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Percy Jackson desperately wants to be Harry Potter.

He’s got a duo of friends like Harry, a magical school and a patient tutor, a fabled quest for a magical object, and a movie with a title nine miles long. For the film, he’s even snagged Harry’s original director, Chris Columbus. The good news for Percy is that his first outing on the big screen is an exciting and enjoyable fantasy feature that plunges headlong into the kind of delicious matinee daydreams Ray Harryhausen delivered in his prime.

Based on a series of novels by author Rick Riordan, Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief tells the story of teenage Percy who learns he is a little more than your average high-school student when the world of Greek mythology comes crashing into his reality. Turns out he’s actually a demi-God, half mortal and half divine, conceived by the philandering deity, Poseidon (Kevin McKidd), whose aquatic abilities he’s inherited.

Apparently, Captain Trident picked up Jackson’s mother on the Jersey Shore and then headed off to the nearest Day’s Inn to shake the pillars of heaven, leaving shortly after. Years later, Percy is living in anonymity with his mom (Catherine Keener) and belligerent stepdad (Joe Pantoliano) when Zeus’ lightning bolt goes missing and he targets the young half-breed as the thief.

Now, the people closest to Percy are revealing themselves as mythical forces both benign and malevolent, and when he’s attacked by a monster hiding in human form, his guardian, Chiron, steps up to protect him. Chiron (Pierce Brosnan), who is confined to a wheelchair in his mortal guise, is actually a centaur and tutor to the demi-gods, whose ranks also include Percy’s pals Grover Underwood (Brandon T. Jackson) and Annabeth Chase (Alexandra Daddario). All three have superhuman powers, and Chiron’s school at Olympus will teach them how to harness those abilities.

As you can see, it’s a little bit X-Men, a whole lot Rowling and both mixed with a healthy dash of Clash of the Titans. The story isn’t terribly original, and I imagine it has been further simplified from the novel in order to cram an inordinate number of big fantasy action set pieces into the two hour running time.

None of this is really a problem, because Columbus demonstrates a sure hand in the direction and the pacing of the film, both things he hadn’t yet mastered when he directed the first two Potter pictures. This one flies right along, giving us as many monsters, magical beings and thunderous battle scenes as can be achieved without losing sight of Percy and his comrades.

When all manner of special effects are being flung across the scene, Lerman, Jackson and Daddario play stabilizing center with performances that aren’t extraordinary but contain exactly the energy the parts call for. Brosnan walks around with a horse’s rear attached to his bottom half and wears it well enough that no one bats an eye while Sean Bean is appropriately petulant and authoritative as Zeus. My two favorite characters, however, are Uma Thurman’s daffy Medusa, whose snake-hair is kind of beautiful in a late 90’s Madonna kind of way, and Steve Coogan’s always amusing Hades, who can be menacing when he isn’t channeling an aged rock star.

What actually distinguishes Olympians as a worthy piece of adventure filmmaking is its light and amusing tone. There’s not as much pomp and circumstance here as there is in the Twilight films, and the mythological element is refreshing because it actually plays into the storyline while remaining true to the thematic gist of the old Greek legends.

There’s even a kind of poignancy to the plot threads involving absentee parents and familial bonds that prove stronger than celestial wrath. On the outside, The Lightning Thief may look like one more cookie-cutter fantasy movie, but instead it’s a wonderful and pleasing matinee adventure.

Hey, there’s also a fire-breathing Hydra. You really can’t ask for much more than that.

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