Climbing Higher Pictures

The summer is sure starting early this year. April has never really been prime real-estate for wannabe summer blockbusters, though this season 2 major contenders have entered the ring. With the exception of Kick-Ass, Clash of the Titans looks to try and hold onto the box office crown all the way until Iron Man 2‘s launch in the beginning of May. But to do that, it’s got to stay afloat and survive on repeat viewings, something that popcorn movies rarely do.

Clash of the Titans Review

By Ryan Hamelin

Movie Grade: C

I think I can start by getting out of the way the main question everyone wants to know. How does the 3D look? The answer, as has already been reported sporadically around the internet, is absolutely terrible. Hairlines will routinely exist several feet behind the head of the person they are meant to be attached to, as the shape they used to extrapolate the 3D was unable to separate their hair from the darker background. Composites of digital backgrounds look like painted murals, as the town below is in 3D, but the entire vista in the distance has been left painfully 2D. The computer generated elements, as they existed as 3D files to begin with, look the best in the transfer, but since they are given depth to such a degree, they stick out as effects even worse than they normally would.

What you have is a film that was shot as a 2D movie, edited as a 2D movie, and should have been released simply as a 2D movie. Alice in Wonderland proved that post-processed 3D can work rather well when given the production time to achieve it correctly, and when you create a film with 3D in mind. The human eye is unable to process 3D images shorter than 2 seconds in length, the reason why neither Alice nor Avatar utilized high intensity cutting to create their sequences. Clash of the Titans was cut without such physical considerations in mind, and even when the 3D works, it becomes disorienting and headache inducing. Not to mention that none of the cinematography or blocking was staged from a 3D perspective, causing the shots themselves to be rather unremarkable in multiple dimensions.

So should you see it in 3D? I certainly wouldn’t recommend it. It doesn’t add anything to the fairly blasé summer popcorn flick, and at its worst makes the film nearly impossible to watch. Several people in the audience removed their glasses altogether, willing to watch a blurry image, or only one eye of it, in an effort to preserve the film as a movie-going experience. The combination of bad post-processed 3D and the recent price gouging of such screens is building an avalanche of backlash against the format that even James Cameron will not be able to quell. If this is any indicator of Warnerbros new policy to present all of their tent-pole pictures in post-processed 3D, I won’t be paying the extra money to catch another 3D screening anytime soon.

But say you do go see the film in 2D. What should you expect? Well at just under 2 hours, this is a pretty short epic. Everything about the film is fighting tooth and claw to convince you of its pre-eminent right to the scale and majesty of not only its source material but a slew of grand successors to the throne it once held. You will find yourself thinking liberally of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, as well as Pirates of the Caribbean as the adventure unfolds, and there’s plenty of stuff which works.

For one thing, the production design is extraordinary. The sets, costumes, and weapons are all beautifully crafted. The world is almost more impressive than the camerawork which is trying to capture it, and you will find yourself concentrating on the surrounding space far more than any of the actors or their dialogue. Speaking of dialogue, the script reeks of studio intervention. It alternates wildly between verbose and almost overbearingly dull exposition about the nature of the relationships between different characters and the gods, to Sam Worthington’s advice of, “Don’t look the bitch in the eye” before the group of warriors moves to enter Medusa’s lair. I can almost hear the notes asking them to “punch up” the lines, and make the sequences more exciting, at the detriment of story, character, and a cohesive world. The film largely fails to stick to even its own rules, and you never feel like Perseus is actually succeeding at defeating anything, more that he happened to be the only one lucky enough to live to the end. We can’t root for the character if we don’t understand when he’s in danger or not, and apparently he is susceptible to a few drops of venom but can survive a 500+ foot drop into the depths of the ocean. I’m not going to go so far as to say there’s a bit of a Terminator Salvation issue at work here, but there are elements of it to be sure.

I guess in the end, the buck has to stop somewhere, and I feel like it may be with Louis Leterrier. The director has consistently and systematically underwhelmed in every project he’s taken on, and I can point back to his work on The Incredible Hulk for reference. He can handle action, to a certain extent, but he can’t create a world that holds its own weight. Everything is just slightly below par, and it is clear that the standards have risen exponentially in a post-Avatar world. Even the CGI here looks dated and tacky, as we’ve been privy to such a higher standard of computerized excellence in past few months. I’m a little worried that Iron Man 2 might suffer the same fate, but at least Jon Favreau was smart enough to eschew a post-processed 3D transfer which could help it feel less dated.

The true crime of this particular adaptation is its brilliant casting, as Sam Worthington is a far better actor than he appears to be here. We also can’t forget Liam Neeson, the only actor alive I would ever believe as Zeus, who does splendidly despite the script’s shortcomings and plays off of Ralph Fiennes’ Hades in a handful of the film’s brightest sequences. I want to see him playing Zeus again in the future, and it’s such a shame that this will probably be his last chance to do so. I predict a big opening and a steep falloff as word of mouth spreads to destroy the early hype. Will it recover enough to result in a profitable investment? Only time will tell. If you still want to see it, save your money and do 2D, while going heavy on the popcorn. Munch it loud enough, and you may just drown out the film’s major flaws enough to enjoy yourself.