Giant (Spanish) (Sub) [VHS]

Giant (Spanish) (Sub) [VHS] Review

1.) The audio is pretty good (some of the music is so famous such that anyone born and raised in Texas in the
past 50 years probably knows it without even realizing it) but the picture image quality has not fared so
well. Another reviewer theorized that the DVD was made from a 3rd or 4th generation copy. About that I don't
know but the result is that some of the imagery is not as good as it should be. (Example : In the opening
shot a watering pond for cattle (in Texas it's known as a 'tank') is shown. The color is faded and not clear
making one wonder how the opening scene looked to theater audiences 50 years ago.)

2.) I think that some of the acting is overdone and the attempt to 'act like Texans' causes some of the scenes
to be almost comical (you have to 'stand back' and think about how the scenes strike you). Now, having said
that, I will also say that some of the scenes are so 'classic' that they make up for shortcomings of other
scenes. (Example: When James Dean shows-up covered in oil after his first well comes in, it seems exactly
what anyone would do when everyone else figured that he would 'lose-his-shirt'.)

The overall 'look-and-feel' of 'Giant' is so much larger-than-life that its strenghts overcome its shortcomings.
If heroic music gets you excited, and the thought of a horizon that stretches further than seems reasonable
makes you want to get in your car and 'head west', then you've got to see 'Giant'.

- Paul Nix (Oct 2009)
They call it Giant because everything in this picture is big, from the generous running time (more than 200 minutes) to the sprawling ranch location (a horizon-to-horizon plain with a lonely, modest mansion dropped in the middle) to the high-powered stars. Stocky Rock Hudson stars as the confident, stubborn young ranch baron Bick Benedict, who woos and wins the hand of Southern belle Elizabeth Taylor, a seemingly demure young beauty who proves to be Hudson's match after she settles into the family homestead. For many the film is chiefly remembered for James Dean's final performance, as poor former ranch hand Jett Rink, who strikes oil and transforms himself into a flamboyant millionaire playboy. Director George Stevens won his second Oscar for this ambitious, grandly realized (if sometimes slow moving) epic of the changing socioeconomic (and physical) landscape of modern Texas, based on Edna Ferber's bestselling novel. The talented supporting cast includes Mercedes McCambridge as Bick's frustrated sister, put out by the new "woman of the house"; Chill Wills as the Benedicts' garrulous rancher neighbor; Carroll Baker and Dennis Hopper as the Benedicts' rebellious children; and Earl Holliman and Sal Mineo as dedicated ranch hands. --Sean Axmaker