Ray Harryhausen Special Effects Titan, Corman’s World and That Guy Dick Miller

RAY HARRYHAUSEN SPECIAL EFFECTS TITAN, CORMAN’S WORLD AND THAT GUY DICK MILLER
It’s often been said that Ray Harryhausen’s stop motion animation creatures are the best features of their respective films, everything from “Mighty Joe Young” and “Earth vs. The Flying Saucers” to “Jason and the Argonauts” and “Clash of the Titans.” He became the auteur.

It’s not often that a visual effects artist overshadows both directors and performers, no offense to Nathan R. Juran (“The 7th Voyage of Sinbad”), Don Chaffey (“Jason and the Argonauts”), and the all-star cast in “Clash of the Titans,” Harryhausen’s grand finale.

In fact, in reviewing “Clash of the Titans” a while back, I wrote that it amounts to Harryhausen vs. nominal star Harry Hamlin. Harryhausen wins. Every. Single. Time.

Then again, maybe not. Not when People Magazine featured Hamlin as the “Sexiest Man Alive” in 1987 and it felt like taking a potshot or two at “Clash of the Titans.”

“And there’s always the possibility of doing a remake of ‘Clash of the Titans.’ ‘I brought my toga home,’ says Harry, raising hopes of another glimpse of those knees. He’s kidding, of course. Frivolous flicks are a thing of the past for The Sexiest Man Alive. Besides, says Harry, laughing, ‘I used the toga to wash my car.'”

While pretty boys are a frivolous matter of the past, even in the present, Harryhausen’s creatures will live on forever.

“Special Effects Titan” allows us the opportunity to hear who and what inspired Harryhausen, his thought and work process on his creations, what challenges he faced, and to see the actual models used. Harryhausen (1920-2013) kept the most minute details in his garage.

— Roger Corman, who turned 94 a month to the day before I watched this documentary, has accumulated 415 producer and 56 director credits over a 65-year period. American International and New World produced some of the best exploitation films ever made along with a ton of schlock (some enjoyable, some not so much).

Peter Bogdanovich, Francis Ford Coppola, Monte Hellman, Martin Scorsese, Ron Howard, Jonathan Demme, Jonathan Kaplan, Joe Dante, Allan Arkush, Jack Nicholson, Peter Fonda, and Pam Grier all had their start or their break working for Corman and most of them appear in “Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel.” Several more big names also appear in “Corman’s World,” but I would like to move on to the next paragraph.

We see Corman working on location as producer on the 2010 TV movie “Dinoshark,” which instantly calls to mind previous Corman productions like “Piranha” and “Humanoids from the Deep.” Near the end of “Corman’s World,” we also see the Hollywood outsider receive an honorary Oscar for “his unparalleled ability to nurture aspiring filmmakers by providing an environment that no film school could match.” It’s only fitting, though, that “Corman’s World” goes out with a set of clips scored by the Ramones’ explosive title song from “Rock ‘N’ Roll High School.” That’s more in the Corman spirit than any award, as Riff Randell blows up Vince Lombardi High School.

“Corman’s World” reminds me that I should watch “The Intruder” (Corman’s most atypical directorial entry, called “one of the most brutal, honest, and unflinching examinations of American racism in cinema history” by Wheeler Winston Dixon in “Senses of Cinema”), thankfully touches on New World’s distribution of films by Bergman, Truffaut, Kurosawa and Herzog, and shows us Jack Nicholson crying over Corman.

Nicholson made his film debut in Corman’s 1958 production “The Cry Baby Killer” and most of his credits before 1969’s smash hit “Easy Rider” are Corman productions, including most famously “The Little Shop of Horrors” and “The Terror.” Corman productions “The Wild Angels” and “The Trip” paved the highway for “Easy Rider.”

Matter of fact, Corman laid a lot of pavement for the road ahead.

— I generally prefer character actors over stars and that group of character actors includes Sydney Greenstreet, Margaret Hamilton, John Cazale, M. Emmet Walsh, Harry Dean Stanton, Brad Dourif, and, of course, perhaps my all-time favorite Dick Miller, who the Academy Awards left out of their “In Memoriam.” Miller died Jan. 30, 2019, at the age of 90.

Miller began his career in Roger Corman productions in the 1950s and he became director Joe Dante’s favorite actor. No matter the size of the role, whether it’s starring like “Bucket of Blood” (the immortal Walter Paisley) or just one scene like “The Terminator” and “Rock ‘N’ Roll High School,” I fondly remember Miller. Sure many of us movie lovers of a certain persuasion do.

— Miller played Murray Futterman in both “Gremlins” films. In “Gremlins,” World War II veteran Futterman keeps going on and on ’bout foreign cars, foreign this, that and everything, and especially “gremlins” before they even attack the fictional upstate New York town of Kingston Falls. Futterman drunkenly rambles, “They put em in cars, they put em in yer TV. They put em in stereos and those little radios you stick in your ears. They even put em in your watches, they have teeny gremlins for our watches!”

— Miller ad-libbed his “They’re ugly. Ugly, ugly people” line about the Ramones in “Rock ‘N’ Roll High School.” Apparently, that’s what he actually thought when he looked at Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee, and Marky.

— Miller originally had aspirations to be a screenwriter and his writing credits are “Four Rode Out,” “Which Way to the Front?,” and the immortal “TNT Jackson.” Miller predominantly stuck to acting, thankfully, with 184 credits listed at IMDb. He played a character named “Walter Paisley” several times. He left behind a tremendous body of work.

RAY HARRYHAUSEN SPECIAL EFFECTS TITAN (2011) Four stars; CORMAN’S WORLD (2011) Four stars; THAT GUY DICK MILLER (2014) Four stars

Attack of the Fantastical Movies

ATTACK OF THE FANTASTICAL MOVIES: ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN, EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS, PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES, MOTORPSYCHO!, GALAXINA, REPTILICUS, BIG BAD MAMA, REAL LIFE, NINJA III: THE DOMINATION, NIGHT OF THE DEMONS

How do I grade something like ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN from 1958? It has a setup that could be called “laborious” or “lackluster” or “lugubrious.” I’m not going to call it any of those words, but I can see exactly why somebody else would. In other words, it’s not until about the 45-minute mark that we get to the 50 foot woman. Yes, I wish they had reversed the numbers, 15 minutes of setup and 45 minutes of 50 foot woman. Simple mathematics. At least, 45 minutes of setup and 45 minutes of 50 foot woman. Yes, that sounds even better than “15 then 45.” The final 15 or 20 minutes of ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN, though, are solid gold. Rating: ***

— It’s virtually impossible to watch EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS and not think about MARS ATTACKS! (flying saucers) and INDEPENDENCE DAY (Washington D.C. invaded), two blockbusters from 1996 with a combined production budget of $145 million and big, big, big stars, including Jack Nicholson in dual roles in MARS ATTACKS! In EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS from 1956, Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion flying saucers are the real star of the show (step aside, Hugh Marlowe) and the film thankfully wastes very little time in showcasing them. It’s the inverse of ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN. ***1/2

— Italian director Mario Bava (1914-80) became especially known for his stylish horror films. From his British Film Institute profile, “Mario Bava took a vital role in the creation of the modern horror film. If there was to be a a Mount Rushmore-style monument dedicated to four directors whose work pioneered a new form of big screen chills and thrills, those giant faces etched in granite on the mountainside would be: Bava, Alfred Hitchcock, Georges Franju and Michael Powell.” In the words of a Pavement song, a Bava film has style, miles and miles. Case in point: PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES, a low-budget science fiction and horror production from 1965 that masked its cheap sets through smoky skullduggery. Bava said in Fangoria, “Do you know what that unknown planet was made of? A couple of plastic rocks — yes, two: one and one! — left over from a mythological movie made at Cinecitta! To assist the illusion, I filled the set with smoke!” Watching PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES for the first time, you might think you’ve seen this basic plot somewhere before … ahem … Ridley Scott’s ALIEN. ***1/2

— 1965 proved to be a great year for titles with exclamation points and for director, producer, writer, cinematographer, and editor Russ Meyer (1922-2004), whose films often proved to be ahead of their time. Meyer contributed two exclamation point titles — FASTER, PUSSYCAT! KILL! KILL! and MOTORPSYCHO! — during a 1965 in which he directed three films overall; Meyer’s greatest cinematic year began with MUDHONEY. Proof of being ahead of its time: MOTORPSYCHO! (what a title) gives us a psychotic motorcycle trio led by a deeply disturbed Vietnam vet — before TAXI DRIVER, before ROLLING THUNDER, before THE DEER HUNTER, before FIRST BLOOD — in addition to all the elements (large-breasted women and endless cleavage, campy humor, satire, and quotable dialogue) we expect from a Meyer film. ***

— GALAXINA lands a few successful jabs at STAR WARS, STAR TREK, and ALIEN, but otherwise it’s a real long slog through 90-plus minutes of a lowbrow and low-budget science fiction and western parody set in the 31st century. Here’s just one example of the film’s humor: Avery Schreiber (1935-2002) plays a character named “Capt. Cornelius Butt.” Then again, I probably should have just said that it’s a Crown International Pictures release. Surely you remember Crown International Pictures? They brought us such immoral, er, immortal classics as THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS, THEY SAVED HITLER’S BRAIN, SEXTETTE, and THE BEACH GIRLS. The late former Playboy Playmate of the Year Dorothy Stratten fills the title role and she’s been described as “a voluptuous blonde android servant.” Galaxina works better when she’s silent (the first half of the picture), because Stratten proves that she was a true novice thespian every time she speaks during GALAXINA. Stratten reportedly complained to film director and her paramour Peter Bogdanovich that the ads for GALAXINA promoted her being the Playmate of the Year, because she wanted to be taken seriously as an actress. GALAXINA would not do good for anybody wanting to be taken seriously for anything. Unfortunately, Stratten’s estranged husband Paul Snider murdered her two months after the release of GALAXINA. Stratten would be immortalized on film by the 1981 TV movie DEATH OF A CENTERFOLD: THE DOROTHY STRATTEN STORY and the 1983 theatrical release STAR 80, played by Jamie Lee Curtis and Mariel Hemingway, respectively. In case you were wondering, you see a lot more of Stratten in Playboy than GALAXINA. *1/2

— Recent weeks, mostly under self-quarantine, have included a few first-time watch monster movies: GODZILLA VS. MECHAGODZILLA and TERROR OF MECHAGODZILLA, SLITHIS (possibly the worst monster movie ever made), THE GIANT CLAW, and, most recently, REPTILICUS, Denmark’s infamous first entry in the monster movie sweepstakes. Judging by REPTILICUS, the Danish should stick to pastries. They make a mean strudel, not so much a Godzilla rip-off. Apparently, there’s never been a second Danish monster movie, so I guess they have stuck to pastries for nearly 50 years since this 1961 turkey. Anyway, I wanted to find the Danish version of REPTILICUS, but, of course, I had to settle for the English dub from good old American International. The plot: Copper miners find the tail of a prehistoric reptile and it eventually regenerates into Reptilicus, a hand puppet (close-up) and a marionette (wide shot) that give the $50 Giant Claw its money for being the “best” worst movie monster of all-time. I enjoyed REPTILICUS even less than THE GIANT CLAW, though. For example, when Reptilicus eats an extra or two, the victims look like they have been cut out of a magazine and they are being thrown into the puppet’s mouth. In THE GIANT CLAW, at least its victims being eaten scene brought me back to the “Eat ‘em! Eat ‘em! Crunch! Crunch!” scene from Q: THE WINGED SERPENT. I even called out “Crunch! Crunch!” during THE GIANT CLAW. No such luck during REPTILICUS. **

— Arthur Penn’s 1967 film BONNIE AND CLYDE proved to be one of the watershed films of the second half of the 20th century and one indication was that for several years, BONNIE AND CLYDE inspired many sensationalistic crime films set during the Great Depression. Roger Corman produced a whole slew of them, with the most famous being 1974’s BIG BAD MAMA starring Angie Dickinson, Tom Skerritt, and William Shatner and directed by Steve Carver (who later directed the Chuck Norris spectacular LONE WOLF McQUADE). BIG BAD MAMA mixes in a hippie-like free love sensibility and showcases bed hopping and generous amounts of nudity between all the murder and mayhem. The title character (Dickinson) and her two not long past jailbait daughters (Susan Sennett, Robbie Lee) all have multiple nude scenes, highlighted by Dickinson’s full-frontal shot late in the picture. One of the picture’s tag lines: “Wilma gave her daughters everything — her looks, her lovers and the crime of their lives!” Dick Miller (1928-2019), yes, that guy, plays a crime fighter and you know you can’t go too wrong with a picture that features an old-fashioned bloody crime spree, much nudity and shenanigans (Dickinson looked absolutely sensational in 1974), Shatner, and Dick Miller. ***

— Many years before the proliferation of reality TV, Albert Brooks skewered it with his 1979 directorial debut REAL LIFE, a satire of the 1973 PBS documentary “An American Family.” Brooks plays an exaggerated version of himself and watching this movie for the first time in 2020, it’s difficult not to conjure up memories of all the obnoxious or obsequious hosts and participants on reality TV shows from years ago — “The Real World,” “The Bachelor,” et cetera, they’re all terrible and I’m fortunate to have survived all my encounters with them. All those creeps still give me the willies just thinking about it now, but unfortunately reality TV seems like it’s here and it’s here to stay. Take that from somebody who’s not watched a whole lot of TV in the last decade, with reality TV being one of the big reasons. I laughed a lot during REAL LIFE, from the epic sight gag on the head of every cameraman (I laughed every single time) to the fiery grand finale Brooks borrows from GONE WITH THE WIND. ****

— The Cannon Group’s best of the worst films could generously be called “sublime stupidity” and I believe that description fits NINJA III: THE DOMINATION perfectly. Part ENTER THE NINJA, part FLASHDANCE, and part EXORCIST, THE DOMINATION must be seen to not be believed. Imagine Jennifer Beals possessed by the evil spirit of a ninja with an Oriental Max von Sydow attempting to bring it out. THE DOMINATION starts out with its very best scene, a golf course massacre that leads to the bad ninja transferring his spirit into the body of telephone lineman and aerobics instructor Christie (Lucinda Dickey). Also happening in the first 30 minutes of the picture: Christie’s aerobics class, her fight against a handful of creeps who were harassing one of her students, and possibly the most awkward bedroom seduction scene in the history of cinema. Christie won’t give this creepy cop the time of day and then, practically the next moment, they end up in embrace and she pours V-8 on herself … this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. There’s also a bizarre sequence involving Christie’s Bouncer arcade game. On the International Arcade Museum page for Bouncer, it says “Bouncer was seen in the low budget martial arts film NINJA 3: THE DOMINATION. The game is in the main character’s apartment and she is seen playing it. The character becomes possessed by the spirit of the ninja, and as he overtakes her body, the arcade cabinet begins to bellow out smoke and hypnotizes her with a little laser show from the screen.” I thought she was already possessed. Yeah, I know, bizarre. Then again, bizarre basically describes both THE DOMINATION and Cannon films in general. We wouldn’t have them any other way. ***

— We’ve seen NIGHT OF THE DEMONS done better before, especially the first two EVIL DEAD movies and RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD, which it seems to reference through both Linnea Quigley and punk rock. We’ve seen this plot before: 10 (mostly) horny high school kids have a Halloween party inside an abandoned funeral parlor. You can fill in the rest, down to every detail both personality and plot. It’s not a bad movie, exactly, it’s just after having seen EVIL DEAD and RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD and EVIL DEAD 2, why settle for less? Seemingly just about every movie from the ‘80s — the good, the bad, and the ugly — has developed a cult following over time and NIGHT OF THE DEMONS is one of them, spoken about in an enthusiastic tone by admirers. I can sympathize, because I feel similarly about numerous movies. I have mixed feelings on NIGHT OF THE DEMONS. On one hand, I can’t think very highly of a movie that goes for three jump scares very early on. That loses points for it real quickly. It’s also one of those movies that I started liking less down the home stretch and I wished it would get to its inevitable conclusion sooner rather than later. On the other hand, it does have a few good moments, just not enough for a recommendation. **

The Giant Claw (1957)

THE GIANT CLAW (1957) ***

Funny how none of the alternate titles for THE GIANT CLAW, a low-budget monster movie from director Fred Sears and producer Sam Katzman, are BATTLESHIP or FLYING BATTLESHIP or BIG AS A BATTLESHIP, because that’s how multiple characters — especially our protagonist, electronics engineer Mitch MacAfee (Jeff Morrow) — describe “The Giant Claw” for at least the first 30 minutes.

Of course, the Giant Claw looks absolutely nothing like a battleship. Mitch himself says at one point to his lady friend’s expression of disbelief, “I said it looked like a battleship, not that it was a battleship.” Yeah, sure, whatever, best never mind.

I love how most of the movie’s promotional goods avoid revealing the Giant Claw’s face, because that act would have undoubtedly scared off potential customers or attracted only those with a taste for absolutely ridiculous movies. At least, that way — not depicting the monster honestly in cinematic propaganda — it took precisely 27 minutes before audiences had the laughter of a lifetime caused by a movie monster. This is one of those movies where I would love to get in a time machine and head for the nearest theater (or drive-in) playing THE GIANT CLAW when it opened in June 1957. How did initial audiences react to it? Did they hoot and holler and howl derisively? Did they flee in total disbelief at the latest Sam Katzman motion picture monstrosity? Did they seek a refund to absolutely no avail? Did they write their Congressmen to complain?

One poster proclaims, “Winged Monster from 17,000,000 B.C.!” “Big as a Battleship!” “Flies 4 Times The Speed of Sound!” “Atomic Weapons Can’t Hurt It!” There’s a drawing of a bird — wings, body, and talons but no face — destroying a plane and a skyscraper. Could that be the Empire State Building? All pictorial renderings of the bird are basically the same — wings, body, and talons, as well as destruction, but no face — and that’s deceptive advertising in a nutshell. (Only those who got to watch the trailer got the real dope on THE GIANT CLAW.)

The producers originally planned to get stop-motion animation titan Ray Harryhausen (MIGHTY JOE YOUNG, JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS, CLASH OF THE TITANS) to create the monster, but he proved to be too much budget and so they outsourced the bird to a model maker in Mexico City. Reportedly, Katzman spent $50 on the puppet that became known as the Giant Claw. Fifty dollars well spent, for sure, and way to go, Uncle Sam.

The film’s posters and the characters themselves fail to accurately describe the giant bird mass murderer in THE GIANT CLAW. To be fair to the actors, they had no idea during filming what the Giant Claw would look like and were left to their own imagination. The characters, though, are made to look like blithering idiots because there’s a vast disconnect between their words and “The Giant Claw” itself, beginning with the battleship description. The filmmakers especially hung out lead actor Morrow to dry, because he gives a legitimately good performance. Legend has it that Morrow ducked out of the theater in embarrassment and got drunk at home after the audience laughed at the Giant Claw’s first appearance. It apparently only took once for Morrow.

Guess that I should try myself to describe the head of the Giant Claw puppet. Extremely long neck, big teeth, flaring nostrils, bulging eyes, and a Mohawk that should be the envy of any buzzard or punk rock singer.

Over the course of the plot, we discover this killer giant bird is actually an alien avian who has come to Earth to lay eggs and wreak destruction and terror on poor, poor humanity. We learn even more, but I will leave that explanatory exposition out of this review for all those individuals who have not seen THE GIANT CLAW before. Trust me, it gets even better as the film attempts to explain the Giant Claw more and more with dialogue passages that could inspire bouts of hysterical laughter. I believe the Mayo Clinic calls it “Pseudobulbar affect.”

Bottom line: This alien avian was sabotaged by a chintzy movie producer named Sam Katzman (1901-73) and both “The Giant Claw” and THE GIANT CLAW will live in infamy as one of the great bad movie monsters and one of the great bad movies, respectively. During my first viewing, I enjoyed THE GIANT CLAW more than many so-called “good” movies.

I have one particular favorite scene in THE GIANT CLAW.

It is reminiscent of the scene in Q: THE WINGED SERPENT (produced by Samuel Z. Arkoff) when lovable hateful creep Jimmy Quinn (Michael Moriarty) leads two hoods leaning on him to the Quetzalcoatl in the Chrysler Building. We hear the Big Q take a couple bites out of crime and Quinn absolutely revels in their demise, “Eat ‘em, eat ‘em! Crunch! Crunch!” I love to hate Quinn even more after that scene.

Anyway, when the Giant Claw chomps on a pair of parachuting passengers, I said out loud, “Crunch! Crunch!” Please keep in mind that in quarantine, no one can hear you scream.

Clash of the Titans (1981)

CLASH OF THE TITANS (1981) Three-and-a-half stars

Harryhausen vs. Harry Hamlin.

That’s what CLASH OF THE TITANS amounts to in the long run for this viewer.

Artist, designer, visual effects man, writer, and producer Ray Harryhausen (1920-2013) mastered the dying art of stop-motion animation. His credits include MIGHTY JOE YOUNG, THE 7TH VOYAGE OF SINBAD, JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS, ONE MILLION YEARS B.C., and CLASH OF THE TITANS, Harryhausen’s final production in which he goes out with a big bang.

Harryhausen is the real star of CLASH OF THE TITANS, and not Harry Hamlin or even big-name actors Laurence Olivier, Ursula Andress, Maggie Smith, Burgess Meredith, and Claire Bloom.

I like CLASH OF THE TITANS a lot because of all them stop-motion creations.

Let’s see, we have scorpions, the Stygian witches, Calibos and his vulture, a two-headed hound of Hell, the Kraken, the mechanical owl Bubo, and, of course, Medusa.

The Medusa sequence is the pièce de résistance of CLASH OF THE TITANS and responsible for at least three stars alone.

Harryhausen himself favored Medusa among his many creations.

The snake-haired Medusa, we all know that she’s deadly with arrows and she can turn a person to stone if you make contact with her eyes. Personally, I pretend that every salesperson in a shopping mall is Medusa and eye contact must be strictly avoided. Perseus (Hamlin) tricks Medusa with his reflection and he lops off her head. Then, our hero uses Medusa’s head to turn the formidable Kraken to stone.

A wide range of filmmakers have been inspired by Harryhausen’s work, including Steven Spielberg, Joe Dante, James Cameron, Tim Burton, Peter Jackson, and Sam Raimi.

In 2010, Academy Award winning animator Nick Park talked with the BBC about his three favorite Harryhausen moments. He finished up with Medusa from CLASH OF THE TITANS after picking two from JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS.

“It was so well done and frightening,” Park said. “It’s all the same technique but going to different heights of intricacy.

“I thought it was a combination of really good lighting and shadow. I do admire a lot of CGI, but there’s something not real about it.

“In the Medusa that Ray did it’s there and it’s grounded, there’s real light hitting real surfaces. Somehow your brain knows it’s not real with CGI.”

I’ll be honest, I am far more interested in Harryhausen’s creatures than the rather convoluted plot involving Perseus, Andromeda (Judi Bowker), Calibos, Cassiopeia, and the gods pulling all the strings.

That’s what I meant by starting this review “Harryhausen vs. Harry Hamlin.”

Most of CLASH OF THE TITANS plays like a soap opera, not helped out by pretty boy Hamlin and Bowker, who seem like they should be on “Days of Our Lives.”

Google is a wondrous invention: With just two magic words and one little click, I found the 1987 People article on Hamlin, “The Sexiest Man Alive” double issue no less, and the opening paragraph of “Last of the Great Romantics” just hooks me in against my better instincts.

“The name seems wrong for The Sexiest Man Alive, Harry is a name for an uncle, or a guy who asks you to the prom because his mother made him. Of course, Harold would be worse. So Harry it is. Harry Robinson Hamlin, to be precise … the Harry everyone’s just wild about.” (Personally, I prefer Harry Truman or Harry Potter, quite possibly since neither will ever be proclaimed “The Sexiest Man Alive.”)

The article comes back around for a swipe at CLASH OF THE TITANS.

“And there’s always the possibility of doing a remake of CLASH OF THE TITANS. ‘I brought my toga home,’ says Harry, raising hopes of another glimpse of those knees. He’s kidding, of course. Frivolous flicks are a thing of the past for The Sexiest Man Alive. Besides, says Harry, laughing, ‘I used the toga to wash my car.’”

Frivolous flicks a thing of the past for Hamlin? Hamlin’s career has included 105 episodes of “L.A. Law,” 21 of “Movie Stars,” 12 of “Veronica Mars,” eight apiece of “Army Wives” and “Shameless,” and 15 of “Mad Men,” as well as a plethora of TV movies and other shows.

Hamlin should count himself lucky to be associated with CLASH OF THE TITANS.

Because Harryhausen trumps Harry Hamlin every single time.