***1/2       The Story Behind Some of Those Constellations

“Clash of the Titans” marks the end of the much-admired stop-motion animation career of Ray Harryhausen. It also happens to include some of his finest work. Like “Jason and the Argonaughts” before it, this movie is based on Greek mythology, and as expected includes your usual dose of adventure.

Zeus, king o’ the gods, decides to punish Calibos, mortal son of the goddess Thetis, for his arrogance by turning him into an ugly creature of sorts. Thetis is none to happy so she releases the Kraken, this movie’s resident giant monster, to wreck havoc. To stop the Kraken Perseus, mortal son of Zeus, starts his epic quest to obtain the head of Medusa to turn the Kraken to stone and thus save the love of his life, Andromeda (the alternative is to sacrifice her to the Kraken). He gets some help along the way, such as epic quest items from the gods, the help of Bubo the mechanical owl, and the assistance of Pegasus the flying horse. Of course Perseus succeeds, you expected otherwise?

The plot is classic Greek mythology through and through. In fact the movie could even be faulted for being too close to the source material. Somehow it seems to lack enthusiasm somewhere. Sure the people are running around going on epic adventures but somehow the audience isn’t encouraged to care. Maybe it’s the slow pace, the movie seems to clip along not nearly as fast as it could. Having the movie condensed by a half an hour probably wouldn’t have been a bad thing. Still, the good news to this is that there is plenty of nice scenes scattered throughout. You get action, you get adventure, you get epic battles, you just have to wait a while to get them but at least they are evenly scattered throughout.

Most of the good stuff is tied up with special effects. Ray Harryhausen does his usual fine work here creating complex stop-motion creatures who move and react as well as something could ever be. Unfortunately there are some times were it seems that good ol’ Ray seems to be slipping. There are a number of parts where the effects and the real footage just don’t seem to mesh right. Overall though, the epic feel of the movie is sustained. With Pegasus and Bubo and Calibos and a giant vulture and Medusa and a two-headed dog and the Kraken and giant scorpions and such, there are plenty of things to like in this movie.

Watching this movie I couldn’t help thinking how closely related this source material is to “The Legend of Zelda”. Maybe I play those games too much but every time Perseus picked up a new item that little “You Got…” jingle played through my head and I halfway expected him to hold the item over his head. Anyways, this movie is a classic based on a classic. It’s a little slow paced and not very enthusiastic, but it gets the job done and provides some entertainment. Oh, and there’s nudity here too, but it’s still PG thanks to technicalities (apparently breast-feeding doesn’t count).

Can’t go wrong with a story that’s been around for thousands of years

Terrific as usual stop-motion effects

Fairly good musical score

A lot of influencial bits

Action! Adventure! Violence! Blood! Gore! Nudity! Mechanical Owls! What more do you want?

Too slow-paced for it’s own good

Somehow fails to keep interest

Occasional bad effect

A number of times where things just plain don't makes sense

Sure, steal from blind people, Perseus is such a nice guy aint he?

Credits