{"id":16206,"date":"2017-09-12T04:58:12","date_gmt":"2017-09-12T11:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/?p=16206"},"modified":"2021-08-31T20:11:33","modified_gmt":"2021-09-01T03:11:33","slug":"review-legendofhercules-4k","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/2017\/09\/review-legendofhercules-4k\/","title":{"rendered":"The Legend of Hercules 4K Ultra HD Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Legend of Hercules<\/em><\/strong> gets to have the distinct pleasure of being the first flop of 2014 at the box office and with critics and audiences alike and for good reason. There\u2019s nothing here save maybe<\/em> for Gaia Weiss who, albeit in a limited role, was decent (and easy on the eyes).<\/p>\n

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The Legend of Hercules<\/span>
\n(2014)<\/span>
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Genre(s): <\/strong>Fantasy, Action, Adventure
\nSummit Entertainment | PG13 \u2013 98 min. | September 19, 2017<\/p>\n

Date Published:<\/strong> 09\/12\/2017 | Author:<\/strong> The Movieman<\/span><\/p>\n

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MOVIE INFO:
\n<\/u><\/strong>Directed by: <\/strong>Renny Harlin
\nWriter(s): <\/strong>Sean Hood and Daniel Giat (written by)
\nCast: <\/strong>Kellan Lutz, Scott Adkins, Liam McIntyre, Liam Garrigan, Johnathon Schaech, Roxanne McKee, Gaia Weiss, Rade Serbedzja<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
DISC INFO:
\n<\/u><\/strong>Features: <\/strong>Commentary, Featurette
\nDigital Copy: <\/strong>Yes
\nFormats Included: <\/strong>4K, Blu-ray
\nNumber of Discs: <\/strong>2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Audio: <\/strong>English (Dolby Atmos), Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1)
\nVideo: <\/strong>2160p\/Widescreen 2.40
\nDynamic Range: <\/strong>HDR10
\nSubtitles: <\/strong>English SDH, French, Spanish
\nCodecs: <\/strong>HEVC \/ H.265
\nRegion(s): <\/strong>A, B, C<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Note: <\/strong>Portions of this were copied from my 2014 Blu-ray review.
\nScreen Captures came from Blu-ray<\/p>\n

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THE MOVIE \u2014 1.0\/5<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
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\u201cWitness the rise of a god\u201d and the failure of filmmaking 101.<\/p>\n

You know, there was a time when Renny Harlin was at least an adequate if not serviceable director coming onto the scene with Die Hard 2<\/em> and several ho-hum entries like The Long Kiss Goodnight<\/em> and Deep Blue Sea<\/em>, so he\u2019s hardly a great action director but fills the chair well enough. But taking into account the stinkers on his resume (see: Driven<\/em> and Cutthroat Island<\/em>), they pale into comparison with The Legend of Hercules<\/em><\/strong>, a film so clumsily made that there\u2019s very little to admire and add in a substantial budget, one wonders where it all went.<\/p>\n

The story, which takes more than a few cues from Gladiator<\/em>, opens with a poorly CGI\u2019d sequence as the Greeks battle… some other force \u2013 we\u2019re not clued in to what army or who any of the characters are \u2013 and Greek King Amphitryon (SCOTT ADKINS) takes on their leader and in incredible fashion, and showing the audience what we\u2019re in store for as Harlin and company copy Zach Snyder\u2019s 300<\/em> (so make this the 100th copycat of the style). With his victory he also receives the support of the opposing army.<\/p>\n

With this stunning victory, finds his wife Queen Alcmene (ROXANNE MCKEE) in despair over her husband\u2019s penchant for war and implores him to stop his conquests which he resoundingly rejects. Having a son already, who she realizes will take on the traits of his father, prays to Hera to give her a son, sired by Zeus, and he apparently obliges with a PG-13 orgasmic scene during which Amphitryon walks in on the joyful event, though he thinks there was a mortal man in the bed who somehow, someway, magically vanished in mere seconds… So, a baby boy is born and Amphitryon makes it known the boy, named Alcides to others, will always be second to his son, though Alcmene names him Hercules.<\/p>\n

Fast forward 20 years and a grown up Alcides\/Hercules (KELLAN LUTZ) is wooing a young woman named Hebe (GAIA WEISS) who, as we discover later, is a princess forced to wed Hercules\u2019 pompous half-brother, Iphicles (LIAM GARRIGAN), to join together two kingdoms as Iphicles is being groomed to ascend to the throne.<\/p>\n

Hercules goes after her with Amphitryon sending his men to stop them before they cross the river because, as Hercules states, they won\u2019t follow. But their plan is thwarted and the pair is taken back the palace where Hebe is to marry Iphicles while Alcides is sent to certain doom with an army led by Captain Sotiris (LIAM MCINTYRE). The army is ambushed leaving only Alcides and Sotiris alive and to protect his identity, Alcides uses his birth name Hercules as the pair are sold off into slavery to fight Gladiator<\/em>-style eventually leading them back to Greece where upon Hercules will win the hearts and minds of the people, as their villages are plundered by Iphicles, and also win his and Sotiris\u2019 freedoms.<\/p>\n

I think you can take a gander what happens next, though this film\u2019s terrible insanity knows no bounds such as a scene shown in every TV spot and trailer where Hercules is chained between two walls, manages to gather all his strength apparently accepting his heritage as Zeus\u2019 son, and rips the chains leaving cinderblocks on each end which he uses to smash the king\u2019s men. Perhaps on paper this sounded cool but it was yet another ludicrous scene in a movie filled with some whoppers already.<\/p>\n

There are so many problems with The Legend of Hercules<\/em><\/strong> that it\u2019s difficult to know where to even begin. Well, first things first, the acting is pretty atrocious from Kellan Lutz in the main title role to the bizarre casting of martial arts star Scott Adkins to play his father and as one would expect from a clich\u00e9d screenplay, he\u2019s the typical cackling villain who is just evil for evil\u2019s sake, no semblance of depth for him… or anyone else in this stinker of a movie for that matter. The only bright spot, and it is a dim spotlight admittedly, is Gaia Weiss on the History Channel\u2019s original series, \u201cVikings\u201d and in spite of a bad screenplay and all the rest, Weiss comes through hopefully unscarred as she has potential.<\/p>\n

Next, the editing was all over the place. At the helm of the cutting room is Vincent Tabaillon whose credentials include Taken 2<\/em>, The Incredible Hulk<\/em> and Clash of the Titans<\/em>, not a stellar career but not bad and nothing to indicate that his work would help keep the pacing off throughout, not that the movie itself had anything interesting to say.<\/p>\n

Lastly, the direction and screenplay. Neither element were good with a what I consider at best average director to a half-assed screenplay filled with clich\u00e9s and utterly awful dialogue only amplified coming out of the mouths of bad actors. I\u2019m not sure exactly where this project went wrong but when you\u2019ve got so many categories that were terrible, it leads to a film that will be relegated to the annals of poor filmmaking and noteworthy for its awfulness and nothing else.<\/p>\n

In the end, The Legend of Hercules<\/em><\/strong> is devoid of any sense of competency let alone originality with a poorly written script, shoddy editing, copycat direction and performances that are, let\u2019s just say, less than stellar. I know I shouldn\u2019t be, but I am astonished to know how in the heck this got the green-light not to mention a hefty budget, this is the sort of crap one would see on SyFy just with an upgrade in visual effects and production design.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

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SPECIAL FEATURES \u2013 1.5\/5<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
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This release comes with a glossy slip cover<\/strong> inside of which is a redemption code for the Digital HD Copy<\/u><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Audio Commentary<\/u><\/strong> \u2013 Director Renny Harlin and Actor Kellan Lutz sit down to pump up their movie providing some tidbits on how certain scenes were shot, working with various actors, etc. It\u2019s your run-of-the-mill commentary with Harlin taking up most of the chatter and leaves little quiet spots.<\/p>\n

The Making of The Legend of Hercules<\/em> (14:46; HD)<\/u><\/strong> is your basic featurette with behind-the-scenes footage set against cast and crew interviews chatting up about their characters, the story and challenges of making the movie.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

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VIDEO \u2013 4.0\/5<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
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The Legend of Hercules<\/em><\/strong> fights its way into the 4K format realm and is presented with a 2.40 widescreen aspect ratio and given a 2160p ultra high-definition transfer (HEVC \/ H.265 codec). Although this certainly doesn\u2019t look bad, compared with the Blu-ray I didn\u2019t discern a huge difference between the two. This is at least a bit sharper but black levels aren\u2019t much deeper and a slight uptick with the colors.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

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AUDIO \u2013 5.0\/5<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
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The original Blu-ray already came with a strong DTS-HD MA 7.1 so this gets a slight upgrade to the Dolby Atmos format. The surrounds sound fantastic providing crisp and clean dialogue levels mainly coming from the center channel but this track really comes to life during the numerous action sequences being able to hear each clank of the sword or bloodshed on the battlefield.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

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OVERALL \u2013 1.5\/5<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
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Overall, The Legend of Hercules<\/em><\/strong> gets to have the distinct pleasure of being the first flop of 2014 at the box office and with critics and audiences alike and for good reason. There\u2019s nothing here save maybe<\/em> for Gaia Weiss who, albeit in a limited role, was decent (and easy on the eyes). Anyway, avoid this like the plague as there\u2019s nothing redeeming, not even in the \u201cit\u2019s so bad it\u2019s good\u201d kind of way either.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

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The Legend of Hercules gets to have the distinct pleasure of being the first flop of 2014 at the box office and with critics and audiences alike and for good reason. There\u2019s nothing here save maybe for Gaia Weiss who, albeit in a limited role, was decent (and easy on the eyes).  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4581],"tags":[3074,2864,2439,2862,2867,2663,2557],"class_list":["post-16206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-4k-uhd-reviews","tag-hercules","tag-johnathon-schaech","tag-kellan-lutz","tag-liam-mcintyre","tag-rade-serbedzja","tag-renny-harlin","tag-scott-adkins"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16206"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16206\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26983,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16206\/revisions\/26983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}