A year ago, Count Vladislaus Dracula (Richard Roxburgh) sets up Victor Frankenstein (Samuel West) with his own laboratory to a living being from body parts, known as Frankenstein's Monster.
Victor: It's alive. It's alive. It's alive!
However, he looks out the window to see an angry mob trying to break down the doors of his castle.
Dracula: Success!
Victor [sighs in relief]: Oh Count, it's just you.
Dracula: I was beginning to lose faith, Victor.
Dracula looks down at the angry mob.
Dracula: A pity your moment of triumph is being spoiled over a little thing like grave robbery.
Victor: I'll take him away, far away, where no-one will ever find him.
Dracula: Oh, no, Victor. The time has come for me to take command of him.
Victor: What are you saying?
Dracula: Why do you think I brought you here, gave you this castle, equipped your laboratory?
Victor: You said... you said you believed in my work.
Dracula: And I do. But now that it is, as you yourself have said, "A triumph of science over God", it must now serve my purpose.
Victor: Good God... I would kill myself before helping in such a task.
Dracula: Feel free. I don't actually need you anymore, Victor. I just need him... he is the key.
Victor: I could never allow him to be used for such evil.
Dracula: I could. In fact, my brides are insisting on it.
Victor calls for his assistant, Igor (Kevin J. O'Connor) to help, but the deformed wretch has joined sides with Dracula. Victor arms himself with a sword.
Dracula: You can't kill me, Victor.
Dracula pushes himself onto the sword.
Dracula: I'm already dead.
Dracula kills Victor, but the Monster has freed himself and attacks Dracula, knocking him into the fireplace. The Monster grabs Victor and escapes to the windmill. The fire blazing Dracula emerges and resumes his human form. However, the torch-weilding villagers trap the Monster in the windmill and set it on fire.
As the windmill collapses, Dracula and his brides arrive, Aleera (Elena Anaya), Marishka (Josie Maran), and Verona (Silvia Colloca). The three female vampires cry in grief as Dracula glares at the blazing fire.
We cut to Gabriel Van Helsing (Hugh Jackman) atop a cathedral in Paris, who is hunting down Mr. Hyde.
Mr. Hyde: You're a big one. You'll be hard to digest.
Van Helsing: I'd hate to be such a nuisance. . . . I missed you in London.
Mr. Hyde: No, you bloody did not!
Hyde shows Van Helsing a bullet wound.
Mr. Hyde: You got me good.
Van Helsing: Dr. Jekyll, you're wanted by the Knights of the Holy Order . . .
Mr. Hyde: It's Mr. Hyde, now!
Van Helsing: . . . for the murder of twelve men, six women, four...
Mr. Hyde [laughing]: Four children, three goats, and a rather nasty massacre of poultry!
Mr. Hyde: So, you're the great Van Helsing.
Van Helsing: And you're a deranged psychopath.
Mr. Hyde: We all have our little problems.
Van Helsing: Now, my superiors would like for me to take you alive, so that they might extricate your better half.
Mr. Hyde [laughing]: I bet they bloody would.
Van Helsing: Personally, I'd rather just kill you and call it a day. But let's make it your decision, shall we?
Mr. Hyde [pretends to think]: Hmm, do let's.
Hyde attacks, an extensive battle ensues. Hyde lands on the rooftop next to a knocked out Van Helsing.
Mr. Hyde: Aaaah! Paris...
Hyde walks to Van Helsing who is laid out flat and picks him up with a chuckle. Then he walks to the edge of Notre Dame's rooftop]
Mr. Hyde [laughing]: I think you will find the view over here to be rather spectacular.
But Van Helsing ultimately causes Hyde to fall from the cathedral. As he falls, Hyde transforms back to Dr. Jekyll, falling to this death.
Van Helsing returns to the Vatican and meets with Cardinal Jinette (Alun Armstrong) in a confessional's booth.
Van Helsing: Bless me father for I have...
Jinette: Sinned! Yes, I know. You're very good at that. You shattered the Rose Window.
Van Helsing: Well, not to split hairs, but it was Mr. Hyde who did the shattering.
Jinette: Thirteenth century. Over six hundred years old! I wish you a week in hell for that.
Van Helsing: It would be a nice reprieve.
Jinette: Don't get me wrong. Your results are unquestionable, but your methods attract far too much attention. Wanted posters. We are not pleased.
Van Helsing: Do you think I like being the most wanted man in Europe? Why don't you and the order do something about it?
Jinette: Because we do not exist.
Van Helsing: Well then neither do I.
Van Helsing gets up angrily, but the Cardinal presses a button, dropping a set of bars over the confessional's exit.
Jinette: When we found you crawling up the steps of this church, half dead, it was clear to all of us that you had been sent to do God's work.
Van Helsing: Why can't He do it Himself?
Jinette: Don't blaspheme! You already lost your memory as a penance for past sins. If you wish to recover it, I suggest you continue to heed the call.
The Cardinal orders him to search out and destroy Dracula, an assignment that doesn't make Van Helsing very happy. Jinette explains that this assignment is important because, 450 years ago, a Transylvanian knight named Valerious the Elder promised God that his family would never rest nor enter heaven until they vanquished Dracula.
However, Dracula still lives, but only two of Valerious' descendents -- Princess Anna (Kate Beckinsale) and Prince Velkan (Will Kemp) -- remain. The Valerius family is running out of time, and the Church is committed to saving their souls. Jinette gives him a torn parchment left by Valerius the Elder, it bears an insignia identical to a ring worn by Van Helsing.
Van Helsing meets with Friar Carl (David Wenham) to stock up on weapons to confront Dracula. Carl approaches Van Helsing . . .
Carl: Ah, there you are. So, did you bring Mr. Hyde back or did you kill him? You killed him, didn't you? That's why they get so annoyed. When they ask you to bring someone back they don't mean as a corpse. Oh, all right. You're in a mood. Well, come on. I've got a few things that will put the bit back in your mouth...
Van Helsing stops to inspect a rack of swords.
Carl: Oh, any idiot can make a sword.
A hulking monk turns around holding a newly-forged sword, staring daggers at Carl.
Carl: Oh, sorry, Father. [to Van Helsing] Here, take this.
Carl hands Van Helsing a bag, then begins to fill it.
Carl: Rings of garlic... holy water... silver stake... crucifix...
They pass a monk test-firing a Gatling gun.
Van Helsing: Why can't I have one of those?
Carl: You've never gone after vampires before, now have you?
Van Helsing: Vampires, gargoyles, warlocks, they're all the same - best when cooked well.
Carl: Ah! Here's something new!
Carl pumps a drop of the yellow liquid onto his pinky finger.
Carl: Glycerine-48.
He snaps his wrist, causing a large explosion after the Glycerine-48 hits the floor. The workers shout and gasp in anger and shock.
Carl: Sorry! Sorry! Sorry!
Carl [turns to Van Helsing, his magnifying glasses over his eyes]: Sorry!
Monk [offscreen in the background]: What in the name of Allah is wrong with you?
Carl [to Van Helsing]: The air around here is thick with envy...
Carl hands Van Helsing his latest invention, a gas-propelled automatic crossbow.
Carl: A work of certifiable genius.
Van Helsing: If you don't say so yourself.
Carl: Well, I did say so myself.
While stocking Van Helsing's kit for the trip to Transylvania, Carl shows Van Helsing a device that emits blinding light. Van Helsing asks what good will that do him . . .
Carl: Oh, I don't know. You could blind your enemies, char-broil a herd of chargina wildebeests - use your imagination.
Van Helsing: I'm not, Carl. I'm going to use yours. That's why you're coming with me.
Carl: Oh, to hell be damned that I am!
Van Helsing: You cursed. Not very well, mind you. But you're a monk. You shouldn't curse at all.
Carl: Actually I'm still just a friar. I I can curse all I want. . . Dammit!
Van Helsing: The Cardinal has ordered you to keep me alive.
He throws the bag back to Carl, then walks past him.
Van Helsing: For as long as possible.
Carl: But I'm not a field man! Van Helsing, I don't want to go to Transylvania!
So, armed with only a scrap of a picture, the items provided by Carl, and Carl himself, Van Helsing takes off for Transylvania.
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