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The Argonauts take on dreadful monsters in Jason and the Argonauts. You gotta love it. |
Director: Don Chaffey
Cast: Todd Armstrong (Jason), Nancy Kovack (Medea), Gary
Raymond (Arcastus), Laurence Naismith (Argus), Niall MacGinnis (Zeus), Michael
Gwynn (Hermes), Douglas Wilmer (Pelias), Jack Gwillim (King Aeëtes), Honor
Blackman (Hera), John Cairney (Hylas), Patrick Troughton (Phineus), Nigel Green
(Hercules)
Watching this film it’s impossible not to get swept up in childish
glee. It’s one of the most gloriously entertaining, wonderfully imaginative and
brilliantly enjoyable films ever made. Watch this at the right age and it’s got
you for life. Its best remembered of course for its wonderful Ray Harryhausen
stop-motion effects – but to be honest the whole film is a brilliantly
assembled package from start to finish, full of thrills and spills. I love it,
I’ll always love it, and it’s got to be one of the best adventure stories ever
filmed. Not much point writing more is there? But I guess I will.
The plot hews fairly closely (give and take) to the
mythology. Pelias (Douglas Wilmer) seizes the Kingdom of Thessaly. Terrified of
a prophecy that says a child of King Aristo of Thessaly will take the throne
from him, he kills Aristo’s daughter at the temple of Hera (Honor Blackman).
Outraged, Hera becomes the protector of Aristo’s surviving son Jason (Todd
Armstrong), and 20 years later he returns. Jason needs to prove himself if he
is to re-take the throne, and decides to find the legendary Golden Fleece in
the distant land of Colchius. He builds the greatest ship ever – the Argus – and holds games to find the
finest crew in Greece. But danger awaits!
If any film is associated the most with Ray Harryhausen,
it’s this one. So it’s almost a shock to realise he didn’t direct it, and that
the monster moments are carefully placed only at key moments – and that a lot
of the rest of the film relies on human action. Jason and the Argonauts is so good because all these elements are
brilliantly put together and superbly staged, with an old-school, boys-own
adventurousness. How can you not enjoy this film?
The Harryhausen effects are astonishingly good, and their
stop-motion brilliance have a grounded reality to them. The staggering copper
monster Talos is fabulous – grinding joints, groaning weight and size. The
shrieking harpies that plague Patrick Troughton’s put-upon Phineas have an
unpleasant, grasping dirtiness to them. The Hydra guarding the fleece is a
rattlesnake-like vicious beast. All brilliant. I love them all – just sequences
to dream of.
But the highlight is of course the skeletons’ battle. Oh
wow. This sequence still holds up so well. It took Harryhausen years in the
making and planning, but really paid off. The skeletons are terrifying in their
cold-eyed ferocity. For skulls, Harryhausen gives their faces a lot of
expressiveness. I just love this sequence – it speaks to the child in all of
us. And there is something extra magical from knowing that the sequence was put
together frame-by-frame and the live action shots carefully choreographed to
match-up with it. Not for nothing did Tom Hanks namecheck this film when
presenting Harryhausen with an honorary Oscar.
These sequences really work though because the film has a
wonderful Sunday-morning-serial briskness to it. Pacily directed by Don
Chaffrey, the film motors so swiftly through its plot that you are surprised to
find it’s only about an hour and a half. Its story structure is not always
perfect: apart from Jason and Arcastus most of the rest of the Argonauts are so
briefly introduced (despite the recruitment Olympics montage at the start) you’ll
find them hard to tell apart. The arc of the story is often a little messy, and
iIn fact it’s easy to forget the film ends on a cliffhanger (the sequel was
never made) and that Douglas Wilmer’s sinister Pelias is totally forgotten
after the first half an hour. But it’s so well done it doesn’t matter.
But Chaffey keeps the events moving forward so well, the
tone so perfectly balanced between heroics, gods debating and thigh slapping
jokiness that the film’s tone and momentum never slackens, with the Harryhausen
monster sequences as exciting tent-poles in the film’s action. A lot of this
feeling is carried across from Bernard Herrmann’s excellent score, a hummable mixture
of bombast and slightly eerie mysticism that reflects and compliments the
action throughout.
The film is extremely well-made and put together. The Gods
as these gigantic figures living in Olympus (Jason is not a lot bigger than the
chess pieces they use to guide the wars of the humanity) are great fun: Niall
MacGinnis is a very 1960s idea of Zeus (the gods would be hot younger guys
today, not tubby Brits), but gives it a headmasterly briskness. Honor Blackman
is very good as a proud but caring Hera – the use of the Argus’ headpiece as
her voicepiece works really well. It’s quite something that all this
interference from the Gods never feels silly at all.
Todd Armstrong and Nancy Kovacks are, to be honest, pretty
wooden as the leads but that seems to be what the film needs. Armstrong does a
very neat line in middle-distance staring. Gary Raymond has a lot more fun as a
scheming Arcastus. The film also manages to shuffle some perceptions: Nigel
Green’s Hercules is more of a roisterer than the great warrior (and, with his
meat-headed over-confidence, causes more problem for the Argonauts than most).
Other performances are perfect adventure-story ham: Jack Gwillim chews the
scenery outrageously as King Aeëtes, which kind of matches up with the
overblown hyper-reality of the skeleton fight.
Talking about this film, it’s hard not to treat it as a
sequence of scenes that I really love. But every scene in it has something. I
love the moment where Hylas proves his worth via clever stone-skimming. The
approach to the clashing rocks – and the intervention of Poseidon to hold the
rocks apart – is brilliant. Hermes’ disguise being unveiled. Hercules doing
something decent by staying behind on an island to look for a missing Hylas.
All those brilliant Harryhausen sequences.
There is something about this film that is just endlessly
and constantly entertaining. No matter your age, it’s a film for every single
generation of children (young and old!) to enjoy. It’s simply marvellous, and
Chaffey and Harryhausen deliver it wonderfully. Every scene is exciting, the
pace never slackens, the special effects are brilliant. But on top of that,
it’s a brilliantly put together, well directed, beautifully scored film. It’s
exciting, it’s gripping, it’s wonderfully entertaining. I’m gutted they never
made that sequel (although since Jason and Medea’s story is literally all
down-hill from here, it’s probably just as well).
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