*Author’s Note: This is a retrospective post on Guillermo Del Toro’s Hellboy (2004). It is not to be confused with Neil Marshall’s upcoming reboot of the same name.
About a year ago, I attended a talk in Cleveland by the famous Canadian clinical psychologist Dr. Jordan B. Peterson, who was there to speak about his bestselling book 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos. His lengthy, engaging lectures about religion, hierarchy, and the western Judeo-Christian patrimony are so popular that he has even merited the attention of Bishop Robert Barron in some of the bishop’s video commentaries on YouTube.
Peterson’s lectures span a wide spectrum of topics, but a central theme that he repeatedly returns to is one that has earned him the attention of the largest segment of his audience: the question of manhood — that, and the apparent inability of secular “moderns” to define the term.
“What makes a man a man?”
It’s a distressingly common question to hear in our embattled twenty-first century landscape, and modern philosophers, commentators, and religious thinkers have all rushed to offer up their answers. Meanwhile, others insist that the question itself is pointless, a contrivance of antiquated traditionalism whose usefulness is long past its expiration date. Yet modern men — young men especially, perhaps — often feel adrift, aimless, and they flock to figures who seem capable of articulating meaning and structure for their lives. In their anxiety over their ultimate purpose, they are searching not only for an identity as men, but for a mission.
So, what does any of this have to do with Guillermo Del Toro’s endlessly charming superhero movie, Hellboy?
In a word: everything.
The film opens on a stormy night in WWII Scotland, with a group of Allied soldiers accompanying a young British professor of the paranormal, Trevor Broom, on a mission to stop a Nazi battalion and their leader — the mad monk Rasputin (Karel Roden) — from opening a portal to the realm of the Ogdru Jahad, the seven “gods of chaos.” The Allies engage the Nazis and, after a battle replete with gunfire and swordplay, the portal is closed — but not before a small, horned creature manages to slip through the opening. Before his comrades open fire, Professor Broom swaddles the imp-like critter in a blanket and announces with relief, “It’s a boy!”
Decades pass, and we find ourselves in the modern era with junior FBI agent John Myers (Rupert Evans), reporting for duty at a mysterious facility in New Jersey. Agent Myers is introduced to Hellboy (Ron Perlman) — now a dumbbell-lifting, cigar-chomping adult in the service of the secretive Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense (BPRD). The BPRD is headed by the now-elderly Professor Broom (John Hurt), who in the years since the war has become Hellboy’s adoptive father. Professor Broom also introduces agent Myers to Abe Sapien (Doug Jones), an aquatic human with psychic abilities and the personality of a less-anxious C3PO. Informed that he will henceforth be serving as Hellboy’s liaison, Agent Myers accompanies the team on one of their missions, the guiding purpose of which is summed up by the professor:
“In the absence of light, darkness prevails. There are things that go bump in the night, Agent Myers. Make no mistake about that. And we are the ones who bump back.”
Like any good superhero, Hellboy is a freak in the most likeable sense. Gifted with extraordinary power that he virtuously uses for the protection of his fellow man, he nevertheless longs for love and a sense of belonging, these hopes finding their embodiment in Liz Sherman (Selma Blair), a troubled young woman whose dangerous power as a “fire-starter” has caused her to wall herself off from normal relationships. The lonesome Hellboy is, of course, fireproof, and his gruff machismo compared to Liz’s moody-poet persona make them a fitting — if incendiary — match.
*Warning: Mild spoilers ahead.
But it is Hellboy’s relationship with his “father,” Professor Broom, which brings forth the spiritual heart of the film. Beginning with the opening sequence in Scotland, Professor Broom is visually identified as having a devotion to the Rosary, his humble wooden beads a constant presence on his wrist, and to which director Guillermo Del Toro’s camera is consistently attentive. Unlike the mad Rasputin, who returns to serve the Ogdru Jahad and submerge Hellboy in his demonic lineage, the professor’s role as an adoptive father provides our big red hero with the spiritual grounding necessary to resist the darkness supernaturally present in his nature. At the crucial moment, just as Hellboy is prepared to submit to Rasputin’s demands and unleash the seven gods of chaos upon the earth, Agent Myers cries out, “Remember who you are!” — and then he throws Hellboy his father’s rosary.
Director Guillermo Del Toro has not been shy about discussing his lapsed Catholicism. No fan of “institutions” or “organized religions,” and doubting the very existence of an afterlife, some of his films can even be seen as forcefully antagonistic towards the faith. Nevertheless, it is deeply interesting that, in spite of his public disavowals of the Church, Del Toro can’t seem to help imbuing his films with Catholic imagery. These can be readily perceived in his more dramatic endeavors (Pan’s Labyrinth), but also in his big-budget crowd-pleasers (Pacific Rim).
In a moment which I suspect is highly personal for Del Toro, Hellboy grasps his father’s rosary and it burns his flesh, leaving a scar in the shape of the cross. It’s almost as if the antireligious Del Toro is admitting that those who reject their Christian inheritance are nevertheless marked by it forever — and, in the face of destructive chaos, maybe that isn’t such a bad thing.
Perhaps the mere fact that a professed nonbeliever is responsible for such a scene is a hopeful sign for the Church’s many prodigal sons, adrift and in search of their true heritage.
As the film concludes, Agent Myers narrates:
“What makes a man a man? A friend of mine once wondered. Is it his origins? The way he comes to life? I don’t think so… It’s the choices he makes. Not how he starts things, but how he decides to end them.”
Hellboy is rated PG-13 for sci-fi action violence and frightening images. Parents concerned about sharing the film with younger viewers can review its listing at Common Sense Media here.
Michael Saltis
A proud native son of Akron, Ohio, Michael currently teaches English to business professionals in Prague, capital city of the Czech Republic. While he doesn't often get away from the "City of a Hundred Spires," he enjoys exploring the rest of the Old Continent whenever possible—especially those storied corners that help him recall the vividly-imagined knights and dragons of his youth.