Hercules
1997
I’m ancient. This fact has been decided tonight, as I remembered the first movie I’d ever seen in theatres was in fact Hercules. The fact that I can remember this event that occurred FOURTEEN years ago makes me feel older than dirt. Goodness.
A long time ago Zeus, you know the head Greek god, shoved a group of evil doers called titans into a tiny hole at the bottom of the ocean. They were going around and melting people with lava, or causing earthquakes, general bad things. So really, they all deserved to go underground. This will be important later.
Fast forward a few years. Zeus and his goddess wife Hera have had an adorable baby boy, Hercules. At his birthday celebration, the entire god population of Mount Olympus gathers, including Hades, Zeus’ brother. He’s the god of the Underworld, and he really hates it. His job must be Hell. Ha! Get it?
Hades is very upset at Zeus, because he stuck him with the Underworld job. To make matters worse, he finds out from the Fates that Hercules is going to end up ruining his plans for using the titans to overthrow Zeus. See I told you they’d be important.
To ensure this does not happen, Hades has his henchmen Pain and Panic, kidnap Hercules, attempt to make him mortal, and then kill him. They make it to step two, turning him mortal. Mostly. He still “retains his godlike strength” as he did not drink the potion they gave him fully. A farming couple finds him and adopts Hercules as their own child.
Hercules grows up to be a stong misfit. He scares everyone off with his strength. One day, after destroying a shopping center, his parents finally sit him down and tell him the truth about his identity.
That’d be kind of a big surprise you know? “Hey honey guess what? You’re a god! We’ve been meaning to tell you that, it just kind of slipped my mind. Oops!” Yeah, I don’t think I’d like discovering that. Not at all.
Herc handles it quite well; he just takes off to go talk to his real daddy in his temple. Zeus is thrilled to finally see his long lost son, but sadly must inform him that Hercules is not able to come back home to Mount Olympus quite yet. In order to achieve his title of god again, he must prove himself to be a hero. How will he do this? Zeus doesn’t tell him! He’s got to figure it out.
Not to worry! He finds a trainer, Phil the satyr, to help him toughen up. After months of hard work, Phil declares him ready to start heroizing stuff. Can I make that an official word?
Phil has Herc start off in Thebes, a completely twisted and warped city. Before they can even get to the mental city, Herc and Phil make a detour to save a basic DID. That’s a damsel in distress, for those of you who don’t know. This particular damsel is named Meg, and she really doesn’t need saving. Really. Hercules doesn’t listen, and beats up the centaur that was holding Meg captive.
After the centaur is rendered useless, Hercules goes over to talk to Meg, and once he does, he is totally smitten with her and her independent, sarcastic ways. Little does he know that she actually is an agent for Hades, since she sold her soul to him. This could put a damper on their relationship methinks.
Herc finally gets to Thebes, and after destroying a monster Hades sent for him, wins the hearts of the people there. He continues to keep their hearts after he kills each creepy creature that Hades throws his way.
Finally, Hades knows the right creature to use. He uses Meg to find out Hercules weakness. There is only one problem with this; Meg has developed a crush on Hercules. Not that she’ll admit it. No. Never. Badly hurt by the last guy she fell for, Meg has sworn of men forever. Until she met Hercules, this was going well for her. Now she doesn’t know what to do.
Hades does though! He used the fact Hercules and Meg have a thing going to his advantage. Tricking Hercules into giving up his strength for one day after he shows Hercules that he is holding Meg prisoner, Hades then reveals she was sort of working for him. This piece of information crushed Herc’s heart. He doesn’t even care that Hades then lets loose his army of titans and starts to ruin all of Earth. Nope. He’d rather be depressed because some girl was using him, but not really. Wimp. And people call him a hero…
With the help of Phil, Meg finally convinces Hercules that she’s a good person and to fight back. It turns out Hercules doesn’t need godlike strength to defeat the Cyclops titan. He can do it with just a piece of rope and quick thinking! Yay!
Well, not so yay. When the Cyclops goes down, a pillar nearly falls on Hercules. Only nearly because Meg pushed him out of the way, and it crushes her. The good news is Hercules gets his strength back because of this! Bad news is Meg is dead.
Hercules is fueled with rage now, so he quickly saves Mount Olympus from the invasion of titans, and then beats up Hades down in the Underworld, all before retrieving Meg’s soul from the river of dead. So she’s not dead anymore! Yay!
Hercules finally achieves his position of god again, but after realizing that means he can’t be with Meg, he decides to stay mortal and live with her. The end.
During the past summer, my then two year old sister loved this movie. I mean, LOVED this movie. As in would watch it at least three times a day LOVED this movie. So. When I watched it again today, I marveled at the fact that I had every. Single. Word. Memorized. It was exceedingly ridiculous. I didn’t even really need to rewatch it; I could just play it from memory!
I am glad I did watch it again though. Because I freakin love this movie. It’s probably, in my opinion, the funniest of all Disney movies. Its humor only increased for me in years, as I now understand all the mythology references. I knew reading Oedipus would one day come in handy! Lovely drawn, intriguing characters, wonderful music, all of these added make this film delightful.
Movie Watching Budd(y)(ies): Family and Leslie. Poor Leslie.
Best Song: “I Won’t Say I’m in Love.” My life song.
Best Part: The narrating muses. They’re hilarious. And can sing pretty well. Do you need more from a narrator?
No comments:
Post a Comment