Believe it or not, Clash of the Titans is a remake and not a spoof of… no – not Remember the Titans, that was American football… rewind a bit further back to 1981’s Clash of the Titans starring People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive in 1987, Harry Hamlin. You haven’t watched it? Neither have I, although I hear it was pretty darn good for its time, elevated to cult status for its stop-motion special effects.

The same can not and will not be said for Clash of the Titans (2010). You’d think that three decades of cinema (and dental) technology would actually improve Hollywood’s take on Greek mythology, but it hasn’t. Apparently, you still need actors who can breathe life into their characters and special effects that can hold their own against the might of the biggest Titan of all, the dreaded lurgi… nowadays, commonly referred to as “the green screen”.

Catch the rest of the review and the trailer after the jump…

Frank Miller’s 300 found the right balance between reality and fantasy. The visual effects were revolutionary enough for the pages of Miller’s graphic novel to make the leap from pulp to celluloid and it worked beautifully… even after the 42nd charge of the six-pack brigade. Louis Leterrier (The Incredible Hulk) struggles to find the right balance in Clash of the Titans. Giant scorpions, Medusa, the Kraken… its like a soulless video game adaptation of Shadow of the Colossus and God of War with an indistinct lead. Clash of the Titans also fails to give its visuals a palpable feel for epic space and size, framing without giving the audience much live-action reference for proportion.

Liam Neeson plays Zeus, modeled on God of War’s fiery red-haired rendition, and his size is never fully realised as he politely appears in human-size for the humans and god-size for the gods. Neeson’s performance is also constricted by the brilliant shimmer of his armour and his face-munching beard, which makes him look more like Hagar the Horrible than Zeus. Ralph Fiennes is unrecognisable as Hades, playing him like an ex-White Zombie band member, clad in a dark cloak and obviously suffering from insomnia. His representation of the king of the underworld is sinister at best, but his performance is also subdued by excess garb and “beardage”… no wonder Ian McKellen didn’t get that Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Gandalf – no one could tell if he was acting or not!?

So with the bad hair day veteran actors lost in their beards, we’re forced to rely on the clean shaven half cyborg-Na’vi-god-actor known as Sam Worthington. Worthington leads the charge as Perseus with his merry band of Argos soldiers and mercenaries, along with a Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson in Scorpion King stunt double in Mads Mikkelson and a Pinky & The Brain “comedy” duo. He’s been entrusted with the task of saving mankind, destroying a couple of Titans and saving the acting department all on his own… shame.

“At last, the holy hand grenade of Antioch…”

Unfortunately, Worthington has also been cast as the vacuous head space for audiences to fill. His performance requires that you embody him like he was your very own Avatar or hand puppet, giving him your personality instead of finding one thrust upon you as with real actors. It’s a poor substitute for Gerard Butler or Russell Crowe, who would’ve at least delivered the lines with a bit more fist-clenched gusto, making the lead dispensable and purely there as an everyman device for plot development.

The lack of character anchors, leaves the film adrift in no-man’s land, void of any identifiable personality and falling back on mediocre action/adventure. The action set pieces are ordinary and dumb by today’s standards… I especially enjoyed Draco’s experienced and altruistic war strategy behind the Medusa slaying. Perhaps this is how things went down in the 1981 original? Although, if you’ve got enough sense to leave out the two-headed dog and change Pegasus from white to black, you’d think they’d have the sensibility to tweak some of the fight scenes too? It’s all quick-paced fantasy fighting and flying, which make up the bulk of the entertainment in this so-called “Odyssey”.

Even the fun factor doesn’t measure up to the recent Harry Potter clone, Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief. The mythology was done better in Percy Jackson with some decent cameos from Steve Coogan as Hades, Uma Thurman as Medusa and Sean Bean as Zeus. The adventure in Clash of the Titans is routine, matter-of-fact and in retrospect they could have easily called it My Big Fat Greek Vendetta. If Percy Jackson was Greek Mythology 101, Clash of the Titans is Greek Mythology for Dummies… running through the list of bad guys like a 3-level ’80s arcade game.

Clash of the Titans is just a bit too blah. The performances are forgettable, the action set pieces are mediocre, the crash course in Greek mythology has been done better, the pacing is routine and the CGI is comparable with the first God of War. It’s basically a half-hearted action/adventure, which lacks the charm of the original and slots in at the bottom of the Greek mythology pile.

To add insult to injury the film wasn’t shot for 3D, but was adjusted for 3D in post-production. This gimmick rides on the back of the success of Avatar. So you have depth of field, but this has no real bearing on the quality of the action. So if you’re very generous when it comes to acting, action, thematic depth and special effects… see it in 2D, otherwise wait for the spoof version to come out on DVD.

The bottom line: DOA.

Release Date: 16 April, 2010

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