Grapes of Death



Color, 1981, 117 mins. 58 secs.
Directed by Desmond Davis
Starring Harry Hamlin, Judy Bowler, Laurence Olivier, Maggie Smith, Burgess Meredith, Claire Bloom, Neil McCarthy, Siân Phillips, Ursula Andress, Pat Roach, Susan Fleetwood, Jack Gwillim, Tim Pigott-Smith
Arrow Video (UHD & Blu-ray) (US R0/RA 4K/HD) / WS (1.85:1) (16:9), Warner Bros. (Blu-ray & DVD) (Worldwide HD/NTSC/PAL) / WS (1.78:1) (16:9)


When the last film in Clash of the TitansRay Harryhausen's trilogy of Sinbad films was released in 1977, major change was in the air Clash of the Titanswith Star Wars cleaning up at the box office and the '80s sword and sorcery boom just on the horizon. In a logical move, Harryhausen returned for one last hurrah on the big screen with Clash of the Titans, a spiritual companion of sorts to his prior Greek mythology classic, Jason and the Argonauts, here boasting a wild cast and a return to the larger-than-life monsters that had made the stop-motion wizard's reputation in the first place. After going through multiple studio hands since 1978, the result was a box office hit in theaters and an enduring favorite on cable TV for years, with generally positive reviews as well apart from grumbling about the R2-D2-style comic relief with Bubo the mechanical owl. Pushing the PG rating about as far as it could go with relatively minor nudity and violence, the film went on to cement its place in pop culture history as a Gen X favorite, a source of reliable quotes (especially "Let loose the Kraken"), and the inspiration for a truly rancid 2010 3-D remake and a 2012 sequel.

After his father, the King of Argos, is stuck down by the gods along with his entire kingdom, Perseus (Hamlin) grows up in exile with his mother and becomes involved in the petty deities' games of retribution. His father Zeus (Olivier), married to the disapproving Clash of the TitansHera (Bloom), does what he can to aid his son who is targeted by the spiteful Thetis (Smith) when her own son, Calibos (McCarthy), is transformed into a monster for his numerous Clash of the Titanstransgressions. Thetis moves Perseus in his sleep to an amphitheater far away in Joppa where he becomes allied with quirky actor and poet Ammon (Meredith) and soldier Thallo (Pigott-Smith). Together they tackle the mystery of the Princess Andromeda (Bowker) whose queen mother, Cassiopeia (Phillips), oversees the wooing of suitors who get burned alive if they can't solve an ever-changing riddle offering by the princess. Aided by a number of gifts from the gods, Perseus sneaks into Andromeda's chamber and learns that her former betrothed, Calibos, now lives in a swamp and gives her the seemingly unsolvable riddles, something our hero puts to an end by offering an answer linked to Calibos' now-severed hand. An enraged Thetis declares that Andromeda must be sacrificed within a month to the Kraken, a sea titan kept imprisoned under the control of Poseidon (Gwillim), setting Perseus and his companions on a dangerous quest to save her life.

Epic in scope and featuring a great, thunderous score by Laurence Rosenthal, Clash of the Titans is a fine showcase for Harryhausen's skills for the '80s generation, enough to even inspire a matinee reissue of Jason and the Argonauts around the same time. All of the actors get in the right spirit with Olivier and Smith getting the juiciest material among the head-butting, mass-murdering gods, but it's the creatures who steal the show here including Calibos, the Kraken, the winged Pegasus, giant scorpions, and best of all, the gorgon Medusa in one of the most suspenseful, stylish sequences in stop-motion history. As with most of Harryhausen's prior films, this was shot flat and had some obvious visual limitations during the Clash of the Titansanimation sequences due to the opticals involved which increased film grain and impacted the clarity of the image. However, it fared well enough on the small screen through its many incarnations including broadcast, VHS, and letterboxed laserdisc and DVD options, with Clash of the Titansan eventual Blu-ray in 2010 with English DTS-HD MA 2.0 stereo audio (plus Dolby Digital French, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, German, or Italian) with English SDH, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, German, Dutch, Italian, Czech, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, Thai, or Finnish subtitles. Extras created for the DVD include "A Conversation with Ray Harryhausen" (12m14s), about his initial exposure to fantastic films and his approach to making monsters set in the past, and a "Myths and Monsters" Harryhausen interview collection for "Calibos" (1m20s), "Pegasus" (1m22s), "Bubo" (48s), "The Scorpions" (41s), "Medusa" (1m53s), "The Kraken" (1m29s), and "Dioskilos" (1m7s).

In 2026, Arrow Video finally gave the film the expanded edition it needed for ages with a two-disc edition available as a UHD (with HDR-compatible Dolby Vision) and special features Blu-ray or double Blu-ray set. The new 4K restoration from the negative is a very obvious improvement across the board, with much deeper blacks, richer colors, finer detail, you name it. The framing adjusts back to the original theatrical 1.85:1 here versus the opened-up 1.78:1 on the earlier Blu-ray, though it doesn't affect compositions much one way or the other. In addition to the usual DTS-HD MA 2.0 stereo track, you get a very boisterous Dolby Atmos option that has fun pushing some key sound effects above you like crashing thunder and Smith's voice during the big temple scene. Optional English SDH subtitles are also included, and the film can be played with a 1981 Harryhausen audio interview at the BFI covering his entire output but focusing largely on this film including his annoyance with critics unfamiliar with Greek mythology. Clash of the TitansHe also goes into his earlier films to varying degrees, such as hollowing out real dead crabs for Mysterious Island. Also Clash of the Titansincluded as a fourth audio option with the film is a 1970 BFI interview with Harryhausen and longtime producer Charles H. Schneer about their collaborations to that point starting with It Came from Beneath the Sea and their first Sinbad hit and up to their most recent film, The Valley of Gwangi, which hadn't hit British theaters yet.

The video extras on disc two kick off with the new Courage & Imagination: Ray Harryhausen’s Mythic Adventure (108m7s), a documentary by David Carins and Fiona Watson (who narrate including an opener about their first exposure to his work) about the man himself and a significant focus on this film with guest interviewees including Joe Dante, John Landis, Randall William Cook, collections manager Connor Heaney, and Vanessa Harryhausen about the artistry and cultural impact of these films. The technical breakdowns of the various effects are the highlights here, including the various matte processes and creation of large-scale beasts like the Kraken. All of the Harryhausen archival interview material is ported over here, plus a teaser, a trailer, and galleries for costume designs (21 images), behind the scenes (4 images), the pressbook (9 images), posters (14 images), color stills (134 images), and black-and-white stills (71 images). The set also comes with a booklet featuring essays by Charlie Brigden, Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, David Moses, Martyn Pedler and Icy Sedgwick plus archival material.

Arrow (UHD)

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Arrow ( Blu-ray)

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Warner Bros. (Blu-ray)

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Reviewed on November 13, 2026