A Dowminating Movie Review - "Clash of the Titans"

Ok, I’m going to be honest with you. I was looking forward to this movie a lot. I personally am a fan of Greek/Roman mythology, and the story of Perseus is one of my favorites (Second only to the Iliad and the Odyssey.) Well, the original Clash of the Titans made in 1981 is loosely based on that story, but was a movie that was made ahead of its time. Anyone who has seen the original can tell you that that its special effects were done on such a large scale that it made the movie itself (despite the story) was very tacky. When I heard that the movie was getting a desperately needed facelift with new graphics, I was very happy. However, I didn’t go into this with very high expectations.

Clash of the Titans, is the story of Perseus (Sam Worthington), the son of Zeus (Liam Neeson) and his journey to save the beautiful Andromeda (Alexa Davalos) by killing the fearsome Kraken, the spawn of Hades. In order to accomplish the feat, he learns that he must kill Medusa, a formerly beautiful woman that had been cursed by the goddess Athena, who turns whoever looks at her face into stone. He manages to behead Medusa, and then races back to Argos upon his flying horse, Pegasus. When he arrives at Argos, he uses Medusa’s head to defeat the Kraken by turning it into stone and save Andromeda.

The graphics of this movie were every well done, and easily the most notable improvement from the original. The scenes with Medusa, the Kraken, and other creatures such as the Pegasus were very well done and visually pleasing.

Another aspect of the movie I liked was the action sequences. While they were somewhat stylized and heavily dependent on CG for, they were still very well done and choreographed. The one thing I always ask of any movie action sequence is “Does this fight serve a real purpose to the story?” if it doesn’t then it shouldn’t be in the movie. With Clash of the Titans, every action sequence serves a purpose as they are trials that Perseus must face in order to accomplish his goals. If you were to take out one of them, the story would be incomplete.

Ooo.... Shiny!

One thing I did have a problem with was the acting. Sam Worthington performance as Perseus was mediocre at best. He seems as though he is unable to separate the different characters he has portrayed in his previous movies from the character he is currently portraying. He gave Perseus the same look and emotional depth as his charaters from Avatar and Terminator: Salvation, which isn’t saying much. The same could be said of Ralph Fiennes who portrayed Hades. Ralph Fiennes brought the same mannerisms to Hades as he did with Lord Voldemort in the Harry Potter movies. The only actors who I felt like they did a good job were Liam Neeson and Mads Mikkelsen. (Best known as Le Chiffre from Casino Royale) However, I felt as though Liam Neeson didn’t bring his “A” game to the role of Zeus, and who could blame him. It is hard to be taken seriously when you’re wearing bright shiny silvery armor.

Another disappointing aspect of this movie was the soundtrack. After the awesome music we got in the trailer, the music was a big “MEH.”. I later learned that the music from the trailer is "The Bird and the Worm" by The Used. However that doesn't change the fact that composer Ramin Djawadi had the opportunity of a lifetime to make a memorable, epic soundtrack, but failed. The music was largely forgettable and unoriginal. I felt as though it was written more for a video game instead of an epic movie.

As for the 3D aspect of the movie, I didn’t go and see it in 3D. The reason for this is because the movie was not shot in 3D, but those effects were added during post-production, so I went and saw it in 2D. My experiences with movies that have not been shot in 3D are that the 3D effects are often poorly done and that they look horrible. And every report I have heard or read about the 3D for this movie was no exception. In fact, according to those reports, it was probably the worst 3D movie experience one could go though. A picture I found from ScreenRant shows just how bad the 3D. From the pic they give (shown below) it looks as though the 3D is just a bunch of 2D images stacked on top of each other, and very poorly at that. Because of this, I would highly recommend saving your money and not seeing the movie in 3D.

See what I am talking about, this is bad....

I would have to say that, while I was entertained with the movie, I was still disappointed even though I didn’t have high expectations. The story itself was very well done, although there were some changes. This is a movie that I would recommend waiting to see till it is at the cheaper venues or even released on Blu-Ray/DVD