A Classic take on the classics

A Classic Take on The Classics

Simon Rogerson

July 30, 2026

In order to celebrate the release of a big (really big) new adaption of The Odyssey, one local cinema decided to show the 1963 film Jason and the Argonauts as some sort of companion piece. With time to spare to watch the new blockbuster and having never before seen this classic film in full, I decided to go and watch both. Not on the same day I should add, I didn't have that much free time.

Theatrical Posters for Jason and The Argonauts and The Odyssey. Pictures from Wikicommons

I definitely enjoyed the experience but was amazed but just how much of the filming style of the older film I found off-putting and took me completely out of the story.

For a start, the dialogue in Jason and The Argonauts was terrible. I know that is a bold statement but it was so stilted, formal and full of exposition it was almost a self parody. This was made significantly more striking by the incredibly obvious overdubbing and poor synchronicity between the actors faces and the noises that were supposedly coming out of them. Having looked it up later, I wasn't surprised to learn that the 2 top billed performers (Todd Armstrong and Nancy Kovack) both had their dialogue dubbed by other (uncredited) actors. As an aside, another off-putting thing was that Todd Armstrong playing Jason sometimes looked alarmingly like Jack Whitehall, which I concede is hardly the fault of the film makers. As for Nancy Kovack, despite being second billed, she is barely in the film and even then wasn't trusted to speak her own lines. To reuse an old joke, I suspect there were probably only 2 good reasons why she was hired to begin with. 

The unconvincing dubbing was not the only sound issue I had with the film. The music in it was also incredibly obtrusive and over the top. I genuinely wouldn't be surprised if there had been difficulties in the mixing when converting from physical formats to digital but the other explanation is that the film makers had chosen to have the trumpets blare out every 3 seconds, obliterating all other sounds in the film.

Incorporated into the music was the sound of a drum that was supposedly being used to keep the Argonauts in rhythm when rowing the Argo. If that was the plan, then clearly no-one was listening as whenever the oars were shown, they were absolutely all over the place, swinging this way and that in no particular order and with a free-form jazz approach to beats and rhythms. And when any of the oars did ever touch the water, it was a very brief and shallow connection. I know this is a petty thing to complain about but it just added to the many ways I was taken out of the film. Other offenders include the fact that the story seemed to take place in a time when the classical Greek temples were already in ruins and where characters were wearing some of the worst wigs and fake beards ever committed to screen. Genuinely terrible wigs. 

Of course, there were lots of high points in the film. Honor Blackman, playing the Goddess Hera, improves every scene she is in. But then, of course she does, she's Honor Blackman. All anyone would have to do is look at the cast list, see her name listed and they could have worked that out for themselves. 

Jason fights the army of skeletons. Picture from Wikicommons

Unsurprisingly, the biggest plus, the thing that the film is famous for to begin with, is the stop motion animation by Ray Harryhausen. This is (of course) brilliant and totally stands up to the test of time. The fight with the skeletons, the Army of the Hydra's Teeth as they are called, remains one of the most exciting and exhilarating things I have seen. Talos, the giant bronze man, is another absolute triumph. Other scenes, particularly the harpies and the hydra, don't stand up quite as well. Not the stop motion itself (which is great) but the way the stop motion footage interacts with the live action footage. That being said I have seen plenty of modern films where the ropey CGI is far worse than anything in this film.

All in all, the final impression I am left with is that Jason and the Argonauts is what it always was, a glorified B-Movie with 1 fantastic feature. Or 3 if you count Nancy Kovack.

Jason fights the Hydra. Picture from Wikicommons

The other big advantage of Jason and the Argonauts is it clocks in at a tight 104 minutes. 

Which brings us to The Odyssey (173 minutes), a film that I thoroughly enjoyed. It is big. Really big. Really, really big. But then the poem is also big (over 12,000 lines apparently). I gather they had cut significant bits out of the poem in order to get the film down below 3 hours. If only there was another way to approach things when your source material is too big to fit into one film. 

I have never read the source material, in any language or any translation. I would say I haven't read it yet but let's just leave it as saying I haven't read it. Other people will know the poem in detail and have strong, informed opinions on the film that I have no reason to argue with, but as a film I enjoyed it.

One thing I have read is (one translation of) The Illiad. Around 20 years ago, the film Troy covered some of the same ground as this epic poem and as a film, Troy was absolutely fine. The decision was made to remove all of the mythology from the story. The result was that, without the divine protection and frequent meddling of the Gods, the Greek and Trojan heroes and warriors in the story like Ajax, Achilles, Hector etc. were just...some dudes. Some dudes who were all good at fighting - Ajax and a few others were big dudes and Achilles had a move where he jumped up and stabbed you in the shoulder - but they were all just some dudes. With the story reduced to just some dudes arguing, the whole thing felt flat and pointless. 

Christopher Nolan's version of The Odyssey keeps the mythology in. I guess there could be a version of The Odyssey that doesn't have the Gods and Monsters but that might be the best way to keep the story down to 104 minutes or less. Or maybe 14 minutes with all that is left over. With the magic and the monsters, the film becomes visually stunning. Nolan has spoken frequently about preferring to use practical effects where possible and it seems reasonable to suggest that Harryhausen himself would approve of some of the scenes, such as the crewmen being molded into pigs. To me, watching from the cheap seats, the whole thing looked and sounded fabulous.

Of course if anyone watches Nolan's work in 60 years time, they will find plenty of his choices, styles and methods to be strange and off putting but that is the way of the world. At least there were no bad wigs in his film, and if nothing else that sounds like progress to me.