History Film / VanHelsing

** The werewolf poem from ''TheWolfMan1941'' appears with the altered wording from ''Film/FrankensteinMeetsTheWolfMan''

** Mr Hyde speaks with a Scottish accent, due to being portrayed by Robbie Coltrane.

** Likewise, Aleera's sister Marishka wastes her time toying with Van Helsing, giving him enough time to dip his crossbow into some conveniently placed holy water and take her out.

''Van Helsing'' is a 2004 Supernatural ActionHorror-{{Adventure}} movie released by Creator/UniversalPictures and directed by Creator/StephenSommers, who did the first two films of ''Film/TheMummyTrilogy''. It stars Creator/HughJackman as the eponymous VampireHunter, loosely based on the character from Creator/BramStoker's ''Literature/{{Dracula}}''. In this incarnation, he works as an agent of the Knights of the Holy Order in the Vatican to hunt down monsters and other abominations. Aiding him is Friar Carl, a slightly irreverent tinkerer and inventor that supplies him with the speciality equipment he needs to take down the creatures of the night.

Van Helsing and Friar Carl are sent to Transylvania to help the last of the Valerious family, Anna and her brother Velkan, destroy {{Dracula}} -- because if they don't, several generations of the family will never get to heaven due to their family's oath.

* DaChief: After his mission to Paris, Van Helsing reports to a cardinal who berates him for the collateral damage his methods cause while also reluctantly praising the results of his work.

* FindTheCure: It's rumored that Dracula possesses a cure of lycanthropy, and Anna intends to find it after [[spoiler:Velkan]] is infected, until Velkan becoming a werewolf fully renders it pointless. [[spoiler:After Van Helsing is infected with lycanthropy himself, Anna and Carl must find the cure in Dracula's castle and administer it to him before the curse can take him over permanently]].

* ChristianityIsCatholic: The Knights of the Holy Order supposedly encompass monster-hunters of all religions... but it's housed in the Vatican and run by Catholic priests. You do, however, see Buddhist monks, mullahs, and some other clergymen in the "base". As is common in Dracula fiction, little to no reference is made to Orthodox Christianity, the majority faith of Romania.

* CuteMonsterGirl: Averted. The Brides may be cute in their human forms but their vampire forms... not so much.

* DesignatedGirlFight: Anna was destined to kill Dracula. She fights his brides instead. She does fight the first werewolf and merely ends up in danger because she was trying to get the one gun with silver bullets and was unlucky enough to be under the cage when it fell. She also shoots the second when it attacks her in the castle until she finds out it's Velkan.

* DiedHappilyEverAfter: [[spoiler:Anna's spirit smiles as she ascends to Heaven.]]

* {{Foreshadowing}}: When Dracula is dancing with Anna, he stops in front of the mirror: as per the myths, he has no reflection...and neither do any of the other hundreds of party-goers in view of the mirror. Sure enough, every last one of them is a vampire too.

%%* HolyHandGrenade: Frial Carl's sun bomb is effectively this.%%How?

* HotGypsyWoman: Anna, the Romani princess, who runs around in [[OfCorsetsSexy sexy corsets]] despite being a fighter. Marishka was apparently of Romani origin too before she was turned.

* IndecisiveParody: Okay, you are either an AffectionateParody, a straight parody, or a MassiveMultiplayerCrossover. '''Pick one'''.

* KissingCousins: Dracula offers Ana to become his new bride while he has her in his clutches. She's his descendant, 400 years removed. Of course, it's Dracula, so...

%%* LuckBasedSearchTechnique: How Carl discovers a very special painting...

* MrFanservice: Every single male character in this movie except Frankenstein's Monster.

* OvershadowedByAwesome: Anna Valerious just can't keep up with Van Helsing and is constantly in over her head against vampires and werewolves.

%%* PortalPicture

* ShirtlessScene: It's an action movie starring Creator/HughJackman, 'nuff said.

%%* HilariousOuttakes

* AdaptationalBadass: One of the entire points to making the film was to reinvent the Van Helsing character into a younger, action hero-type. In the book, Abraham van Helsing was an OmnidisciplinaryScientist who spoke comically broken English. He was well built, but getting on in years, and did not perform any notable act of physical skill; he was purely TheSmartGuy.

** Dracula's Brides. In this portrayal they're not only directly active in the plot, and serve as second-only to Dracula regarding their threat level but they also have strength and transformation abilities similar to Dracula himself.
* AdaptationalNameChange: The real-world Wallachian nobleman whom Dracula character was based on was Vlad III, also known as Vlad the Impaler, Vlad Tepes or -- surpise, surprise -- Dracula, son of Vlad Dracul. However, in the movie, Dracula introduces himself as "Vladislaus Dragulia".
** Actually the historical Vlad III did sign his name that way. Spelling wasn't exactly standardized in that period.

* BarbieDollAnatomy: The vampires when in monster mode have no nipples and genitalia on their seemingly nude bodies. ''{{Justified|Trope}}'' in that all the creatures that transform have their ''clothes'' transform too. The lone exceptions are the werewolves, who retain their pants when transforming, even as they rip off their upper clothing and ''[[BodyHorror skin]]''.

* CostumePorn: All three brides wear very elaborate dresses. Also, the masquerade ball has dozens of extras dressed outlandishly.

* DesignatedGirlFight: Anna was destined to kill Dracula. She fights his brides instead.

** The film opens in black and white, like the classic Franchise/UniversalHorror films

* NeverASelfMadeWoman: Anna Valerious's standing is defined primarily by that of her father and brothers.

* AngelUnaware: The title character is implied to be this, due to repeatedly being referred to by Dracula as "Gabriel" and, at one point, the "left hand of God". Van Helsing also early on mentions to Carl that he remembers fighting ''Romans'' at Masada in 72 AD. The Novelisation actually downright confirms this: Van Helsing is mentioned as having two large disfiguring scars between his shoulder blades, right where ''wings would be''. The scars would seem to imply they were forcibly ''torn out''.

* ManOnFire:
** This happens to Dracula ''three times''.
** The werewolf once, once to '''SIX''' dwergers[[note]]Of special note. The DVDCommentary reveals that the six seen on-screen was just ones that were filmed. The suits for the dwergi seemed to have a problem of catching fire as soon as a spark hit them[[/note]], and [[spoiler:once to Anna.]]
** This trope was abused to the point where it started [[WebVideo/NecroCritic Necro Critic's]] famous Burning Man Count running gag.

** Van Helsing must kill Dracula to prevent the Valerious family from "passing into Purgatory" and never reaching Heaven. Yeah, except that, according to Catholic dogma, passing into Purgatory means eventually ending up in Heaven. The movie states that they would be ''stuck'' in Purgatory forever, because of a special deal the original Valerious made.

* WhamShot: At the masked ball, Dracula dances with Anna amidst a huge crowd of Bucharest party-goers. He lowers her into a dip in front of a full-length mirror, which reveals that Dracula casts no reflection... and aside from Anna, ''neither does anyone else.'' The audience's OhCrap is mirrored by Anna in-universe.

* [[DisasterDodgingDog Disater Dodging Cow]]: During the fight with Dracula's brides, one of them picks up a whole cow and chucks it through a building with a comical "MOO!" When the fight ends, the cow emerges from the wreckage completely unharmed.

* DeathOfAChild: Implied at Dracula's summer home in Budapest, where at least one of the vampires is a little girl. And that's not even getting into Dracula's offspring exploding all over the place, but that probably falls more under WhatMeasureIsANonHuman

* DeathOfAChild: Implied at Dracula's summer home in Bucharest, where at least one of the vampires is a little girl. And that's not even getting into Dracula's offspring exploding all over the place, but that probably falls more under WhatMeasureIsANonHuman

* HorribleJudgeOfCharacter: What's wrong, Dr. Frankenstein -- [[WhatAnIdiot you actually thought that Dracula had altruistic intentions for your creations]]? To be fair though, the novelization of the film points out that while he's not quite as foolish as to believe Dracula is altogether altruistic, he has no idea whatsoever that Dracula is a vampire. This lack of knowledge comes back to bite him in the ass once the creature is successfully brought to life.

* ActionGirl: Anna ''wants'' to be one, right from the get-go. She spends so much time trying to get into fights that at one point Van Helsing actually has to gas her into unconsciousness. Unfortunately, she's still a human fighting supernatural monsters. She's not a complete disappointment, though, given how she performs some impressive feats of agility and acrobatics throughout the film that make up for her [[OvershadowedByAwesome comparative]] weakness.

** Creator/KateBeckinsale's character hunts [[Film/{{Underworld}} vampires]]. This was originally what was preventing her from being cast; as she had just done ''Underworld'', Stephen Sommers feared she wouldn't want to do another vampire film. However, her agent convinced him to send her the script, and she immediately signed on.

* AluminumChristmasTrees: Gypsy royalty did exist in real-life; [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ștefan_Răzvan Ștefan Răzvan]], a 16th century Moldavian voivode who ousted Aaron the Tyrant, is one of the few examples. That said, due to racism, Roma acquiring an independent property of their own is almost unheard of, and they mostly came to power due to their connections with established powers (the above Răzvan escaped slavery because his father was a loyal Ottoman subject and his mother was a native Romanian).

* HistoricalInJoke: During Van Helsing's briefing about Dracula, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vlad_Tepes_002.jpg this famous portrait of the real Vlad Dracula]] is reproduced with the face of actor Richard Roxburgh.

* HotGypsyWoman: Anna, the Gypsy princess. Marishka was apparently a gypsy too before she was turned.