Clash of the Titans (1981) Laurence Olivier, Claire Bloom, Maggie Smith, Ursula Andress Movie Review

Clash of the Titans (1981)   3/53/53/53/53/5


Clash of the Titans (1981)

Clash of the Acting

Perseus, the favoured son of the god Zeus, has fallen for Andromeda, trouble is Andromeda use to be engaged to the son of sea goddess Thetis who already had issues with Perseus. In order for Perseus to marry Andromeda and be able to fulfil his destiny he must go on a series of quests which include capturing Medusa and taming Pegasus.

"Clash of the Titans" is what I call a Good, Bad and Ugly movie although in truth that ugly is seriously down to what you think of old special effects. So let me start with the ugly and I say that because I know many a modern audience who has watched this 1981 version of "Clash of the Titans" have laughed at the special effects. In truth whilst of course they often look less than convincing there is something quite beautiful about the work of Ray Harryhausen and you have to admire the work which went in to producing just a single second of footage when it comes to Medusa.

Next is the Good and in a way it goes in hand with the visual effects as "Clash of the Titans" is a beautiful movie with some impressive sets and good location shots. Throw in some nice costumes and frankly a good looking cast and "Clash of the Titans" is certainly not an ugly movie.

But for me there is the bad and the acting is bad, at times laughably bad and frankly from Harry Hamlin attempts at doing theatrically heroic to Laurence Olivier really over doing the delivery it just makes it hard work. The reason being is that the acting is so inconsistent that it foes flick from being impressive and epic to laughable within the blink of an eye.

What this all boils down to is that "Clash of the Titans" is one of those movies which I can appreciate technically especially considering when it was made. But as a piece of entertainment it constantly let me wanting due to it being inconsistent.


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