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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Hellboy
Columbia Pictures / Sony Pictures Entertainment


6.7

based on 37 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 111 votes
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FILM:

MPAA RATING: PG-13 for sci-fi action violence and frightening images

Starring Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Jeffrey Tambor, Karel Roden, Rupert Evans, John Hurt, Corey Johnson, and Doug Jones

A supernatural action-adventure based on Mike Mignola's acclaimed Dark Horse Comic series of the same name. (Sony)

GENRE(S):	Action \| Adventure \| Horror \| Sci-fi
WRITTEN BY:	Guillermo del Toro (also screen story) Peter Briggs (screen story) Mike Mignola (comic books)
DIRECTED BY:	Guillermo del Toro
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: July 27, 2004 Video: July 27, 2004 Theatrical: April 2, 2004
RUNNING TIME:	120 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

Washington Post Richard Harrington

Del Toro moves his story along with unrelenting energy and wit while introducing the opposing parties with admirable efficiency.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

A perfect fit in the category of instant classic, and, not incidentally, fits the profile of super-profitability. Bursting the bonds of its genre, Hellboy fills the screen with gorgeous imagery, vertiginous action and a surprising depth of feeling.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

Surprisingly smart, graphically faithful live-action adaptation of the Mike Mignola series

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

One of the most poetic comic-book adaptations to come along in years, yet it never loses its sense of lightness and fun -- del Toro gives it just enough screwball nuttiness to keep it from bogging down.

Slate David Edelstein

Guillermo del Toro is in a class with Peter Jackson as a fan-boy who gets it--a brilliant filmmaker who has a kind of metabolic connection to horror and sci-fi that helps him transform secondhand genre material into something deep and nourishing. Del Toro reaches into himself and finds the Wagnerian grandeur in schlock.

Film Threat Pete Vonder Haar

Hellboy just might end up being one of the best movies you see this year.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

One of those rare movies that's not only based on a comic book, but also feels like a comic book. It's vibrating with energy, and you can sense the zeal and joy in its making.

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

The movie's got a heart as warm as hellfire.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

Played by Ron Perlman, he's the most magnetic action hero I've come across in a long while.

LA Weekly John Patterson

One of the sturdier superhero movies of the last couple of years, with monsters and effects and diabolical baddies to spare, a heart as big as a house and a love story that actually gets its hooks in you.

The New York Times A.O. Scott

Mr. del Toro lets loose with an all-American, vaudevillian rambunctiousness that makes the movie daffy, loose and lovable.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Hellboy is on fire with scares and laughs and del Toro’s visionary dazzle. It’s the tenderness that comes as an unexpected bonus.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

The film - despite being a half-hour too long - is a rocking, rolling supernatural spectacle.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

The screenplay has flashes of real wit, and Perlman is perfect in the title role.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

Hellboy may be a big, noisy goof of a comic-book action film, but love is in the dank, dark, subterranean air as the bulky red-hued palooka tries to win the heart of the pyrokinetic beauty Liz Sherman.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Hellboy likely won't be the best comic-to-screen adaptation this year, but, squared off against its early-season challenger, Marvel's "The Punisher," this is the winner.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Directed by Guillermo del Toro with a colorfully kinetic visual imagination that seldom lets up.

San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub

The movie has a self- deprecating sense of humor and a strong emotional core that vaults it above most action movies that come out this time of year.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

There are other filmmakers who might have been drawn to a comic book as enchantingly ridiculous as Hellboy. But there are none who would have turned in a sleek $60 million picture as daringly silly, playful and imaginative as this one.

Premiere Sara Brady

If the film's love triangle feels a little silly and the arch-villains a little over the top, it's all secondary to del Toro's passionate immersion in Hellboy.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

So forget about taking anyone under 12. But if you want to see what a benign demon looks like when he's eating nachos and unwinding to Al Green, this is the movie for you.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

Hellboy is, to borrow a phrase, one helluva good time.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

Pretty much impossible not to like a little, but it's also hard to like a lot. There's a fantastic film to be made from this material, but now, the burden of making it falls to a sequel.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

To his credit, del Toro does not flinch from the ridiculous. But he is equally sensitive to Hellboy's pulp poetry.

Variety Joe Leydon

Has more than enough across-the-board appeal to attract mainstream auds unfamiliar with source material.

Los Angeles Times Manohla Dargis

An enjoyable if somewhat neutered defender of the free world. Make no mistake: Hellboy still has a hide as hard-boiled as Lee Marvin in "The Dirty Dozen," but now he's also wearing a smile.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

While the film ably thrusts longtime fans of Mignola’s highly stylized artwork and newcomers alike into the world of that ol' debbil Hellboy, the film suffers from both scattershot character development and a serious case of H.P. Lovecraft overdose.

New York Post Jonathan Foreman

Surprisingly enjoyable, as adaptations of cult comic books go, thanks to a sense of humor all too rare in the genre, winning performances by Ron Perlman and Selma Blair, and a sweet romance of the kind that made "Spider-Man" a richer experience than its competitors.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

Will dazzle you while establishing the world in which it takes place. After that, you may wonder whether Guillermo del Toro got amnesia halfway through.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

It's a treat because, making no apologies for the source material, director Guillermo del Toro lets his picture gorge on power bars of pop energy, sugared with sprinkles of playful humour, and, at least twice, laced with a visual style so piercingly keen that horror morphs into beauty. Not bad for a pulpy outing.

Empire Kim Newman

Hellboy might not have the name-recognition factor of the Spider- or Batmen, but Guillermo del Toro brings the audience swiftly up to speed on artist-writer Mike Mignola's comic book anti-hero.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

For all its f/x pageantry, it is rather tired, as if it's the third sequel of a franchise, not the initial episode.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Arguing that you shouldn't expect rich characterization from a comic-book movie misses the point: Vivid relationships separate the graphic novels from the funnies and, in the end, spectacular set design is just window dressing.

Chicago Tribune Mark Caro

Hellboy's adventures may take him to you-know-where and back, but the movie remains in limbo.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Standard-issue superhero movie -- except that writer-director Guillermo del Toro, taking his cue from "Hellboy" comic book creator Mike Mignola, brings a wicked sense of humor to this particular monster mash.

USA Today Claudia Puig

Hellboy's cheeky attitude and snarky dialogue, specifically Perlman's snidely funny lines, are the highlights.

Dallas Observer Robert Wilonsky

Hellboy is as much a wreck as "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" or "The Punisher," coming and going in two weeks, and as much a bore as "The Hulk."

The average user rating for this movie is 6.7 (out of 10) based on 111 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

[Anonymous] gave it a5:
Poor script, weak characters, underdeveloped plot. Del Toro tried to capture the comic's gritty, minimalist feel but failed.

Andrew B. gave it a9:
To not be charmed or entertained by this film would require either a heart of stone or an utter lack of taste in entertainment. It does an excellent job of creating a comic book feel and look, and Ron Perlman's hellboy is more than likable enough to carry multiple films. So what if the plot can be a bit hard to follow at times. Since when did that matter much for a comic book film?

Prins M. gave it a9:
Good adaptation of an awesome graphic novel.

Oliver C. gave it an8:
As much as the acting and writing could have been improved, Del Toro still brought us the best looking monsters i've ever seen in a movie. And that's no mean feet.

[Anonymous] gave it a7:
It has good points, some action and neat visuals. Perlman's got some good lines, but overall, the movie's too muddled and anticlimatic to be especially entertaining. After a while, you just...lose interest.

Jim P. gave it a0:
Utter pap! The acting was so wooden it was unbelievable!

Ian F. gave it a7:
The first time I watched this movie I was not impressed. The villains had the potential to be cool but had so little air time and character development they became 2D figures (especially compared to the amount of time spent developing the protagonists). Ilsa especially was not worth having in the movie (which is a shame because a German bombshell could have made a good villainess). The plot was pretty standard: evil priest wants to summon in the outer gods (HP Lovecraft stuff here), and the valiant Americans must save the world. Can these yankee chumps continue to try and prove that they won WWII alone any other way than rewriting history? Hellboy is a great character brilliantly protrayed by Pearlmen (he's come a long way from In the Name of the Rose and Beauty and the Beast), the other characters are fun (especially "Niles" and the FBI Director). The FX are good, nothing to complain about. Music score is good. The plot. Weak weak weak. I didn't even realize what was essentially wrong with it until I read other reviews, and then it occured to me: I'd seen it before! The ending swallowed by monster then blows it up a la MiB was anticlimatic and cheesy. The motivation for the entire "plot" was fine (Hellboy ends up being the key to the apocalypse is nice), but the journey to this was confused and often irrelevant. Should have been a TV series.

Hellboy Columbia Pictures / Sony Pictures Entertainment

Hellboy
Columbia Pictures / Sony Pictures Entertainment