Clash of the Titans
Apr. 21st, 2010 11:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackGood things
1. Reasonably dramatic action scenes
2. Many, many depictions of gods and monsters that were excellent at least some of the time.
3. Beautiful Andromeda is sacrificed to sea monster.
Bad things
1. For a film called Clash of the Titans, it had one fundamental mistake. THERE WEREN'T ANY TITANS! AND THEY DIDN'T CLASH! This was the first thing everyone said. (I don't know where the title of the original film came from: Was it an existing saying for a titanic struggle in general? Are Zeus and other Olympians called Titans as well by extension? The Titanomachy did get a brief mention in the setup, but along with all the main character's character development, it was over in seconds.)
Things a regular film watcher would consider very bad, but not everyone will care about
1. The plot was rather "meh". There were some interesting ideas (see below), but after that it was all "go here, do that, then so-and-so turns up", a collection of loosely linked scenes without enough connection.
2. The main character was really "meh". All the OTHER characters were interesting, but Perseus didn't look like a fisherman, and then didn't look like a hero, he looked like a footballer. He shouted, but never actually seemed emotionally energised, just like he was going "shout at gods, tick, shout at friends, tick"
3. All sorts of plot developments, such as they were, were carried with a few words of a cliche, rather than anything interesting. If it's the first film you've ever seen, the "do you love me less because I'm adopted?" scene could be touching. But if you've seen it before, you wish the characters would say something interesting, or show some charisma, or something.
4. None of the other Gods got to do anything at all. Poseiden didn't even appear!
5. The characters of the gods and some of the other figures were updated in interesting ways, but in other ways were projected onto modern cliches.
Things I thought were good, but expect everyone else to disagree about
1. The whole gods-vs-men idea. What happened after the titanomachy? Did Hades deserve to be imprisoned? Did Zeus really create mankind to be worshipped, was he justified? Were mankind's original complaints justified? Was Zeus fooled by Hades or trying to play both sides against each other? When Zeus helped Perseus, was it actually for Persues' sake, or did he figure that a Kraken defeated at the last minute with Zeus' help would get both terror AND love from the worshippers? Was he playing both sides against each other all along, or just trying to save his own neck, or what? Is he supposed to be forgiven for ravaging the world because of his love for Perseus, or are we to suppose he's not that bad after all? What would a passionate but inconsistent god like that actually be like?
I'm sure a lot of people will think this is just dumb, but somehow a bundle of inconsistent motivations managed (for me) to convey a background of conflicted emotion and ripe theology, and invite me not to criticise, but ask "ok, so how WOULD that work?"
2. As always, you can draw a Jesus metaphor if you try. (I honestly try to avoid doing this every time :)) But the difference here is that it doesn't JUST say "look, a messianic hero", it makes assertions about God himself which are non-trivial (although not accurate). For the record, it would have to be something like:
Zeus = God
Hades = Devil
Kraken = Death
Perseus = Jesus
Andromeda = Temple sacrificial lamb
Io = Holy Spirit
(And no, it's not accurate. If it were, it probably wouldn't be interesting :))
Edited to add: The version of the film that had all the missing plot in, that was then re-edited into this one, including cutting all the gods out!
http://chud.com/articles/articles/23299/1/BY-ZEUS-THE-VERSION-OF-CLASH-OF-THE-TITANS-YOU-DIDN039T-SEE/Page1.html (thanks to andrewducker for the link)
The other version of the film sounds smoother in so many ways, simply by the other gods and other soldiers on the quest having anything to do, as well as everyone having some sort of consistent characterisation.
I'd really, really like to see that version, it sounds so much more like a story than a collection of random stuff.
OTOH, "Zeus goes mad and other gods panic" is more complicated than what they show, but less complicated than the things you read into the final portrayal of Zeus. Apparently that is completely accidental, and they do want to just show Zeus redeemed, but if you think about you can read so much more into it if you want to: does Perseus grin and forgive Zeus because of Zeus' love for Perseus, despite Zeus never actually repenting of any of his tortures of mankind, other than failing to get away with it cleanly? Or does he just feel forced into it? There could have been an even more awesome story in there SOMEWHERE.
1. Reasonably dramatic action scenes
2. Many, many depictions of gods and monsters that were excellent at least some of the time.
3. Beautiful Andromeda is sacrificed to sea monster.
Bad things
1. For a film called Clash of the Titans, it had one fundamental mistake. THERE WEREN'T ANY TITANS! AND THEY DIDN'T CLASH! This was the first thing everyone said. (I don't know where the title of the original film came from: Was it an existing saying for a titanic struggle in general? Are Zeus and other Olympians called Titans as well by extension? The Titanomachy did get a brief mention in the setup, but along with all the main character's character development, it was over in seconds.)
Things a regular film watcher would consider very bad, but not everyone will care about
1. The plot was rather "meh". There were some interesting ideas (see below), but after that it was all "go here, do that, then so-and-so turns up", a collection of loosely linked scenes without enough connection.
2. The main character was really "meh". All the OTHER characters were interesting, but Perseus didn't look like a fisherman, and then didn't look like a hero, he looked like a footballer. He shouted, but never actually seemed emotionally energised, just like he was going "shout at gods, tick, shout at friends, tick"
3. All sorts of plot developments, such as they were, were carried with a few words of a cliche, rather than anything interesting. If it's the first film you've ever seen, the "do you love me less because I'm adopted?" scene could be touching. But if you've seen it before, you wish the characters would say something interesting, or show some charisma, or something.
4. None of the other Gods got to do anything at all. Poseiden didn't even appear!
5. The characters of the gods and some of the other figures were updated in interesting ways, but in other ways were projected onto modern cliches.
Things I thought were good, but expect everyone else to disagree about
1. The whole gods-vs-men idea. What happened after the titanomachy? Did Hades deserve to be imprisoned? Did Zeus really create mankind to be worshipped, was he justified? Were mankind's original complaints justified? Was Zeus fooled by Hades or trying to play both sides against each other? When Zeus helped Perseus, was it actually for Persues' sake, or did he figure that a Kraken defeated at the last minute with Zeus' help would get both terror AND love from the worshippers? Was he playing both sides against each other all along, or just trying to save his own neck, or what? Is he supposed to be forgiven for ravaging the world because of his love for Perseus, or are we to suppose he's not that bad after all? What would a passionate but inconsistent god like that actually be like?
I'm sure a lot of people will think this is just dumb, but somehow a bundle of inconsistent motivations managed (for me) to convey a background of conflicted emotion and ripe theology, and invite me not to criticise, but ask "ok, so how WOULD that work?"
2. As always, you can draw a Jesus metaphor if you try. (I honestly try to avoid doing this every time :)) But the difference here is that it doesn't JUST say "look, a messianic hero", it makes assertions about God himself which are non-trivial (although not accurate). For the record, it would have to be something like:
Zeus = God
Hades = Devil
Kraken = Death
Perseus = Jesus
Andromeda = Temple sacrificial lamb
Io = Holy Spirit
(And no, it's not accurate. If it were, it probably wouldn't be interesting :))
Edited to add: The version of the film that had all the missing plot in, that was then re-edited into this one, including cutting all the gods out!
http://chud.com/articles/articles/23299/1/BY-ZEUS-THE-VERSION-OF-CLASH-OF-THE-TITANS-YOU-DIDN039T-SEE/Page1.html (thanks to andrewducker for the link)
The other version of the film sounds smoother in so many ways, simply by the other gods and other soldiers on the quest having anything to do, as well as everyone having some sort of consistent characterisation.
I'd really, really like to see that version, it sounds so much more like a story than a collection of random stuff.
OTOH, "Zeus goes mad and other gods panic" is more complicated than what they show, but less complicated than the things you read into the final portrayal of Zeus. Apparently that is completely accidental, and they do want to just show Zeus redeemed, but if you think about you can read so much more into it if you want to: does Perseus grin and forgive Zeus because of Zeus' love for Perseus, despite Zeus never actually repenting of any of his tortures of mankind, other than failing to get away with it cleanly? Or does he just feel forced into it? There could have been an even more awesome story in there SOMEWHERE.
no subject
Date: 2010-04-21 10:57 pm (UTC)http://chud.com/articles/articles/23299/1/BY-ZEUS-THE-VERSION-OF-CLASH-OF-THE-TITANS-YOU-DIDN039T-SEE/Page1.html
no subject
Date: 2010-04-21 11:10 pm (UTC)The other version of the film sounds smoother in so many ways, simply by the other gods and other soldiers on the quest having anything to do, as well as everyone having some sort of consistent characterisation.
I'd really, really like to see that version, it sounds so much more like a story than a collection of random stuff.
OTOH, "Zeus goes mad and other gods panic" is more complicated than what they show, but less complicated than the things you read into the final portrayal of Zeus. Apparently that is completely accidental, and they do want to just show Zeus redeemed, but if you think about you can read so much more into it if you want to: does Perseus grin and forgive Zeus because of Zeus' love for Perseus, despite Zeus never actually repenting of any of his tortures of mankind, other than failing to get away with it cleanly? Or does he just feel forced into it? There could have been an even more awesome story in there SOMEWHERE.
no subject
Date: 2010-04-22 07:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-04-22 09:30 am (UTC)