, in Jason you show a nipple, and in Eye of the Tiger you have a Minotaur that impales a guy. Still, there’s a lot of Harryhausen in the movie. For example, Sammael does the Mighty Joe Young move, slamming the floor when he’s angry. When we were directing Tippett on the movement, we said, do the Harryhausen thing, where it’s almost choreographic.” Such innovative use of style is one of the first times that instead of relying on realism, effects artists draw on the past, creating monsters that are not only horrific, but also exemplify the rich history of animation — a sort of cross-generational approach that achieves truly creative effects, and not just the latest technical fad.