Review of Hercules (2014) by Beatrice L — 05 Dec 2009

After the second Disney Golden Age in the late 80s to early 90s, Disney produced a large amount of (as lame as it sounds) "meh" films. They were films that weren't bad, but weren't great either. Hercules was one of them.

As much as I hate to say this, I think I dislike this movie the more I watch it. That doesn't mean I dislike the film altogether. In fact, there are many positive elements about this film. The design is decent, some of the characters like Meg are likeable and the songs are possibly some of the catchiest ones I've ever heard (and we have Alan Menken's genius to thank). I remember when I was younger, I had friends who had Hercules on video and we used to rewind the "I Won't Say I'm In Love" sequence to watch over and over. The song was that damn catchy.

Anyway, I think I've figured out that the reason why movies like Hercules don't measure up to Disney's Golden Age is because they don't take themselves seriously enough. Hercules attempted to be more hip than serious. It also had mountains of pop culture references, it ended abruptly and had a couple of cringe-worthy one-liners every now and then like "He was supposed to be the all-time champ, not the all-time chump.".

Many people would complain that Hercules deviated drastically from the Greek myth, but I won't blame Disney too much for that. Some of their greatest movies like Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid were altered dramatically from their original sources and they worked. Greek myths are usually filled with blood, gore, sex (in some cases, orgies) and adultery, which is far from appropriate for a kid's film!

So as a whole, the movie's intention was to be silly, fun and enjoyable, and it was. It was entertaining, but it wasn't great either. It wasn't intended to be the greatest thing since the Lion King, but if Disney wants their 2D films to improve, they should probably try to take themselves more seriously.