The Twelve Tasks of Asterix (1976)

Simply A Masterpiece

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

It has the classic french dubs, the style and the humor. It's well paced, has the humor and balanced references you need (the goddamn washing powder). The characters are parodies, stereotypes, but gentle ones, keeping everything in the appropriate tone. Finally, it rounds up the value of friendship through A/O's relationship but also A&O/the village's. Even Caesar finds his own place in the world, in a perfect -before it was cool- epilogue. Yeah, that's pretty much one of the best animated Asterix classics.

Thank providence for YouTube, where I have discovered that several animated films based on various "Asterix" iconic novels actually exist. I recently watched "Asterix and Cleopatra" on YouTube and rated it quite favorably in my Amazon.com review. More recently I viewed the even more diverting "The Twelve Tasks of Asterix" (hereafter TToA), which adds understated but piquant British humor and attitude to ancient Greco-Roman themes.TToA begins from the beginning, introducing us to the stalwart Gaulish village which is the sole hold-out against Julius Caesar's hordes and especially the village's cleverest warrior, Asterix, and its most powerful, Asterix's friend Obelix. They have repelled Caesar's forces so decisively for so long that many of the Roman military and senate leaders start to believe the villagers are immortal gods (or at least demigods) against which resistance is futile. Caesar angrily scoffs at this and personally travels to the village to propose a contest: if Asterix and Obelix can complete 12 excruciatingly difficult tasks, Caesar will admit that the Gauls are gods and will let them be. But if they fail even one task, the village must accept defeat and absorption into the Roman Empire. The short, phlegmatic, and unassuming Cassius Tiddilus (I think that his name) will monitor the heroes' progress.And so we're off. TToA is an excellent place for the "Asterix" neophyte to learn the lore and why these Gaulish characters are internationally renowned. The animated movie is also a deft parody of the twelve tasks of Hercules (which are briefly referenced) and an unexpected showcase for droll, unflappable behavior in outlandish situations in the Monty Python vein. Some of the tasks are traditionally athletic like foot-racing, javelin throwing, and judo. Others allude to Greek myth like the sirens' island of voluptuous pleasure and the old man of the mountain's riddle. Still others are more satirical like the attempt to acquire a permit in a bureaucratic labyrinth and spending the night on a ghostly plain. Yet no matter what they face, Asterix and Obelix (speaking in delightful matter-of-fact British tones) address them with stately, unflappable resolve which, again, reminded me of Monty Python.The ingenious beauty of TToA (and of "Asterix" in general) is its appeal to various levels, from connoisseurs of lively, sometimes cartoonishly violent action and fighting to appreciators of clever parody and sly dialogue. Best of all, TToA is unpretentious fun that, as the climactic scenes in the Coliseum show, doesn't take itself seriously.

This is the year 50 before JC. All the Gaul is occupied by the Romans. All the Gaul? No! A little village populated by some irreducibles Gallics resists again and always to the invader. This situation gets on Jules César's nerves who's starting to compare these Gallics as gods. To have proof of this, he sets them 12 works. Astérix and Obélix are chosen to take up the challenge... This animation film isn't an adaptation from one of Astérix' albums, it's an original screenplay that inspired from the Greek mythology with Hercule's works. The movie is a pleasant surprise because the animation is more careless than in Astérix' previous adaptations for the cinema, although it's a bit basic. Concerning these "works", of course they're fanciful and eccentric but they're irresistibe, varied, full of modern anachronisms (like the chips in the sixth work when Obélix must eat a pantagruelian meal). Besides, the anachronism is a common thing in Astérix' adventures.The best moments of the movie are the pantagruelian meal, the sequences of the hypnosis and the crazy flat. At the end, in spite of tiresome sequences, peculiar to Astérix's adaptations, I think about the (useless) battle against the Romans at the beginning, the movie is a happy entertainment and the best animation film with Astérix.

I'm mostly a rather introvert person. When a comedy makes me smile it has succeeded, when it makes me chuckle it is a rousing success. The climax of this film made me fall from my cinema seat laughing.This film is not based on any of the Asterix comic books as most of the Asterix films. Asterix faces 12 tasks, one more daunting than the other (I can't remember why, it was over 20 years ago), building up to the last one, the most difficult of the lot. Do not, under any circumstances, including hurricanes and invading Mongolic hordes, leave the cinema before that scene!