![\"hercules\"](\"http:\/\/smugfilm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/hercules.jpg\")
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Hercules<\/a> (2014) Trust me, I\u2019m as surprised as you are. I mean, I thought I\u2019d like<\/i> it\u2014The Scorpion King<\/a> is serviceable, cheesy fun and I figured this one would be up that same alley\u2014but holy shit, this thing is a masterpiece. Easily the best film I\u2019ve seen all year long. And while yes, the title of this piece is<\/i> hyperbolic, it\u2019s not as hyperbolic as you might think. There is true brilliance\u00a0<\/span>in this film. It is a singular work with something truly unique to say, just waiting to be discovered.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n In recent years, there\u2019s been a handful of great, way-better-than-you\u2019d-think actioners, most of them mid-budget\u2014Punisher: War Zone<\/a>, Dredd<\/a>, and John D\u2019Amico favorites Universal Soldier: Regeneration<\/a> and its sequel Day of Reckoning<\/a> come immediately to mind. Here, finally, is a big budget one with just as much \u2018none of the execs really expect much from this project, so nobody\u2019s really looking over our shoulder, so let\u2019s use that freedom to make something legit\u2019 snazz. For all I know, maybe it did<\/em> have studio notes left and right, but the finished product feels consistent in vision and wholly free from the tinkering whims of uncreatives.<\/span><\/p>\n Half of the reason I love this movie so much is that I just plain love it\u2014it\u2019s genuinely funny, clever, exciting, tightly-plotted, well-shot, well-acted, all those great things. The other half is that it has a clear thesis that I can\u2019t even fathom how it got away with having. It\u2019s the kind of idea that you\u2019d think woulda been shot down as quickly as it was pitched\u2014which is to say, it\u2019s ingenious.<\/span><\/p>\n I don\u2019t want to spoil the experience of watching the point of it all unfold, but I will say that this film does for sword-and-sandal what Cabin in the Woods<\/a> did for horror. It creates a line in the sand that can\u2019t be undrawn\u2014there\u2019s all other films of the genre, and then there\u2019s this one. Without giving too much away, basically, whereas every other film of the genre takes the existence of ‘the gods’ as a given, this one doesn\u2019t. Its characters, like all human beings, just don\u2019t know for sure. And that small difference makes all the difference.<\/span><\/p>\n In a perfect world, atheists and agnostics and skeptics and the like would discover this film and realize what it\u2019s doing and embrace it tearfully and thankfully and spread the word about it. But I don\u2019t know if that will ever happen. It could be that this thing is too buried by its own patina of brainlessness that intellectuals or even faux-intellectuals just won’t ever give it a watch. Hell, I haven\u2019t even been able to get friends of mine who trust me on movies to try it. I beg of you, though\u2014if you give one seemingly dumb movie a shot in your entire lifetime, let it be this one. You won\u2019t be disappointed, even if the type of film it is isn’t your style\u2014the message is that strong, and that necessary.<\/span><\/p>\n 5 out of 5 Codys.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
<\/b>Directed by Brett Ratner
Screenplay by Ryan Condal & Evan Spiliotopoulos
<\/span>98 min.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p>\n