The One Movie Moment Arnold Schwarzenegger Wishes He Could Delete From His Career

Arnold Schwarzenegger has made a few duds throughout his career, but there’s one scene in his debut Hercules in New York that he no doubt wishes he could scrub from his CV. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s action movies like The Terminator or Total Recall are classics of the genre, and while he branched out to comedy and the occasional drama (like 2015’s Maggie), action movies were something he could always fall back on. Like any major A-lister, he had some bombs along the way too, with Batman & Robin or Arnie’s gory Agatha Christie adaptation Sabotage being among the worst.

The trophy for Arnold’s worst movie would go to his debut feature, Hercules in New York from 1970. Schwarzenegger was only 22 when he filmed this low-budget fantasy comedy, where Hercules is exiled by his father Zeus to New York. Arnold had already made a name for himself as a bodybuilder during this time, and the project was something of a dream come through. He had always dreamt of starring in American movies, and first got into bodybuilding after watching the fantasy movie Hercules and the Captive Women, starring Reg Park. Sadly, his debut didn’t live up to his dreams.

Arnold Schwarzenegger Wants To Get Rid Of A Scene From Hercules In New York

Arnie can’t bear this Central Park fight scene

Arnold Schwarzenegger charges at a bear in Hercules In New York.

Hercules in New York might be fun for Arnold completionists, but it is a chore to sit through. Schwarzenegger had no acting experience before the film, and oh boy, does it show, with his line deliveries being impossibly wooden. To add insult to injury, producers changed Schwarzenegger’s credit to “Arnold Strong” and had another actor dub his voice as his Austrian accent was considered too thick. In short, it was a dud, and in 2017, Arnold recounted to Business Insider watching a scene from the film with his children when they discovered it on television.

I hadn’t seen it in so long and my kids got it and put it on, and they saw me wrestling a bear, and I had to stop and watch this entire fight scene with that bear. Just to watch how ludicrous it was.

According to Arnold, the “bear” Hercules fights in Central Park is really a guy with a “coat thrown over him.” While he had a good time reliving this scene with his children, the Hercules in New York bear fight is a sequence Arnie likely wants to delete from his filmography.

While Arnie generally has a sense of humor about the film, he did admit during a 1991 interview with David Letterman (via YouTube) that it was “… a movie that I’ve tried to hide for centuries.”

Hercules In New York Is One Of IMDb’s Lowest Rated Films

It’s not the only Arnold movie on the chart

Hercules driving a horse and carriage in Hercules in New York

While ratings on Rotten Tomatoes or IMDb shouldn’t be taken as the last word on a movie’s quality, if a film ends up on IMDb’s Lowest Rated chart, the odds are good you should skip them. While Hercules in New York is somewhat obscure nowadays, enough people voted on IMDb to see the film land at 69 on the Lowest Rated charts. That puts it above the likes of Police Academy: Mission to Moscow (70) or Arnold’s own Batman & Robin (83), while Disaster Movie (1) and Manos: The Hands of Fate (2) are the reigning champions.

Some viewers might find camp value in Hercules in New York, but between the horrid production value and Arnold’s own poor performance, it’s just not a fun watch. There are a couple of gags that raise a chuckle and co-lead Arnold Stang does his best to inject the movie with life, but its place on the IMDb lowest ranked film is well earned.

The Scene Didn’t Stop Arnold From Becoming A Huge Star

A decade later, Arnold was fronting Conan the Barbarian and The Terminator

Hercules in New York did little for Arnold’s career, and he soon refocused his attention on bodybuilding afterwards. He had some scattered acting credits in the years that followed, but ironically, it was only by playing himself in the documentary Pumping Iron that producers began to take note of his natural charisma and charm. Getting cast as the lead in Conan the Barbarian changed his career, and he became a genuine movie star when The Terminator arrived a couple of years after that in 1984.

Arnie might not be the greatest actor in the world, but one look at his work in Hercules in New York and his later films reveals how dramatically he improved…

Schwarzenegger then had one of the all-time box office runs as a star, including Commando, Predator, Twins, and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Hercules in New York quickly faded into the background, only occasionally being dragged out of obscurity for the sake of a talk show gag. Arnie might not be the greatest actor in the world, but one look at his work in Hercules in New York and his later films reveals how dramatically he improved at his craft.

Source: Business Insider, The Late Show with David Letterman/YouTube, IMDb