Clash of the Titans

[lynn]

I liked it. It was fun. Liam phoned it in, Sam lapsed back into Aussie and every time I giggled, Medusa looked like something out of Shrek and what was with all the big name actors that didn't even get lines? The myths got busted as did many nameless buddy characters. The Kraken was about a scary as a snapping turtle... actually maybe not that scary. But it was fun all the way along and I had a good time.

[Gilberto]

The kraken was cool, but since we're not given any reason to care about the people of Argos (and almost every reason not to), its appearance is less than dramatic. The first film broke out the kraken right away, just to let people know how bad it was, but this version counted on the trailer to do it for them. The movie is fun, but the whole thing felt phoned in, and you already know my feelings on crap heroes and the injustice of what was done to Medusa. Left me a little sour at the end. All that and a thrown-in half-assed attempt at 3D made the whole movie feel like an overplayed gimmick.

[lynn]

Clash of the Titans is a gimmick film, that's all it's about really. I didn't see it in 3D, as you can imagine it's difficult to get out here in the Aussie outback. So I felt they took it all too seriously, I think I only remember one or two intentional jokes. They should have let it be funny.

[Gilberto]

Adventure films should be funny. Even Lord of the Rings had a lot of fun moments and humor to let you know who the characters were and what their relationships were so they became important to you. The original Star Wars films used humor to introduce the characters' sensibilities, which made the drama more real by contrast.

Bad writers think humor is anathema to drama. They think heroes have to be hard and mean to be real. They also think FX are fun even if the story isn't.

[lynn]

I don't think any film should take itself too seriously, even in drama the moments of comedy highlight the tragedy and allow us space to breathe. Comedy is how we cope with tragedy. And tragedy is what results when movies take themselves too seriously. Adventure films shouldn't be serious, come on, he's riding a flying horse and fighting a lady with snake hair, have a laugh already!

[Gilberto]

Take a note from Shakespeare on this one, kids. Hamlet's got a lot of funny lines. Tom Stoppard had a field day with that interplay of comedy and tragedy in Rosencrantz and Gildenstern are Dead.

[lynn]

I love Rozencrantz and Guildenstern are dead, that's a classic play. Far better than Clash of the Titans.

[Gilberto]

I'll admit, the action is better in Clash of the Titans, but I like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern a lot better.

The thing is, I'm convinced that Shakespeare would be writing action movies if he were alive today. He always incorporated action elements and fantastic themes in his plays because he knew how to play to the groundlings. He also wrote many a play about mythic heroes, so a Clash of the Titans movie would be right up his alley. People always act like "it's just a fantasy film" or "it's only an action movie", but those were his bread and butter. It's not a waste of good writing to employ it in genre films.

[lynn]

I think a lot of people misjudge Shakespeare because of the archaic language, and think that his beautiful language must be preserved or is the only wonderful thing he does. Problem is not that his language is good but that it is dated. Because he wrote so long ago! When you look in context his language is up-to-date and fun, his people are cheeky and rude a lot of the time, making sex and fart jokes... I think no-one need fear updating the language when doing a modern Shakespeare because he is so mired in his time, so long as you don't just do a blank translation, that you actually use the most forward and funky and funny of our current language. Get Diablo Cody to do it. Honest to Blog? But he wrote for all sorts, not just stuffy academics, so we should be reclaiming him.