My Dear Sir Yardley,
In spite of the dozen or so perfectly good reasons (all of them having to do with much neglected thesis pages) to ignore your request for me to see Clash of the Titans, I have foolishly yielded based on the following reasons:
1. I Love my sister (who persists in her silly, but genuine affection for you).
2. I thought it would amuse me.
3. You might finally cease your insistent queries (Have you seen it yet? Have you, have you, have you? But WHY NOT?).
As you assured me Sir Yardley, there were numerous reasons to hate this movie. However, I have neither the time nor the patience to discuss them all. Consequently, it is my intention to categorize and discuss the highlights of awful.
1) Unforgivable Misuse of Talent
a) I want to know what argument they used to convince the usually lovely Liam Neeson to take a role in this movie. “Okay…you’ll be playing Zeus. First, you’re gonna rape this woman, who will subsequently be killed by her jealous husband, but not before your infant bastard son (i.e. demi-god Perseus) is cast into the ocean, only to be found and adopted by a family of simple fishermen, who will later be killed by your brother Hades. Perseus will hate you, and eventually, and rather idiotically, declare war on you, because he will have miraculously deduced you are the one to blame for his family’s death, as well as the sea’s lack of fish. At the end of the movie, after Perseus saves you, banishes Hades, and has killed the enormous Kraken, you will give him a rousing speech about how it’s bad to be bad, and killing people is wrong. You will also assure him it was you who left the mysteriously anonymous gifts that ultimately enable him to trap Hades and nearly kill you. You will then bring back from the dead his five-minute, demigod girlfriend, whose name I can’t remember. After that, all will be forgiven. Trust me. You’re gonna love being in this movie!” Apparently, Mr. Neeson is not as smart as I thought he was.
b) If he’s not careful, the enormously talented and interesting Ralph Finnes is gonna get type casted as the oiliest bad guy in the history of film (please see his other work as Voldermort in the Harry Potter films and as the serial killer in the Hannibal Lector prequel, Red Dragon). His role as Hades made me shake my head with disappointment.
c) Sam Worthington is a likable actor, and I loved his work in Avatar. I think, however, he needs to take a break from action films. Terminator Salvation and Clash of the Titans just about killed me.
2) Idiotic Plot/Characters
a) Please see section a) of point # 1.
b) There were two heroines who have ten lines between them. Both nearly die hasty, melodramatic deaths. I can’t name either one of them.
c) There are at least half a dozen seemingly important supporting characters whose names were said once or not at all. As it usually is with this sort of script, they all die.
d) There’s still no explanation for the 300-year-old, neon blue-eyed, charcoal people or the random severed hand that turned into a 50 ft scorpion.
3) Terrible, Terrible FX
a) The effects for the cities looked awful.
b) The effects for Medusa were wretched.
c) Zeus’s body armor looked like something from The Neverending Story.
d) The flying daemon bats from the sea were cool, but you never get a clear picture of them.
4) Random quotes and thoughts that came to mind as I watched:
a) “We don’t have any fish. Let’s kill the Gods.”
b) Perseus’s only gift is the ability to get really pissed off. He’s a lame demigod.
c) The Kraken is apparently male, because Medusa can only kill men, and her head kills it.
d) “Shhh…be vewy quiet. We ah hunting Medusa.”
e) Marching in single file, through a lava pit, wearing nothing but a kilt seems like a bad idea.
f) Sam Worthington’s kilt is too high, and makes him look as if he’s wearing a skirt.
g) Everyone in this film has a different accent. There were three confirmed Brits, a dozen Americans with crap voice lessons, one Aussie, and one unconfirmed Canadian.
I hope you are satisfied, Sir Yardley, because I will never watch this movie again.
Until next we meet,
Becky
