Controversy
The song is considered to be one of the darkest in any Disney film, depicting Hell, sin, damnation and lust; subjects that are generally considered inappropriate for children. This song and sequence prompted the ratings board to consider a PG rating for the film. In its defense, Disney claimed that its adaptation of The Hunchback of Notre Dame was meant to play as much to adult audiences as to children. The studio attempted to produce an animated film with an audience broader than only children, the main target audience of Disney animated features.
Wheeler W. Dixon of Film Genre 2000: New Critical Essays said that Hellfire "was too much for many adults" prompted reviewers such as Mark Silver of The Los Angeles Times to say things like: " a beautiful powerful film that I would not recommend to children under eight or nine years old".
Animator Floyd Norman recalled the pitching session for the musical, in which Menken and Schwartz were "on hand to perform the songs that would grace the production". He recalls Hellfire "clearly ha the executives squirming nervously", wondering if this material could be in a Disney film.
The Hellfire subplot, "involving the villain’s need to desire to screw and/or murder the heroine because of his guilt-ridden lustings for her", which was described as "a cross between “Schindler’s List” and “Sweeney Todd”" by Scott Mendelson of HollywoodNews.com, was also referred to as one of the things, alongside other Disney events like Mufasa being killed onscreen, that surprisingly were given "G-ratings from the MPAA back in the 1990", which Mendelson uses as context when discussing Tangled's PG rating.
Religious conservatives boycotted The Hunchback of Notre Dame film due to this song, which they said was "a suggestive rejection of purity amplified by imagery of a half-naked Esmeralda dancing in a fire".
Read more about this topic: Hellfire (song)
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