What We Learned on the Set of Neil Marshall’s Practical Effects-Driven, Horror Take on ‘Hellboy’
Director Neil Marshall unleashed a definitive modern classic in 2005 with claustrophobic cave terror The Descent. He injected new life into the sparse sub-genre of werewolf horror with Dog Soldiers, and has directed some of the most action-packed, breathtaking hours of television in Game of Thrones, Hannibal, and Westworld. Well versed in horror with a proven track record, there’s perhaps no better director suited for Hellboy, a reboot more grounded in realism and faithful to the comics on which it’s based. Most exciting of all, though, is Marshall’s steadfast belief in using practical effects.
After being fortunate enough to spend a day on set, touring multiple set pieces throughout Nu Boyana Film Studios in Bulgaria, speaking with some of the cast and crew, and seeing Marshall and David Harbour in action, I learned a lot about what to expect from the upcoming film. While there’s no shortage of love for the two Hellboy films that Guillermo del Toro made, the common complaint among fans of Mike Mignola’s acclaimed comic series is that del Toro’s films were nothing like the source material, venturing far into fantasy and taking liberties with the personality traits that made Hellboy, well, Hellboy.
I’m thrilled to report that not only is Marshall’s film looking to stick much closer to Mignola’s work, but his version of Hellboy is going to be much more grounded in horror, realism, and glorious practical effects.
“Mike was involved in the genesis, even in the discussions about doing a third [movie]. But then when those plans shifted to a reboot, he still remained involved right from the story level to all the way through. We’re still emailing furiously with him on a daily basis,” producer Lloyd Levin shares on Mike Mignola’s involvement with this iteration of his character. Mignola’s comics are dark and violent, and thanks to the successes of R-rated superhero films like Deadpool and Logan that have paved the way, Marshall’s film has also been granted the room for an R-rating. On what exactly that means for Hellboy, Levin explains, “It applies to intensity. It applies to gore. It applies to horror and graphic depiction. We’re not grafting an R-rated mission onto the movie or onto the comic book. The comic books themselves are R-rated. There’s buckets of blood. There’s beheadings. There’s an intensity that equates naturally and organically to the R-rating. It wasn’t like, ‘Let’s have an R-rating,’ an arbitrary decision to go in the direction of an R-movie, it was being more faithful to the graphic novel. And if you’re going to be more faithful to the graphic novel, it’s R-rated material. So that was the genesis of that. Everything that was in the comic book, we’re running with that.”
Levin, who also produced 2004’s Hellboy, its sequel, and the two animated features Hellboy Animated: Sword of Storms and Hellboy Animated: Blood and Iron is a clear fan of the big red demon. When asked what made Neil Marshall the best director for this project, especially in respect to how different his work is from Guillermo del Toro, Levin cited the desire to make this Hellboy more rooted in horror with Marshall at the helm, explaining, “He was the first director we approached about this, and again that was because early on we liked this to land more squarely as a horror movie, and a grounded horror movie. It was more low fantasy; you know fantasy elements that enter into our world, as opposed to being more fantastical. So if we’re going to lead with the movie as horror, if we’re going to lead with it as grounded fantasy, he just seemed like a great choice.”
Between nailing the character just right, appeasing a rabid fanbase, and creating a new film in the wake of Guillermo del Toro’s vision, the pressure of stepping into the director’s seat seems daunting. What was it about Hellboy that appealed to Marshall? “Part of it was that challenge of filling those big shoes of, like, taking something that’s so well established and go well, what can we do that’s going to reinvent it in some way that isn’t radically deviating from the source material, and in some ways being more faithful to the source material. I don’t know. I like a challenge?” Marshall laughs, before adding, “Or maybe I’m just a sucker for punishment. That was a big part of it. And I just saw so much potential in a darker, more quote, unquote R-rated version of the material. Kind of instantly Mike Mignola connected with that concept as well, and then everybody else came on board to it. Ok, so let’s go dark with it.”
The term dark, however, is one that seems to be used so commonly that its meaning feels far more subjective to the interpreter. To a horror fan, dark can hold a lot more weight than it can to a casual viewer. When asked what Marshall means by going dark with Hellboy, he answers, “It’s really difficult for me to say because I’m really kind of immune to horror and stuff like that, because I watch so many horror movies, so I doubt it’s going to be disturbing to me, but it might be disturbing to some people. It’s going to dark places for sure. But that’s more to do with, well, no, some of the stuff is actually pretty sick. Yeah, we’re pushing the envelope on some stuff, and then going into darker places with the characters and backstories, so emotionally darker places for Hellboy. It’s a bit of an emotional journey for him, a huge emotional journey for him. And then literally we’re going darker, and it’s going to be more violent and bloody. So there’s many aspects to that. But you’re right; dark gets used quite a lot.
“So maybe more ultraviolent. That’s what we’re aiming for.”
To demonstrate, we met with Academy Award-winner makeup and effects artist Joel Harlow (Star Trek: Beyond, Logan) in his makeup studio where he gets transitions David Harbour into the intimidating Beast of the Apocalypse, shaved horns and all, before touring the shop where his department was hard at work creating creatures in line with Marshall’s practical effect driven approach. While the Hellboy bodysuit was impressive in its own right, it was Harlow’s work on the Gruagach, a monstrous adversary of Hellboy’s that stole my breath away. Harlow’s immeasurable talent means a lifelike, life-sized beast suit with a fully animatronic head for Hellboy to go head to head with on screen. The eyes, nose, ears, and mouth are all fully functional, promising a thrilling scene to come.
Still, as amazing as all of the practical creature effects are, it doesn’t quite live up to the expectations of gore laid out by Levin and Marshall. That is, until I noticed a rather grotesque body in the corner of the shop, a grisly body frozen in an expression of terror with eviscerated skin and the milky white eyes of death, complete with a lot of tubes that indicated a load of blood and body fluids waiting to be pumped. When asking Harlow about the body, he says of it and the movie’s effects, “They’re pretty gnarly. This is our first plague victim that we see in the film. It oozes, hence the tubes, you know, it’s pretty gross. Which is great for us. We wanted to do layers and layers of different textures and different opacities of material so it looks like really the skin is starting to slough and liquefy. It’s pretty cool.”
It is pretty cool. What’s revealed in the shop not only indicates that Hellboy is shaping up to be as gory as promised, but it gives a more insight into Hellboy’s main big bad in the film, the Blood Queen played by Milla Jovovich. Fans of the comics will recognize the character as the greatest of all British witches, and it seems that we’ll get some of her backstory in the film as well.
Neil Marshall explained what he’d like audiences to come away with after watching his version of Hellboy, explaining, “I’d just like people to see it in its own right; a new take on Hellboy. And hopefully an amazing one.“ After what I witnessed on set, I can’t help but feel like he’ll succeed.
Stay tuned for more on my visit to the Hellboy set.
Hellboy returns on April 12, 2019.
