Reviewed by

Christopher Armstead

Let’s get this out the way first because if you plan on seeing this bloated remake go ahead and save your premium dollars and avoid the ‘3D Experience’. The only thing 3D did for me in this movie was make it uncomfortable for me to wear those silly glasses over my regular glasses and see some really cool looking 3D trailers. Those were dollars I could’ve kept in my pocket or spent on lottery tickets. Cool, that’s out of the way. Now we have to decide which was the more lackluster presentation of Greek Mythology… ‘Percy Jackson and the Olympians’ or this remake of the 1981 semi-classic ‘Clash of the Titans’. It’s a total tossup but I wouldn’t watch either of those movies again on a bet. At least Percy Jackson had the honor not to charge me a 3D premium not to be impressed.

A boy is found floating in the river, yet another love child of Zeus who apparently uses his incredible and unlimited powers primarily for the purpose of tricking human women into giving up that ass. This boy will be called Perseus, grow up to look like Sam Worthington and work along side his adoptive father as a fisherman. Life is simple but life is good.

During this mythical time the Humans have grown tired of their Creators cruelty and their incessant raping of their women and are rebelling against them. Zeus (Liam Neeson) has to quell this nonsense and quickly, so to that end he unleashes baby brother Hades (Ralph Fiennes) upon these idiot humans. Tragically, while Hades was completely wrecking the rebel city of Argos, Perseus loses his family and has sworn revenge against Hades and the gods. This is around the time Perseus also learns that he is the son Zeus which brings him little joy and life becomes way complicated and isn’t so good no more.

Under the orders of Zeus, Hades has given the Arogisans a choice. Sacrifice their beautiful princess Andromeda (Alexa Davalos) or face the wrath of the Kracken. They

have ten days to make this choice and then it’s on. But there is a plan. The king of this land has dispatched Peseus along with some of his finest soldiers on a virtual suicide mission to seek out knowledge on how to kill this Kracken, a beast so lethal and so feared that even the gods in Olympus shake at the mention of its name. Guided by his lifelong protector Io (Gemma Atherton), who has been cursed by the gods for NOT giving up that ass, Perseus engages on a most treacherous mission and will face some of the most horrific beasts that the fertile minds of those Greek mythologists could imagine, including Medusa who looking was looking pretty damned hot in this… I’m just saying… on his quest for revenge. Against a god who cannot be killed anyway. Sure it sounds completely pointless but we’re going to go ahead and watch anyway while these two pairs of glasses completely cave in my nose into my face.

Saw this movie with a group of friends in a packed house full of people who WARNER BROTHERS ripped off in over charging to see this non-3D movie in 3D. This packed house was largely quiet while watching a movie that had a lot explosive computer generated fight sequences, mythical beasts, and epic adventure. Outside of some much needed humor injected into this story by actor Liam Cunningham playing one of the doomed soldiers of Argos, this theater would’ve been completely quiet. The most fun I had at this movie was when the old guy next to me discovered his wallet was missing and went batty in the middle of the show claiming someone had picked his pocket. He left his wallet at home by the way. So what we’re left to ponder is why was this movie, directed by Louis Letterier who did a pretty decent job with his version of ‘The Incredible Hulk’ was so uninvolving?

I believe when the decision was made to treat this version of ‘Clash of the Titans’ as a work of serious cinema the film was doomed because now there’s no fun to be had in this movie, a movie that screams ‘Let’s have some fun with it!’. Doomed as quality entertainment that is, not doomed as a money-maker because I am sure it will do that, though I doubt folks will be going back for seconds on this one. Special effects wise there is no comparison between this and the original since thirty years of graphics advancement crushes the late Ray Harryhausen and his stop motion genius, but that movie seemed to be having fun with itself. Even Sir Lawrence Oliver seemed in on the joke of it all. Years later when adults would watch the first movie again, remembering the original as children, the wacky fun that was the original ‘Clash of the Titans’ comes rushing back. I doubt kids watching this verison 25 years from now are going to have that same feeling.

A twelve year old who might like this movie today, years from now will wonder what exactly is Perseus trying to accomplish. Since they made the decision NOT to make Andromeda a love interest, Perseus really has no real reason to save Argos, especially considering the Argosians have shown him nothing but contempt, leaving simple revenge against the gods as motive which of course is fairly pointless because he can’t do anything about the gods. Then you have Liam Neeson’s version of Zeus who is basically portrayed as an erratic, easily manipulated simpleton who can’t control his Johnson. While I would hate for this movie to be longer, I wouldn’t have minded more gods and less Perseus. The gods were looking kind of sweet up there in Olympus with their shiny armor, but they got hardly any screen time and poor Danny Huston as Poseidon got only one line and didn’t get to do jack.

So in the absence of a quality narrative, the gods rendered mostly inert, except for Fiennes fascinating interpretation of Hades, and Sam Worthington’s Perseus not being all that exciting to spend time with, we have special effects. They are nice and all, and we did like the Medusa battle and the Kracken was a worthy beast at the end but it couldn’t carry the movie. We also liked the nod to that stupid-ass owl from the original.

If you watch these kinds of movies you’re gonna go if you haven’t gone already so I’m just saying save your premium dollars and don’t give Warner Brothers any more money than they deserve by seeing this in 3D. Heck, it might be better in 2D but I’m not going to watch it again to find out.