Hercules
1997 Directed by John Musker, Ron Clements
Synopsis
Zero to Hero!
Bestowed with superhuman strength, a young mortal named Hercules sets out to prove himself a hero in the eyes of his father, the great god Zeus. Along with his friends Pegasus, a flying horse, and Phil, a personal trainer, Hercules is tricked by the hilarious, hotheaded villain Hades, who's plotting to take over Mount Olympus!
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Self-awareness and pop-cultural referentiality had been done in many, many times in cartoons prior to the 1990s. But that was the decade in which that tone really became all the rage in American animation, thanks to things like The Simpsons and Animaniacs. Moments of earnestness and sentimentality couldn't occur without being punctured by meta-humour and parody. Disney successfully embraced that style with the Genie character in Aladdin, and from then on, usually that tone was restricted to just one comic relief character (such as the dragon in Mulan which as we all know is Eddie Murphy's Third Best Film).
However, Hercules (which like Aladdin was directed by Musker and Clements) was probably the first Disney movie in which that oh-so-'90s…
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Arguably the weakest of the later Disney renaissance films of the 90s (it's a tossup between this and Pocahontas, which has more problematic characters and story, but also far more interesting animation), Hercules is undeniably cartoony, more akin in style to a Tex Avery short than to the other Disney films of the period. It's a refreshing change coming after the realistic approaches employed before then, but it also has the effect of making the film seem inconsequential and overlong.
What really irked me as a kid still irks me today - the way that the characters and symbols of Greek myth, as decidedly hard-R and undisneylike as you can get, are reduced to the blandest set of Disney tropes… -
This review reportedly contains spoilers. I can handle the truth.
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Phwoar!
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Re-watched this on the 13th, such a great film. I adore the Disney Renaissance so much and Hades is such an awesome villain.
Why oh why didn't he get a song?
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Fun movie. Unfortunately a lot of songs, but for once, they are not so cheesy.
Viggo liked it too.
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annoying and horribly egotistical
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More of the same from the House of Mouse: sloppy songs, mediocre animation and some humour.
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One of the childhood favorites.
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Arguably the weakest of the later Disney renaissance films of the 90s (it's a tossup between this and Pocahontas, which has more problematic characters and story, but also far more interesting animation), Hercules is undeniably cartoony, more akin in style to a Tex Avery short than to the other Disney films of the period. It's a refreshing change coming after the realistic approaches employed before then, but it also has the effect of making the film seem inconsequential and overlong.
What really irked me as a kid still irks me today - the way that the characters and symbols of Greek myth, as decidedly hard-R and undisneylike as you can get, are reduced to the blandest set of Disney tropes… -
This review reportedly contains spoilers. I can handle the truth.
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Went the distance. SO GOOD.
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I just cannot get sick of this film. It is most definitely my favourite Disney film.
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this film shows the first signs of the end of the studio renaissance; the over-the-top directing and writing shows in the over-stylization sights and very stereotypical characters; at least we got that MOTOWN girls to narrate the picture
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Irreverent humor, unique animation, and a vibrant score can't seem to save this movie. Again, there's just something not quite there about it, but the entire film suffers for it.