Clash of the Titans -remake

[John in Covina]

I enjoyed the original with all the Harryhausen stop action animation and the trailer clips for this version looks like it will be a really well made project. I have high hopes for this version.

I wonder if they will redo Jason and the Argonauts?

Stop action has a special charm to it but the CGI stuff is getting to be eye-popping magic.

 

[Yeps]

Honestly, I think it looks great. I expect it to be every bit as cheesy and awful as the original, but with shiny new effects, which will be great.

 

[Lady Day]

The original was perfection, watch it every year. Pioneering stop motion, bad acting AND action! What could be improved on!?

LD

 

[dhermann1]

Bad acting! Hokey, maybe, but really. You start with Lord Larry Olivier, add Claire Bloom, Maggie Smith, Burgess Meredith, Flora Robson, Sian Phillips, Tim Piggott-Smith. An astounding cast. It's not just the great animation that made this film a legend.

 

[Feraud]

I always enjoy classic stop motion films and the original Clash is cool.
My son wants to see the new version so we will catch it in 3D.

 

[Lady Day]

Bad acting! Hokey, maybe, but really. You start with Lord Larry Olivier, add Claire Bloom, Maggie Smith, Burgess Meredith, Flora Robson, Sian Phillips, Tim Piggott-Smith. An astounding cast. It's not just the great animation that made this film a legend.

You're right.

LD

 

[Doctor Strange]

Again, with my being a bit older (seeing Jason and the Argonauts theatrically when I was 8 was the really significant event for me!), I was underwhelmed with the original Clash. Yes, Harryhausen's work was fantastic, but everything else about the film grated, from the wasted big-star cameos on Olympus, Burgess Meredith doing his whole Rocky mentor thing in Ancient Greek drag, that idiotic R2D2-inspired owl, the terrible matching of the actor and stop-motion models playing Calibos, the lame lead performances...

Understand: to a longtime Harryhausen fan, it was a very important event - finally, a big-budget film! - but the film itself was largely disappointing. What wasn't disappointing was visiting the NY Museum of Modern Art's Harryhausen retrospective celebrating his career when the film was opening: seeing many of his classic models "in person" was thrilling!

As for the new film, I have zero interest in seeing it. Another CGI crapfest: maybe I'll catch on cable eventually.

And John, of course they're going to remake Jason and the Argonauts: just get used to it, everything is going to be remade multiple times. That's the entertainment biz these days! (Jason was actually already remade as a TV film by the SyFy Channel a few years ago - and it was nowhere near as awful as that usually portends!)

 

[Feraud]

What wasn't disappointing was visiting the NY Museum of Modern Art's Harryhausen retrospective celebrating his career when the film was opening: seeing many of his classic models "in person" was thrilling!

That sounds amazing! :eusa_clap

 

[Doctor Strange]

It was very cool. Other outstanding movie-related stuff I was lucky enough to attend in NYC in the 70s/80s included:

A big Warner Bros cartoon retrospective at MOMA - I went to a couple of events, including a great Chuck Jones retrospective with the man himself.

A James Bond film retrospective, also at MOMA - I attended a very cool presentation by Maurice Binder about how he created those amazing opening-title sequences.

A traveling Hollywood exhibit at the Cooper-Hewett Museum with all kinds of astounding props, costumes, etc. Highlights included Sam's piano from Casablanca, the Yoda puppet from the Star Wars films, the Emerald City matte painting, one of those neon violins from the Busby Berkeley musicals, and the golden calf from the 1956 Ten Commandments (it was awe-inspiring: I wanted to get down on my knees and worship it!)

And of course, I saw lots of great retrospectives and premieres in those days. As I've said here before, seeing Raiders of the Lost Ark on opening day at Loew's Astor Plaza was an incredible experience, because - very much unlike nowadays - nothing had been leaked beforehand, all we knew as it was Lucas-Spielberg production in the spirit of the old 30s/40s serials and that it starred that Han Solo guy: seeing it with a psyched, packed house who were thrilled and surprised at every plot point was outstanding!

 

[Panache]

While not in the same league his Jason and the Argonauts, Harryhaussen's Clash of the Titans had a mythic quality to it. By this I mean to say that one felt they stepped into the pages of a legendary story. Neither attempted to be gritty or "real". The films started and you suspended your disbelief to enter a world of Gods, Monsters, and Heroes.

While neither is perfectly true to the myths, they do give one a great sense of wonder and you remember the feeling of reading those tales for the first time as a kid.

CG is great and all, but Harryhaussen's stop motion creatures and the life he gave them were magic.

Cheers

Jamie

 

[John in Covina]

I had forgotten that there is a 3d version, I haven't seen any of the recent 3d releases so maybe Clash will be the one.

I alwas snicker when in the first movie when we hear the shield in Zeus's "whiny baby" voice saying "No, Me First!"

 

[Hondo]

Heres my two cents worth, the originals, Jason and the Argonauts, Clash of the Titans were made for childrens audiences, lets remember that. I am also one who saw these in the theater as a kid, I enjoyed the stop motion allot better than any CGI stuff, it just gets tiring. The originals may seem corny, cheesy but it was made for children, do you see any blood or guts spilled?
Shoot I love cheesy films lol

 

[John in Covina]

I also find some special effects annoying such as in the Alien Versus Predator films where the action is so fast I can't tell what's happening.

Sometimes they make these films to be more like video games and that tends to lose my interest too.

 

[Feraud]

Heres my two cents worth, the originals, Jason and the Argonauts, Clash of the Titans were made for childrens audiences, lets remember that.

Were they really made for children? I never got that impression. [huh]

 

[John in Covina]

Maybe more on two levels like the Bugs Bunny cartoons of old. Stuff the kids would laugh at and stuff only the adults got.

 

[Doctor Strange]

Were they really made for children? I never got that impression. [huh]

If you've rewatched Jason recently, you'll see that it's actually written on a far more mature level than a lot of today's movies.

 

[Atomic Age]

I had forgotten that there is a 3d version, I haven't seen any of the recent 3d releases so maybe Clash will be the one.

I alwas snicker when in the first movie when we hear the shield in Zeus's "whiny baby" voice saying "No, Me First!"

The new Clash of the Titans is not a true 3D movie. It was not filmed with 3D cameras. Like most 3D films in this particular 3D fad, it was processed in a computer after the fact to get the 3D effect. Right now the only true 3D film in release is Avatar.

Doug

 

[Feraud]

Actually Doc I watched Jason and Clash recently and that is why I replied the way I did. I didn't get the impression they were made for children.
Of course, I could be dead wrong in my impression of who these films were intended for when released.

 

[Chainsaw]

Watched the old Clash of the Titans the other day. It's a classic. Grew up watching it on channel nine when I was a kid. I don't want to see the new Clash, I think it will just ruin the old one for me.

All the Warner Brother shorts were made to go along with the news reels, before telivison was popular. Everyone would go down to the theatre, to get their fill of news, and Cartoons for levity. I have some awesome WWII American WB propaganda shorts.

You guys would probably love. Buy war bonds, Sgt Snafu (training cartoons for the army made by WB) The fighting Filipinos, ( American propaganda for Support for the war in the islands).

The best one has to be Bugs bunny ...... Bugs bunny takes on the whole Japanese army, from Sumos, to Karatakas, et-cetera.

The new movies, with all the special effects seem so hollow, and meaningless.

 

[Hondo]

When I went to Saturday matinee to see films like Hercules, The 300 Spartans
Jason and the Argonauts, and Clash of the Titans there were mostly children in audiences, and if you go to most reviews of Jason and the Argonauts (I think)
they say "children will enjoy" this movie, I never saw many adults in theaters.
We all enjoyed the action scenes, well you know us kids