"Darkman" sets a new standard for that old cliche about an action movie being a "roller coaster." This is one wild ride.

The biggest surprise, however, is that it's relatively bloodless — most of the gore is offscreen. Who would have expected that in the first mainstream movie directed by goremeister Sam Raimi, whose independent films "The Evil Dead" and "Evil Dead II" are standard-bearers for gloppy, gooey blood 'n' guts horror?

"Darkman" suggests Raimi used those films as an apprenticeship to break into the business. He has a terrific instinct for keeping a story on track while surrounding it with special effects and stunts, all the while keeping gore to a minimum — especially by today's standards.

That isn't to say the film is without violence, however. There is sadistic torture here that puts "Darkman" in the same class as "Total Recall," "Die Hard 2" and the many other violent films of the past few months. But Raimi generally doesn't show the violence explicitly and he doesn't dwell on it. That's a welcome relief in this summer of gory movie mayhem.

The first major studio attempt at bringing a comic-book-style hero to the big screen since "Batman," "Darkman" is a nifty end-of-the-summer winner, and may become a real sleeper.

Drawing on imagery and story elements from "Batman," "Phantom of the Opera," "The Hidden," "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," "The Elephant Man" — even "The Incredible Hulk" — along with a myriad of other popular fantasies, "Darkman" is the story of isolated scientist Peyton Westlake (Liam Neeson), who is close to a breakthrough in the development of synthetic skin.

And it's a good thing, since it isn't long before he needs it.

Peyton's girlfriend Julie (Frances McDormand), an attorney, who lives with Peyton in an apartment above his waterfront warehouse laboratory, stumbles onto a memo that implicates her boss, high-rolling real estate developer Louis Strack (Colin Friels) with mob boss Robert Durant (Larry Drake).

So, when Durant and friends come looking for the memo, they find Peyton, torture him and leave him for dead, blowing up the warehouse behind them. But Peyton is thrown from the blast into the river and later, mistaken for a transient accident victim, is taken to a hospital.

When Peyton becomes a guinea pig for an experimental procedure, he finds himself endowed with superhuman strength and an enormous will to live. He has two motives — to restore his life with Julie and to get revenge on the mobsters.