Clash Of The Titans (2010) review

Despite boasting a cast that included Laurence Olivier, Claire Bloom and Maggie Smith, 1981’s Clash Of The Titans is something of a kitsch guilty pleasure, best remembered for Ray Harryhausen’s creature effects and Harry Hamlin (as Perseus) acting like a piece of wood in a toga. 2010’s version, as directed by Louis Leterrier (The Incredible Hulk), promised to be a more stylish, less sniggersome affair, and it’s certainly more macho as muscleman-du-jour Sam Worthington bears his biceps and rippling torso while battling lots of CGI monsters.

Raised by fisherman Spyros (Pete Postlethwaite, unintentionally hilarious), young Perseus (Worthington) doesn’t know he is the son of god Zeus (Neeson). After his family is killed by god of the underworld Hades (Fiennes, channelling his Lord Voldemort performance from the Harry Potter movies), Perseus soon discovers his lineage and thus reluctantly finds himself on an adventure with a group of soldiers, guided by Io (Gemma Arteton), to kill the monster Kraken before pretty Princess Andromeda (Alexa Davalos) is sacrificed to it. Or something. It’s all a lot of humourless male posturing and grunting, to be honest, mixed in with impressive special effects such as the flying horse Pegasus, the icky giant scorpions, and evil Medusa (who can turn a man to stone with just one look).

As is the current trend, it seems, this was filmed in 2-D but released in 3-D at cinemas, a bad decision as the reformatting looked, quite frankly, rubbish. It’s much better to watch this in good old 2-D at home, and while it’s nothing special, older kids who like Greek myths and a bit of blood and gore will probably enjoy it.