Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief

My family went to see the movie "Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief" today. All of us have read the books and are big fans. I do think it's interesting the comments made about how this movie is a ripoff from Harry Potter. If you actually read the book, the movie was nothing like it. I'd say it wasn't a bad way to spend a few hours. My family liked it, at no time was I wondering how long we'd been in the theatre. But where the book was great, the movie lacked...a lot.

CGI was awesome. Medusa & her snakes were amazing.

If you can avoid paying full price (where we live you can see movies on the weekends for $5 per person before noon), you won't feel like you were short-changed with this one.

I recently read the book series (out of boredom), so I saw this film today with my friend. Firstly, it is quite different from the book. A major part of the storyline was completely left out (or even discarded), some parts were removed, and random parts added that did nothing for the storyline whatsoever. The beginning of the movie felt rather rushed, and hearing the 'whhaat?' from my friend confirmed the fact that they don't really explain things much in the first place. Anyone who might've recently studied Greek mythology or like to read about it as a general interest..it might make more sense to. Otherwise, it would seem a little random.

I'm never impressed when movies make changes from the books that don't greatly benefit the storyline. Unfortunately this was the case, with several things being completely different. But, if you've not read the books, you won't know any better. Still, I think keeping with the original storyline would've been fine, and definitely wouldn't have made the movie longer if done properly.

I honestly thought the acting was excellent from all of them, and there are quite a few laughs along the way.

I'm giving this a 6. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad either. It should've been better. I doubt they'll continue to make the other books into movies, much like they've completely botched the movie versions of my favourite books (His Dark Materials), but considering a major part of the plot was removed, it doesn't really matter much.

I guess you know the drill already. With the Lord of the Rings making Hollywood studios go into a frenzy in adapting the many fantasy books out there, not everything Tinseltown touched turned to box office gold, and more often than not, save for that famous boy wizard, what could have been pilots of franchises, became no more than false starts. I suppose it goes to show that a solid story is still fundamental, other than making yet another special effects extravaganza to try and wow a growingly jaded audience.

So the verdict for Percy Jackson & the Olympians? I dare say I was impressed by how engaging it was, so much so that 2 hours just flew by, but that doesn't mean that it didn't have its fair share of plot loopholes for you to ridicule, or clichés that make you chuckle that these are still utilized in this day and age. Simply put, if the Greek gods and goddesses were all powerful, especially that of Zeus, well the first few minutes as played by Sean Bean, made him out to be a clueless weakling who had his all powerful lightning bolt being stolen from under his nose, like taking candy from a kid, and now the kid's throwing a bad tantrum, threatening the fate of the world and that of Olympus (erm, the Empire State Building in New York, anyone?) unless his accused, the titular thief and demigod son of Poseidon (Kevin McKidd) coughs out his favourite toy.

But that is only if Percy Jackson (Logan Lerman) is guilty in the first place, given that he actually doesn't know his half-god lineage no thanks to Poseidon being horny enough (as do the other gods in their frequent visits to the human earth) to impregnate Sally Jackson (Catherine Keener), and then Sally deciding to keep Percy safe from jealous harm from other godly beings, because being the son of Zeus, Poseidon and Hades (Steve Coogan) is a big thing actually, the three being big daddies and sworn brothers in this mythology.

But of course in one fell swoop, all hell breaks loose, Percy discovers that a Pen can indeed be a powerful weapon, and allies himself with a Satyr Grover (Brandon T. Jackson) his good friend and protector, the cute demigod Annabeth (Alexandra Daddario) - note the necessary trio of heroes in the vein of Harry Potter here given that they're demigods, but still need to go to a Hogwarts equivalent to hone their special abilities, amongst other Greek god offsprings numbering in the hundreds (told you they were horny), in the middle of a nowhere forest, demarcated by a sign board and a force field to keep out muggles, I mean, humans.

Being an introductory film to the world of the Olympians, we learn facts like why Percy's such a big deal (no he didn't repel the biggest foe in the franchise), and the little do's and don'ts they have to learn from the likes of the centaur Chiron (Pierce Brosnan). But kids being kids, and wanting to save his mom from the clutches of Hell, Percy and his friends embark on an American cross country road trip, and in the meantime try to decipher just who could that Thief be, having 14 days as the deadline to meet, which forms the basis of incidents and episodes that the trio come face to face with in exhibiting their powers (well, actually only Percy's).

Part of the fun is to see how other notable names in the casting list get to play up their gods and demon status. Uma Thurman stars as Medusa, spruced up by special effects snakes adorned on her head, which at certain points looked quite CG-ed for its own good. Or having Rosario Dawson star as Persephone in quite fed-up manner, and the lists goes on. Suffice to say that many of the appearances here are quite self contained in the scene they appear in, that they rarely re-appear again until the sequel (already announced for next year). Joe Pantoliano hams it up as Percy's muggle, I mean human step dad, and I was somewhat impressed by the extremely mean looking CG design of Hades, which can really strike fear with his appearance. The one that came out in the bonfire, that is.

With Clash of the Titans coming just round the corner, one wonders whether it may suffer from an audience jaded with this version's interpretation of Greek mythology, plus the uncanny use of the same villainous types that would prove detrimental by the time Titans come around. I guess that remains to be seen. Meanwhile, stay tuned when the end credits start rolling, as there's a scene that'll come on as soon as the cast list rolls off. And I certainly have no clue why "The Olympians" were dropped from the title of its release here.

The premise of this movie - that Greek gods were real and have offspring in the modern world - is interesting. But the execution of this idea felt very rushed in this movie. I haven't read the book, so can't judge where the blame lies for this.

The movie is an enjoyable way to kill a couple of hours, but isn't as engrossing as other movies of this genre.

Several big stars feature in cameo roles and for anyone who knows a fair bit about who celebrities are, this tends to distract from the movie. Uma Thurman, Brosnan, etc., aren't really given the screen time to build a strong character for themselves. Perhaps the best of these is Steve Coogan playing Hades, but even here you send most of his screen time thinking "oh look, it's Steve Coogan" rather than being drawn into the movie. It could have benefited from having the minor roles played by less known actors - as it is, their appearances tend to detract from the main characters who actually do a good job with the material they have been given.

But these are minor concerns - the biggest problem with this movie is that Percy finds out he's a demigod and suddenly seems to develop gifts with no effort or training, just by virtue of knowing his past. At the start of the movie, he already demonstrated an exceptional ability to remain underwater for long periods of time. But after finding out he's a demigod, he develops strong sword fighting skills with no training or effort (the start of the fight between the red helmets and the blue helmets, before the water "thing"), and later is capable of manipulating water in a couple of scenes without being taught this skill or having any difficulty or doubts about his ability to do it. This is just preposterous. The mythical/other worldly framework is generally used to provide a context to display human failings, struggles, and virtues. Instead, in Percy Jackson, this framework is used to simply give the lead character a loose justification for overcoming other mythical creatures. He doesn't have to question how to use his powers, nor does he have to put any effort into developing these powers.

Like I say, the movie isn't so bad as to make it unwatchable, but they really missed a chance to make this movie have a strong impact by failing to give it any depth. It is all just the bells and whistles of CGI and having mythological creatures just to have some interesting looking battles and a trip to the underworld. It could have been so much more. Whether this is a failing of the movie, the books, or both, is up to those who have read the books to decide. But the movie reeks of jumping on the Harry Potter bandwagon in an attempt to get box- office success, while ignoring the fact that those movies were built on books that had some depth to them. That is what gave them their cultural poignancy. This movie lacks it completely.

I went to see this movie without any expectations. I haven't read the books and I only read one review in the paper.

Yes, there are parts borrowed from other movies, but what makes this movie different is that it doesn't take itself too seriously, like Harry P. It was as if most of the actors were instructed to 'Ham it up'.

I didn't look at my watch during the movie (two hours), which is a good sign that I am enjoying going along for the ride.

What I didn't like was that most of the mythology was missing. Like it was assumed knowledge. All it did was not allow me to connect to the main characters because I didn't know enough about them (from the film).

The music wasn't overbearing, but went nicely with the film. Nothing memorable except "Highway to Hell".

S/Fx were done to an acceptable level, especially Hades (the place not the God). But the Gods were too human for my liking.

Maybe the producers are hoping this film will fill in the void being left by Harry P. The hero in this movie looks about the same age as Harry in his last film.

I don't think it is a repeat watch (DVD).