Be sure to skip colossally stupid ‘Van Helsing’

A couple of years ago, writer/director Stephen Sommers breathed new life into Universal’s “Mummy” franchise. Sommers’ latest attempt, “Van Helsing,” tries to reinvent and revive Universal’s Dracula, Frankenstein and Wolfman characters for a new generation. The resulting film is, without a doubt, the most colossally stupid, tedious and awful movie released this decade.

“Van Helsing” is so horrible that 20 minutes into the film I wanted to drive a stake into my own heart.I know what you’re thinking, “Oh come on, it can’t be THAT bad.” Yes, it can. Let me count the ways:

1. I haven’t heard Slavic accents so laughably bad since Boris and Natasha hunted Moose & Squirrel.

2. Although set in the 18th century, all the main characters dress in outfits and use slang that is modern.

Nit-picking? A little. But wait, it gets worse.

3. In this version of the Dracula story, the Count cannot be harmed or killed by holy water, garlic, a stake through the heart, silver bullets, you name it. The only thing that can kill Dracula is a bite from a werewolf. So who does Dracula hire as his minions? Yup. Dozens of werewolves. Nothing says “Evil Genius” like surrounding yourself with a battalion of relentless killers who have a hankerin’ to take a bite out of you.

Of course, Dracula has an “antidote” for werewolf bites. He keeps a syringe loaded with the antidote in a booby-trapped room. And the syringe is encased in a 3-foot-high glass egg that’s filled with acid.

Still not convinced? Howzabout this?

4. Dracula’s plot is to unleash tens of thousands of bat babies from their cocoons so they can feed on humanity and turn the peoples of the world into vampires under his grip.

There’s a snag in the plan, though. The bat babies can’t be brought to life until they receive an electric shock that has first passed through the body of Frankenstein’s monster. Whaaaa?Stupid? Yes. And what stinks is that “Van Helsing” isn’t the “good” kind of bad movie — the kind you and your friends can sit and make fun of. No. “Van Helsing” just sucks the fun right out of you.

GRADE: F