Movie Thoughts: The Prince of Egypt (1998)

• Released: 18 December 1998
• Directed by: Brenda Chapman, Steve Hickner, Simon Wells
• Running time: 1 h 39 min
• Rating 5/5

Synopsis

A young prince of Egypt finds out about his heritage and is given a message by the God of his people to deliver the Hebrews from their lives as slaves under the rule of Pharao.

My Thoughts

You know I love this movie. I'm really not big into anything relationg to the Bible or Christianity, but this is just one movie that is pretty much perfect in my book. Where to even start.

The animation? Gorgeous. I love the style on the humans and just how amazing the expressions look. It's just done beautifully and even the CGI elements really haven't aged all that well, except maybe the brief dream sequence Moses has when he realizes his heritage.

The other visuals? Absolutely stunning. The backgrounds and environments just give this movie such a huge scale, particularly in Egypt. It feels big, it feels grand.

The characters? Really, really great. I like how this movie really focuses on the brotherly relationship between Rameses and Moses. You really just see how their bond from being very close to that of enemies, and all the while neither of them really wants to be enemies, but they just are meant to be in this case. You see the heartbreak when Rameses realizes that Moses didn't return for him, but to free his people because he was sent by God. You just feel for these brothers so much. Moses doesn't just magically preform all miracles without suffering under it, either. You clearly see the heartbreak he's going through, seeing others suffer like this.

But even outside of our lead and villain, the other characters are great, too! I like how the two major female characters both have very distinct personalities and defined roles in the story. The Bible is a bit of a sausagefest, so it's great to see strong female characters without making them the standard action girl type. I really liked both Tzipporah and Miriam, and heck, even Yocheved, albeit brief, has a great scene. Aaron has a smaller role, but I like him nonetheless, how he goes from distrusting Moses to fully accepting him as his savior. Jethro posed a great fatherly figure to some of the characters. Moses and Rameses' mother has this genuine soft love for her sons. Heck, even Seti, being the monster that he is, has some nuance to him.

The only two characters I really couldn't get into in this movie were Hotep and Huy, the comic relief high priests from Egypt. But, granted, their presence was honestly very downplayed and they never took over the movie sans for one song sequence.

Talking about the soundtrack... Good God is it amazing. I'm not usually that big a fan of songs from musicals like this, but they absolutely blew me away with soundtrack. Yes, "Playing with the Big Boys" is definitely my least favorite, but even then I don't actively dislike it. The rest? Absolutely phenomenal. From the grand epic opening of "Deliver Us" to the cheerful "Through Heaven's Eyes" to the bombastic and amazing "The Plagues". I pretty much couldn't have asked for a better soundtrack. The background music, too, is memorable and great. My favorite instrumental soundtrack would have to be that of the Burning Bush scene. 

I honestly don't know what else to say here. It's just that type of movie that I really don't have anything much to complain about and gets a perfect 5/5 rating from me. I have watched this film many times and will watch it many times more in the future.