Clash of the Titans Directed by: Louis Leterrier Starring: Liam Neeson, Ralph Fiennes, Sam Worthington Rating: NR Release Date: March 26, 2010
TRAILER SCORE: 5/10
MY THOUGHTS: The original Harry Hamlin stinker is one of my most favoritist movies of all time ever dating back from my childhood (along with The Dark Crystal, Krull and The Last Unicorn). So I feel especially well prepared to critique the modernized, CGI stinker version of that god-awful, fantastic pile of crap from 1981. Now, here's what the new, spiffy trailer does RIGHT: A. The Giant Scorpions. Sure, they're a wee large and it looks like the screenwriters took some liberties with how they actually fit into the plot, but the original movie is just one big liberty taken after another, so now I guess we're taking liberties with liberties...which, I suppose is like taking a grain of salt with another grain of salt. Where does it end? Regardless, back to what the trailer does right...B. The Kraken (and, of course, Liam Neeson declaring, "Release the Kraken!--originally Sir Laurence Olivier's job). Does the Kraken look a SMIDGE like the creature that snacks on New York City in Cloverfield?...only a smidge and the tentacles are a nice touch. C. Pegasus--and now, a brief interlude of childhood reminescence...as a young lass, there was nothing more appealing than a flying horse, except maybe a flying unicorn that was also pink and granted wishes. Now I love horror, but the flying horse fixation continues, unabated--I'll assume most women are genetically predisposed to want their very own Pegasus. Pegasus from the first movie was either bad claymation or what looked like a flapping mechanical saddle that Hamlin was supposed to ride while looking awestruck. The updated Pegasus looks so beautiful, I nearly swooned. The eight-year old girl inside of me certainly squealed with happy delight.
So, what did the trailer do wrong? Everything else you can possibly imagine it doing. It found things to do wrong that I wasn't even sure existed prior to the trailer, such as having an amazing cast (Liam Neeson as Zeus? Ralph Fiennes as Hades? Frickin' cool, right?) and not actually showcasing said cast. This is a remake of a 80's b-movie, and you're not going to give us tons of scenes with Neeson and Fiennes and instead rely on regurgitated CGI? I say boo. Balance it out (special effects with star power) to let us know this isn't just another totally brainless, fluffy shell of insubstantial dreck...which it probably is anyway. Who am I kidding besides myself?
And yet I'm not done ranting: the music choice is mind-blowingly terrible, like brainwash you into being a zombie for the government terrible, and our new Perseus looks and sounds like a whole lot of putty-colored blah. Sam Worthington is like the poor man's Channing Tatum, and I already think Tatum looks like one of the vacant wrestlers I went to high school with.
So what are we to do with this confusing mishmash of impressive star power, recycled visuals, and what basically amounts to an old turd dressed up to look purty? I for one am going to march right out and see it, schizophrenic trailer notwithstanding. Will it be ghastly? Who knows. Maybe so, maybe not. But there is one thing I know for sure and I know it deep down in the very marrow of my bones, in the very core of my essential being...there's a flying horsey! I want to braid flowers into its mane!