I know I'm biased because I loved this as a kid but for me this has such magic about it. It helps that producer Schneer got top British actors to play the Greek Gods, as well as Burgess Meredith in the Obi Wan role. Harry Hamlin and Judi Bowker are engaging leads - he's handsome and polished and should have done more of this stuff. Bowker is pretty; she doesn't get too much to do except stare either vacantly or wistfully but she has a look perfect for the part.
There's a surprisingly amount of nudity - Perseus' mother breast feeds him and walks nude along the beach. Judy Bowker's bare bum coming out of the bath.
The momentum suffers in the middle when Hamlin and Bowker get engaged, but it recovers for a tremendous second half which has some amazing action sequences - particularly the raid on Medusa's lair. Then this it followed by more exciting battles including taking on Calibos and scorpions and a race against time to stop a sacrifice.
There's so much good stuff - the mechanical owl (much whinged about but I liked), the depth of characterisations (the villains - Maggie Smith and Calibos - have complex, three dimensional motivations), the all too human Gods, a magical sword and helmet, "release the Kracken" (I did think about people taking a shit when this was mentioned), giant vultures,the three witches, Medusa's two headed dogs, the Kraken (actually he's a little too much like Godzilla).
It's a very strong script with a marvellous sense of adventure. No wonder people love Harryhausen seeing this again took me back to childhood.
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