Just what we need, a remake of Clash of the Titans
- 07 July 2008
- Gerard Wood
It's a well known and widely accepted fact that in the entire span of Ancient Greek history and mythology there are only about three stories worth telling and bringing to the big screen.
Isn't it? Why else would Warner Brothers be remaking 1981's Clash of the Titans?
In its day this was an enjoyable telling of the adventures of Perseus, son of the opportunistic (and insatiable) god Zeus by the mortal princess Danae. To cut a long story very short, the tale relates Perseus' adventures to defeat the Kraken and wed the princess Andromeda. With Medusa, the snake-haired Gorgon, Pegasus, the flying horse, more gods and goddesses than you can poke a stick at, and of course, the monstrous Kraken, this was ideal material for legendary special effects creator Ray Harryhausen. Harryhausen also produced the movie, which was the last to showcase the technique of stop motion animation that he had perfected over some thirty years, but which was soon eclipsed by computer generated special effects.
Warner Brothers' remake is due in 2010 and is being directed by Louis Leterrier, most recently responsible for The Incredible Hulk remake. If anything good can be said about this project it's that Lawrence Kasdan is responsible for the script. Kasdan, amongst many other things, is responsible for the script of Raiders of the Lost Ark and Return of the Jedi.
On second thoughts, maybe that's not good news...
There is only one question worth asking about this project: why, by all the numerous gods and goddesses of Classical Antiquity, would anyone bother remaking this movie? That's a rhetorical question of course, because we all know the reasons, but let's consider the remake for a moment. Three categories come to mind. There's:
-
The remake that aims to get it right this time around. This is rare, especially given 3 below. Dune arguably falls into this category.
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The pointless remake because the original was good enough. Escape from New York and Highlander definitely fall into this category.
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The pointless remake because while the original wasn't particularly good it's not worth getting right anyway. Clash of the Titans... Say no more.
Actually, there's a fourth category that Clash of the Titans (and almost every other remake) also falls into: -
The pointless remake because there are many other stories to bring to the big screen so why waste any creative energy and other resources remaking it!
So, here's just one idea for you unimaginative scrapers of the bottom of the barrel: why not pick up where Wolfgang Petersen's Troy leaves off and continue Homer's epic of the Iliad? We've already got a convincing Odysseus with Sean Bean and Homer has done most of the work for you already.
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