Clash Of The Titans (1981)

When it comes to mythology, there's a lot of leeway to be had - what with the gods walking down among men every so often, their children's destinies, the fact that any mythical creature can wreak havoc wherever and you can chalk it up to "divine providence" or whatever. Who had time to write down all of it?

Movies had a field day with such concepts and there have been loads of examples that deal with Roman, Greek, Norse and other-such mythologies, all of them brimming with adventure, excitement, gigantic monsters lumbering around and the ever-present "Will of the Gods".

1963's Jason and the Argonauts was a good example of this. So were 1956's Helen of Troy, 1961's Ursus, 1959's Black Orpheus, 1962's The Three Stooges Meet Hercules and our subject for today which, though a latter-day entry in the ancient mythology sweepstakes, still did its best to be true to its school - in a manner of speaking.

In 1981, a $15 million throwback called Clash of the Titans was unleashed to theaters with the promise of large-scale action, chaos, destruction, all manner of mythical beast you may recall from your school days - and a few conventions that only the Eighties would bring with it, with a nicely-played throwback in the midst of it all. Round it all off with some of the biggest stars ever and there you have it...of course, when it comes to the gods, you have to aim high. But we'll get to all that.

For now: plot - Perseus (Harry Hamlin) is the favored son of the god Zeus (Sir Laurence Olivier), but he has unwittingly angered sea goddess Thetis (Maggie Smith) by fighting and injuring her beast-like son Calibos (Neil McCarthy). Perseus has also fallen in love with the lovely Princess Andromeda (Judi Bowker), who was once engaged to Calibos before being cursed by Zeus. In the meantime Perseus proves his worth by taming the wild flying horse Pegasus, confronting the Stygian Witches, fighting the two-headed dog beast Dioskilos (rather than the three-headed Cerberus we all know and love), battling against Medusa for her head, defeating the sea-going beast known as the Kraken (a Scandinavian beast, but anyway...), all to save Greece, the day and the life of his beloved.

Right there we have a good, solid plot that will touch many points we all know and expect: familiar mythological characters, long treks, fulfillment of destiny, huge beasts and the gods getting involved whenever they darned well feel like it.

It also doesn't hurt that we have goddesses like Ursula Andress playing Aphrodite, Claire Bloom as Hera and Susan Fleetwood as Athena. Mmmm... goddesses....

Director Desmond Davis (whose portfolio contains mostly TV movies but also films like Smashing Time, Ordeal by Innocence and Girl with Green Eyes) directs with clarity and brightness with a good feel for the script by Beverley Cross - who has fittingly written Jason and the Argonauts, The Long Ships and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger - and while it feels like we're breezing through the Cliff's Notes version of Greek mythology, there's a reason for that.

Modern audiences expect action, effects and peril every five minutes lest they get bored. That all comes to play here in imagery crisp and sharp enough to befit a 1950s epic and action enough to keep the discriminating Eighties youth or mythology fan glued to the screen.

It helps to have a good cast - and Hamlin playing the young heroic Perseus of the title does his mop-headed best to keep his jaw square, voice firm and action resolute as he keeps up with the turns of the script.

Burgess Meredith also appears as a poet/actor Ammon who becomes the sidekick to this son of the gods and every so often voices his frustration with youth today (or in Ancient Greece) and perhaps keeps an ear open as to how he can make a quick play out of all this.

The Gods have an easier time of it. Olivier is...well, Olivier in a white robe and booming voice, commanding all from a seated position or strolling around a white marble Mount Olympus to manipulate and command as only Olivier/Zeus could. No secret that he took whatever work he could get in his later years and even though it would only be the following year he would appear as the God-like General MacArthur in war epic/Sun Myung-Moon tax dodge Inchon!, Olivier at least bothers to act and orate.

Maggie Smith kind of plays the heavy as Thetis, who connives and demands sacrifice to appease her injured pride and the fate of her prideful son Calibos. Haughty and hateful, Smith is sinister but also has a lot of good scenes, even if some are played as a statue. At the time, she was married to the screenwriter (yes, Beverley is a man's name in this case - go figure), so small wonder she got the meaty role. Not like she could be Zeus....

As Calibos, McCarthy is seething, nasty, cruel and vile as a half-man, mostly-monster whose vanity and outward cruelty manifest themselves in such a way that he becomes as vile on the outside as he is inside. McCarthy's voice also suggests what a villain should sound like: prideful and almighty. He also has what could kindly be called the hardest role in all of Clash, since he is hidden under mounds of makeup and, in long shots, is represented only as a stop-motion figure.

That's not really as cheap as it sounds, since the stop-motion in this film is headed by none other than...

...wait for it...

Ray Harryhausen!

Yes, the man responsible for the award-wining effects in such classic films as 20 Million Miles to Earth, The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, Gulliver's Travels, Mysterious Island and - surprise! - Jason and the Argonauts also helmed the effects here. It all falls in place quite nicely, especially in scenes where Perseus tries to capture and ride Pegasus, giant scorpions attack our heroes, Medusa stalks and stares into stone many a victim, the Kraken rises from the sea and terrorizes and - in a bow to that Eighties convention that all huge movies must acknowledge at least one Star Wars-based contrivance - a mechanical own named Bubo is forged and created on Olympus to accompany Perseus with clicks, and chirping hoots as it flits and flies about, acting like a beaked R2-D2 most often. He's kind of a nuisance but hey, he's a nuisance created by the legendary Ray Harryhausen, folks ...so we can let that one slip by.

While a lot is taken for granted in this movie, it should be noted that ALL movies that deal with Mythology of any kind take things for granted. It's as if the makers know that maybe a scholar or two is going to catch their flick but hey, it's called artistic license, people! In the end, all that matters is that people are entertained. Right? Whoever said that accuracy is entertaining?

Not Michael Cimino, that's for darned sure.

In the end, Clash of the Titans earned $41 million, cementing its success as a solid latter-day mythology film par excellence and creating a legend that even insisted a remake was in the offing. I haven't seen that remake, though; I understand it's good, but you have your mythology, and I'll have mine, thank you very much.

I really enjoyed Clash of the Titans and, old school or not, I think you will too. It's a movie that knows how to tell its story, how to populate it with characters that are worth investing time in and, more than anything, reminding us that mythology is pretty cool.

Especially when it incorporates mechanical owls and Ursula Andress.