Envision a world where everyone wears a tunic and speaks in a British accent, except you. You wear a tunic and speak in an unabashedly Australian accent...
Now, envision a world without internet, without cell phones, no Blu-ray, no DVDs, not even VHS. A world without satellite TV, even without cable... But especially a world without CGI. This was the world of my childhood in the '70s.
There were only three channels (well, four, if you count PBS. But no one watched anything on that.) Since there was a lack of options, one's TV schedule was sacred. If you wanted to watch cartoons, you might squeeze in a few before school on "Wallace & Ladmo". Otherwise you had to wait until Saturday morning.
On Saturday, there was no sleeping in. You were up before the crack of dawn - right at that moment when the late-night infomercials ended, and the animation started. Scooby, Grape Ape, Underdog, the ageless Bugs Bunny, Tarzan, the Lone Ranger, with a good measure of Schoolhouse Rock in between...
By early afternoon, once the cartoons ended, dad might join you for "Star Trek" reruns (the old ones... with William Shatner). Or the matinee adventures. Those were my favorites. You know, the movies with claymation special effects. "Jason & the Argonauts", "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad", "Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger"... I loved these movies. Especially the clay monsters. You knew it was fake. You could see every flaw in the effects. But you loved it anyway.
My youth was spent on these movies. By the time "Clash of the Titans" came out, we had cable. Those early days of cable - it was one of the first movies that I was able to watch over and over and over.
When the new version of "Clash of the Titans" came out a couple of years ago, I liked it, but it did not have the same magic of the first one.
I kind of feel the same way about its sequel, "The Wrath of the Titans".
In our modern age, CGI has replaced the old claymation. But there is so much going on on the screen that you never get a good look at what you're seeing. It goes too fast, and you don't have time to actually realize what it is, or scrutinize anything. You can't see the creature long enough to even tell what it looks like.
Don't get me wrong. It's freaking cool. But slow it down a bit! Sheesh!
Add onto that the grainy, almost black-and-white film stock that is in vogue right now, and that makes the whole movie imperceptible. It is like watching a movie through a dream fog - or watching a UHF channel with a really bad antenna. I don't WANT my fantasy movies to be grainy! Save that for art flicks or film noir! I want my fantasy films to be crystal clear and panoramic.
Other than that, it is a great movie. The performances were good. Sam Worthington is very likeable, but he plays the same character in every movie. The movie also featured Liam Neeson (My kids: "Look, it's Qui Gon Jin!"), Ralph Fiennes ("Look, it's Voldemort!"), and Danny Huston (Me: "Hey, it's the scary vampire from '30 Days of Nights'!).
The action was fast-paced taking them from fighting a chimera, to huge cyclops in a forest to a moving maze to fighting a big lava guy.
But when the movie was over, I was like, "Huh? That's it? It's over already?"
In other words - unfulfilled... disappointed...
However, I recognize that this might just be the cynicism of adulthood settling in. Because Aidan, my ten year-old son, loved the movie. He rates these types of movies based on how many kinds of monsters they have. This movie had a whopping SIX MONSTERS. Pretty good, in his mind.
