Film Review: The Lightning Thief

The Lightning Thief is a film that's at odd with itself. The book series it's based on is one of the funniest ever. I am one of the biggest fans of the series, owning all the books and anticipating the movie. The cast seemed to be in place..so what went wrong?

The story is that Percy Jackson has never fit in..until he learns he's the son of Poseidon. He soon goes to a camp for Half-Bloods (sons of god and humans). Along with his friends Grover and Annabeth, he has to get a precious God artifact and Percy's mom.

The trouble with the film is that the books mainly took place in Percy's mind, so humorous comparisions and descriptions would come. Percy and his pals were also younger and funnier. The film just never wnats to be what the book was: a comedic/action book. The film just wants to be an action pic.

The gigantic amount of things cut from the book is daunting. Among the most disturbing things cut are Krono's (the books main villain) and The Prophecy which would become the main thread of the books. The fact that this and important characters like Ares were cut makes me think sequels would only get worse.

Although casting was terrific, the film has bad visuals and too much cutting. I suppose it's fine for the casual film fan, for a fan of the books though it's an abomination.

Rating: 6.0 out of 10 or C
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Chris Columbus Spills on Future Projects

Admit it, folks. Chris Columbus ain't chopped liver in Hollywood. He's directed Mrs. Doubtfire, the first two Harry Potter films, the upcoming Lightning Thief movies and wrote Goonies and the Gremlins. The following is an interview that was just taken with him:

Over the years, there's been lots of talk about doing remakes and/or sequels to some of Columbus' earlier work, the most recent one being a rumor that there were plans of doing a 3D remake of Gremlins. When ComingSoon.net spoke to Columbus at the junket for his new movie Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief, he admitted that so far, neither he nor the original film's producer Steven Spielberg had been contacted about it.

"I spoke to Steven Spielberg a couple days ago and said, 'You know, I've been reading on the internet about this 'Gremlins 3D' and no one's approached him either, so I don't know if that's really true," Columbus told us.

That doesn't mean he's completely ruling out doing some sort of sequel or update. "It would be fun to go back and revisit (them). Something like 'Gremlins,' which is a movie I really like, I think it's impossible to recreate in a CGI environment. I think it will inevitably lose some of its charm. Those are edgy Muppets in a sense and you don't want to lose that sense of anarchy that those gremlins had, because behind the scenes are 25 puppeteers making them to come to life."

"'Goonies' would have to be the Goonies on their own as parents and their children doing something," he continued. "But as Steven said, 'How can you really be going underground finding another gigantic pirate ship filled with treasure? What can be the next adventure?'"

What about a sequel to Mrs. Doubtfire, his hit cross-dressing comedy starring Robin Williams? "'Mrs. Doubtfire' is an interesting idea for a sequel because it's the one time in film history where you can revisit the character and they'll be the same age 15 years later. Because of the make-up, people can see Mrs. Doubtfire again and nothing has changed about her, which I think is kind of interesting."

Columbus also mentioned he's still in touch with Spielberg regularly and the two of them have been talking about producing a movie together, although it's not likely to be a sequel to one of the movies above.

Interesting. I don't know about a Mrs. Doubtfire 2, but I like a 3D puppets Gremlin movie.

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Casting of The Man

Spider-Man that is. The Spider-Man reboot fiasco continues, as two people have been discussed to play Peter Parker. First up is Logan Lerman. This kid will play Percy Jackson in The Lightning Thief film and has had some early talks. He said he's "a fan of the series...I'd love to focus on the human elements of it". He might do well. At least better than the 2nd option.

That second option is Zac Efron. This is one that seems to have momentum as several outlets have reported it. It seems Tobey Maguire has given Zac his blessing and Zac really wnats to do it.

I guess this casting could be put in a book called "How To Kill Your Franchise"

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