February 17, 2010 -- This is a film with a very low level of sophistication aimed at the child to lower teen audience. It may be adequate entertainment for its intended audience but is way below the level of storytelling that most older teens and adults should expect. It does have some comic elements, simple action scenes and some good special effects, but the story has been seriously dumbed down. Except for the big budget sets and effects, this is a lot like a lower-tier Disney film. It might serve as a rudimentary introduction to Greek mythology, if nothing else.

Percy Jackson (Logan Lerman of “Gamer”) seems like an ordinary teenager until one day he suddenly discovers one of his teachers is a deadly fury, another is a centaur, his best friend is a satyr and he is a demigod, the son of Poseidon, god of the seas. Other than that, just a normal day in the life of a teenager. Jackson is shipped off to a kind of demigod summer camp where he takes a crash course in sword fighting and how to use his demigod powers related to water. If you thought Hogwarts was a dangerous place, they hack each other with real swords in this camp! It would never pass any kind of safety inspection. The sword fights, by the way, look totally fake.

Percy soon finds out he has been framed for the theft of Zeus' favorite lightning bolt. In order to avoid massive death and destruction, he must find the missing lightning bolt and return it to Zeus in a few days to prevent a war of the gods. Instead of doing that, he decides to do something else entirely, but it works out O.K. in the end. This is another one of those fairy tales where a person is born to be a hero. He doesn't have to work at it. He doesn't need any training. He doesn't even have to be particularly bright. Heroism is his inheritance. It just happens, like inheriting the throne.

The actors are fairly good, with Pierce Brosnan (the one-time cool hero James Bond) trying hard, but failing, not to look silly as a centaur. Grover the satyr (played by Brandon T. Jackson of “Tooth Fairy”) is the comic relief, and he does his best to save this film. Alexandra Daddario of “The Babysitters”) plays it straight as the Xena-like warrior demigod Annabeth. Rosario Dawson of “Sin City” plays a smokin' hot Persephone who is bored living in hell, sort of like a desperate housewife. Steve Coogan (“Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian”) somehow finds a slyly funny way to play Hades. An awful lot of acting talent goes to waste in this film, but there is barely enough here to marginally satisfy the younger set, or the very easily satisfied. This film rates a C+ for them.

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Copyright © 2010 Robert Roten. All rights reserved.
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