Clash of the Titans (2010) (Blu-ray / DVD)
Steve Barton
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Reviewed by Uncle Creepy
Starring Sam Worthington, Gemma Arterton, Mads Mikkelsen, Alexa Davalos, Ralph Fiennes, Liam Neeson
Directed by Louis Leterrier
Distributed by Warner Home Video
The original Clash of the Titans was and still is a feast for the senses. Featuring some of the best stop-motion effects work that Ray Harryhausen has ever come up with, the flick is a classic in every sense of the word. Louis Leterrier’s remake? Not so much. The differences begin with the plot …
Hades (Fiennes) hatches a half-baked scheme to fool Zeus (Neeson) into letting him out of the underworld and back on Mount Olympus by releasing the Kraken and destroying cities populated by those who don’t show the Gods enough respect. Who knew that the mightiest of mighties had Dangerfield complexes? Anyway, standing in the way of all this is Zeus’ son, Perseus (Worthington), who plays his role as wooden as the boat on which he arrived. The plan is simple … cut off Medusa’s (crappy CGI sprite) head; show it to the Kraken, thereby turning it into stone; expose Hades’ deception; and further along an even more half-baked love story between the son of a god and a chick who’s cursed to be hot for all eternity. Or something like that.
Don’t get me wrong … the original film doesn’t exactly have the best of plots or acting either, but it was charming, had monsters, and was lots of fun. This one has monsters. Yes. That’s what it has.
I will say this in its favor, though – in theatres Clash of the Titans was converted to play in 3D. Warner wisely dropped the gimmick for this home video release, and honestly? It plays a lot better. Or at the very least I’m not constantly distracted and complaining about how the 3D effects in the movie just didn’t work. Is that a positive? I don’t have any idea.
You guessed it! Yes, the Blu-ray does indeed look and sound better than its standard definition cousin. In fact, there are parts of this flick that look downright amazing. Suffice it to say that if visuals alone are your bag, you’re going to love this movie. Those looking for anything beyond the surface will be coming up empty.
Another reason to buy the Blu-ray over the DVD, providing you have the tech, is the special features — most of which are Blu-ray specific. Other than being BD Live enabled, Warner presents Maximum Movie Mode, which allows viewers to dig on the movie while picture-in-picture goodness in the form of interviews, behind-the-scenes features, concept art, looks at the effects, and the film’s many stunts pop-up frequently. It’s fairly extensive and actually makes the movie a bit more interesting to sit through. Nice.
Next up we have a section called Focus Points, which is a series of brief featurettes totaling about thirty-five minutes that show off various making-of sequences of the flick from a look at Worthington’s Perseus to the mighty creatures of the movie. Speaking of Worthington, he gets his own featurette – the eight-minute long Sam Worthington: An Action Hero for the Ages. Here you will gush over Sam(!) as he trains for his big showdown facing off against a guy in a green leotard holding a pole with a ball on it, errr … we mean the Kraken! This is action personified, folks! Add on about twenty-five minutes of deleted scenes, including an alternate ending that finds Perseus confronting his father on Mount Olympus, and we are done. Not too shabby.
I know I seem pretty hard on this flick, but it’s only because it let me down in ways that not even I could have expected. At the very least it should have been big dumb entertainment. Instead it’s just big and dumb. You could certainly do worse in terms of what to watch, but do yourself a favor and stick to the original.
Side Note: I want the head of whoever thought that it would be funny to dis Bubo the mechanical owl on a friggin’ stick in my front yard. Thanks.
Special Features
2 1/2 out of 5
Special Features
3 1/2 out of 5
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