Crim at the Movies: The Legend of Hercules
Published by Crimson Lionheart in the blog CWorld (Over Heaven). Views: 1054
This is just embarrassing.
The Legend of Hercules is a film directed by Renny Harlin, and stars Kellan Lutz, Scott Adkins and Gaia Weiss. The story, as the title goes, revolves around the character of Hercules, son of Zeus, who was born solely to end the life of the tyrannical king of his people, unite the lands in peace and....
Wait...What?
I came to watch this film, and what I got what....just awful. It's poorly directed, horribly acted, disastrously written, everything about this movie is all over the damn place. This might be a reason on why we do not see many quality gladiator-esc films; these Hollywood producers are so worried about making the characters of the film act like “total 300 style badasses” that they sacrifice a quality experience. I can just picture the ideas for this movie being spoken about at meetings and drawing boards, how excited they might have been to have the opportunity to create....this....thing. I swear that this movie is trying so hard on being an action movie that it almost fails as a movie in general.
The dialogue of this film feels ridiculously forced, and makes it incredibly difficult to latch onto any of the characters. It’s just feels like someone saw an episode of Spartacus and was just like "Hey! I now know how people of that era spoke!" and wrote an entire screenplay, full of fancy words and shallow speeches that are not only boring and delivered as if the audience is a bunch of idiots, but you can tell that not a single word sounds truthful or even sincere.
We then have Hercules speaking to his clichéd, forbidden love Hebe (Yeah, that's right; HEBE!), and the conversations between the king and his sons and the rousing battle speeches that....
..I...I just can’t....I can’t continue this. But for the sake of you guys, I’ll keep marching on.
So yeah, the dialogue is appalling. The screenwriter must have also seen speeches in Braveheart and a whole bunch of action movies and must have been like "Well, we obviously need a battle speech!" and wrote a bunch of big speeches that were emotionless.
And then we have the acting. MY GOD! First of all, we have the main actor, Kellan Lutz, who came from Twilight... So you knew from the very beginning, you were going for a hell of a ride. He's is completely emotionless, stale and doesn’t care for his character for a second. His so-called ‘forbidden love’, played by Gaia Weiss, is just as bad! The only reason she was cast is because of good ol’ sex appeal! Scott Adkins almost yells every single word. He could be speaking to his wife in private, eating dinner or even doing things under the covers, he still finds the need to use the royal canterlot voice every word to her.
The only decent performance was delivered by Liam McIntyre, who plays Hercules's friend and comrade He could actually do something right, he actually had emotion and character! Despite his decent performance though, everybody but him deserves Razzie's.
The action is just a Greek tragedy (See what I did there?). If you’ve ever seen 300; you know, that badass film with Gerald Butler and a bunch of Spartan's kicking a bunch of Persian's asses? And how the movie went into an awesome slow motion every once in a while during the fighting, when a sword was plunged deep into a body, or someone hit another over the head?
Guess what? They do it here! And is it good? **** no!
They overuse it to death, and by the end of the film, it’s not even fun, just cringe worthy every time it occurs. That being said, there is not a single moment in this film in which you worry for Hercules. Everybody knows that he's going to beat his opponents, and that makes for fights that have you bored and uninterested! Even when the great hero Hercules lacks peril in his fight scenes, you have a problem. The Greek myth of Hercules has been told so many times from viewpoints and stages of the demi-god’s story, that to make another film about it. Sometimes you really need to bring something new to the altar. For Renny Harlin, well...he’s just giving the middle finger to the gods with this movie
The CGI here is again, horrible! Every CGI aspect of this film looks atrocious and incredibly fake, and mixed in with the terrible live sets, it makes for a difficult experience. There was this once scene roughly within twenty minutes of the movie where Hercules is sent to a completely unrealistic portrayal of Ancient Egypt, on an enormous wooden ship. And then, I noticed the water CGI textures and animation that almost caused me to turn off the movie right there and then. And then there is the scene which has just hit a new low point is when Hercules kills the Nemean lion, who seemed to be minding his own business in his forest completely innocent. And what does our hero decide to do when he encounters this beast, why kill it of course!
You know, there is only so much of a film and what makes it awful that I could take until I either turn it off or just find the whole thing unintentionally hilarious. This is exactly what happens in this movie that apparently was meant to be something of a “300” rip-off. NOTHING is original about this movie. Absolutely nothing!
Oh, and I forgot to mention that this movie had a budget of $70 million.
This film should be nominated for Razzie's, and make a minimal amount at the box office. While this might be saying much, this is easily one of the worst movies that I have ever seen since Foodfight, and the worst movie of 2014. Whatever you hear about this film, avoid it at all costs.
Now...I need to make myself feel better. I need to think about my life....
This movie received One out of Five Lionhearts
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