World Exclusive: Hugh Jackman on Van Helsing

Debate has been raging in the Empire magazine office for some time now as to the Biggest Film of 2004. The Amazing Spider-Man? Well, possibly. Troy? Pah! The Chronicles of Riddick? Not on your nelly, Vin! For our chums on the magazine are staking (ahem) their reputation and pride on the latest and greatest CG-filled revisionist epic from one Stephen Sommers: Van Helsing. Starring X2's Hugh Jackman as the eponymous monster hunter (a man who could teach Buffy a thing or two about vampire slaying), Sommers' $160 million genre-bending movie pits Van Helsing against his old arch-enemy, Count Dracula, in a fight to the undeath. With a greenlight budget of $160 million, Universal Pictures are pumping money into this action horror extravaganza, and judging from the early promotional art, their confidence is not misplaced. Empire magazine talked to a buoyant Jackman, delighted to be finally anchoring his own blockbuster, on the Prague set recently, and managed to wrangle a very interesting plot synopsis out of the Aussie star... 'This is kind of the younger and more adventurous swashbuckling version of Van Helsing,' explains Jackman, 'who is, for want of a better word, a mercenary for the Catholic Church who is out there killing or dealing with possessed souls of all different shapes and sizes. Right at the beginning of the movie you meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, which introduces my character. So he's out there dealing with these rogue demons that have taken over bodies. And as it turns out, Dracula, whose existence has been known to the Church in Transylvania, is kind of starting to get out of control, and so they send Van Helsing, on a big mission to find him. Anna, Kate Beckinsale's character, is the youngest and final member of the family whose job it is to try and track Dracula for 400 years. 'So that's how we meet up and Frankenstein becomes involved because