2014 Reviews #26: Hercules In case you didnt see the last announcement, in addition to this review, there will be three more this weekend. Tomorrow is Magic in the Moonlight and A Most Dangerous Man, then Sunday will be Lucy. Get hyped. Hercules stars Dwayne The Rock Johnson, and is directed by Brett Ratner… for some reason. No, I am not a fan of Brett Ratner, I think hes a pretty weak director and a bad person overall but Im not going to judge him for his personal life, or for his past work. Were here to talk about Hercules! I thought this movie looked terrible. Really, I did. I thought it looked so ridiculous and like it was going to take itself way too seriously. However, to my surprise, this movie wasnt terrible. It was actually pretty entertaining. Its not perfect, or great, or really even a very good movie, but I found myself having some fun with it. Now, like I said, I wasnt expecting much from this movie, and so I was prepared to grade it based off of the idea that it was going to be a terrible movie, but it wasnt, so now Im going to judge it based on the fact that I actually think it could have been a lot better. Ill start with the positives, as always. The performances are actually fine… Really. There wasnt any performance that stuck out as just awful. Nobody was great, but they were all on the same level of acceptable so it kinda made everything more believable in this world of ridiculous-Brett-Ratner-ness that was presented to us. From the start, I didnt understand why The Rock was going to play Hercules, and he didnt necessarily convince me, but he actually did a pretty good job. I mean, the guy is a giant so hes kinda the only one that looks strong enough to do all these super-hero-esque things. However, that super-hero-esque stuff is a big problem and Ill get to that in a minute. But besides The Rock, Ian McShane is the only other performance that really stands out. Again, theres nothing really special about his performance, he was just more memorable than the other characters. Sigh. So, Brett Ratner. Like I said, I am not a fan. I dont like really anything about him, but I always judge a movie with no bias whatsoever. I hate Seth MacFarlane, but I didnt fail A Million Ways to Die in the West. I dont like Michael Bay, and I failed the hell out of the new Transformers, but if Michael Bay makes Transformers 5 really well, I wont stop myself from enjoying it, and Ill give him the praise he deserves (because that will definitely happen). With all that out of the way, I will admit that Brett Ratner actually did a fine job here. Pretty much all the action sequences are shot really well, with not too much shaky cam, and overall its a pretty good looking movie. Im not gonna lie and say he did a bad job, because he really didnt. His direction actually added a lot to the action in this movie, so good job, Brett. I already kind of said it, but the action was actually the best thing about the movie. There were some genuinely badass moments. Well, those are the main positives so now Ill get into my problems, because I have a few. First of all, the story doesnt really make any sense. Things just sort of happen, so other things can happen but there isnt really any logic or reason to those things. It didnt bother me all that much because I was expecting everything to suck anyway, but I still need to mention that the story wasnt very good. The writing was actually probably the weakest thing in the movie, because the dialogue is not very good. The tone is really inconsistent because the dialogue is constantly changing between forced-comedy, and forced-drama. The movie cant quite decide what it wants to be which is too bad, because whenever it embraces its grandiose action set-pieces its a lot of fun. The opening sequence to this movie is probably the best thing about it, because its just Hercules killing monsters and being badass. THATS the movie I wanted to see. The reason my standards for this movie changed is because of that opening sequence. When it was happening I was like holy shit is this movie actually going to be good? But it was interrupted by a joke, which really pissed me off because it wasnt even a funny one. I know I said that the trailer looked like it was going to take itself too seriously, but honestly I almost wish it did… Whenever the movie had the guts to go big, it actually succeeded, and I just wish that it had been a little more over-the-top, honestly because the climax was a little forgettable and plot-heavy. I just wish that this movie had been more Hercules slaying monsters, and killing people, and less… conspiracy/political stuff. Its weird because my initial worry with this movie is that it wouldnt be smart enough, but now my complaint is that it thinks its much smarter than it actually is. The movie actually makes fun of Greek mythology and the story of Hercules much more often than you would expect it to, and it was kind of annoying actually. I just wanted it to be a big-dumb-popcorn-flick, and it tried to do something different and -- I do appreciate that usually -- but here it just didnt work. Im gonna go ahead and spoil something here, because if you dont know this thing going in then youre going to be pretty mislead, based off of the trailer. In the trailer theres a voiceover that says The Gods have unleashed Hell on Earth. But that line is never said, and that plot point does not exist. There is no scene that shows the Gods, and the movie actually doesnt state whether or not Hercules is the son of Zeus or not. This is what I mean by, the movie thinks its smarter than it actually is, because it tries to get you to think, but the movie isnt nearly ambiguous enough to handle a vague topic like that. Again, I have to spoil a little more, but its something thats revealed within the first 5 minutes of the movie, so dont worry. The movie basically tells us that Hercules has a team of people, and they are the only reason that he has such a large reputation. Like, he couldnt have done all of these amazing things on his own, because nobody knows if he really is a Demi-God or not. This is an interesting plot point, but the movie isnt smart enough to handle something like that. It basically tells us that nothing supernatural actually exists in this world, but the consistency doesnt actually prove it. It tells us what to believe, but never shows it to us, and that kinda pissed me off. Anyway, I think this movie could have actually been a lot better if it had just gone all out and been ridiculous and fun. If youre looking for some gritty, and well-shot action but you dont want to have to think too much, youll enjoy Hercules just fine. OVERALL GRADE: B-
Posted on: Fri, 25 Jul 2014 20:48:11 +0000
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