Rating: G
Genre:
Drama
Release Date: 05/31/2005
SubTitles: English/French/Espanol
Dubbed: English/French
Sound: DDS/DD1
Run Time: 201 Minutes
Flags: Suitable for Children
Distributor/Studio: Warner Home Video
George Stevens' sprawling adaptation of
Edna Ferber's best-selling novel successfully walks a fine line between potboiler and serious
drama for its 210-minute running time, making it one of the few
epics of its era that continues to hold up as engrossing entertainment across the decades.
Giant opens circa 1922 in Maryland, where Texas rancher
Jordan "Bick" Benedict (
Rock Hudson) has arrived to buy a stallion called
War Winds from its owner,
Dr. Horace Lynnton (
Paul Fix). But much as
Bick loves and knows horses, he finds himself even more transfixed by the doctor's daughter,
Leslie Lynnton (
Elizabeth Taylor), and after some awkward moments, she has to admit that she's equally drawn to the shy, laconic Texan. They get married and
Leslie spends her honeymoon traveling with
Jordan to his ranch, Reata, which covers nearly a million acres of Texas. Once there, however, she finds that she has to push her way into her rightful role as mistress of the house, past
Bick's sister,
Luz (
Mercedes McCambridge), who can't accept her brother's marriage or the changes it means in the home they share. Also working around Reata is the laconic ranch hand
Jett Rink (
James Dean) -- from a family as rooted in Texas as the Benedicts but not nearly as lucky (or "foxy"),
Jett is dirt-poor and barely educated at all, and he fairly oozes resentment at
Bick for his arrogance, although
Luz likes him and for that reason alone
Bick is obliged to keep him on. One thing
Jett does have in common with his employer is that he is in awe of
Leslie's beauty; another is his nearly total contempt for the Mexican-Americans who work for them --
Jett and
Bick may have contempt for each other, but either one is just as likely to dismiss the Mexican-Americans around them as a bunch of shiftless "wetbacks."
Luz feels so threatened with a loss of power and control that she decides to assert herself with
War Winds, yet another "prize" that
Bick brought back from Maryland that resists her authority -- then decides to ride the stallion despite being warned that no one but
Leslie is wholly safe on him, and spurs him brutally in an effort to break him, which ends up destroying them both in the battle of wills she starts.
After
Luz's death,
Jett learns that she left him a tiny piece of land for his own, on Reata, which he refuses to sell back to
Bick, preferring to keep it for his own and maybe prospect for oil on it. Meanwhile,
Leslie and
Bick have their own problems --
Leslie can't abide the wretched conditions in which the Mexican families who work on Reata are allowed to live, taking a special interest in Mr. and
Mrs. Obregon and their baby,
Angel; but
Bick doesn't want his wife, or any member of his family, concerning themselves with "those people."
Leslie's humanity and her independence push their marriage to the limit, but
Bick comes to accept this in his wife, and in four years of marriage they have three handsome children, a boy and two girls, and a loving if occasionally awkward home life. Meanwhile,
Jett strikes oil on his land -- which he's named Little Reata -- and in a couple of years he's on his way to becoming the richest man in Texas, getting drilling contracts on all of the land in the area (except Reata) and making more money than the Benedicts ever saw from raising cattle.
Bick is almost oblivious to the way
Jett grows in power and influence across the years and the state, mostly because he's got his own family to worry about, including a son,
Jordan III (
Dennis Hopper), who doesn't want to take over the ranch from him, but wants instead to be a doctor; an older daughter,
Judy (
Fran Bennett), who wants to study animal husbandry and marry a local rancher (
Earl Holliman) and start a tiny spread of her own; and a younger daughter,
Luz (
Carroll Baker), who's just a bit man-crazy and star-struck by the movies.
The American entry into the Second World War and the resulting need for oil forces
Bick to go into business with
Jett and allow him to drill on Reata, and suddenly the Benedicts are wealthy enough to be part of
Jett Rink's circle, which includes the governor of the state and at least one United States senator at his beck and call -- and
Luz develops a serious crush on
Jett, who likes his women young and is especially attracted to her, as
Bick's and
Leslie's daughter. Young
Jordan marries
Juana, a Mexican-American nursing student (
Elsa Cardenas), and his father accepts it begrudgingly, with help from
Leslie. The war kills
Angel Obregon (
Sal Mineo), a death that even affects
Bick, but the Benedict family gets through it wealthier than ever and grows some more with the birth of
Jordan IV to
Jordie and
Juana. When the family attends a gala opening of Jett Rink Airport, which concludes with a dinner honoring
Jett's success, however, young
Jordan's wife is humiliated by
Jett's racist edicts, and he is beaten up by
Jett's men after punching the oil baron. Seeing this,
Bick challenges his old rival to the fight that's been brewing for a quarter of a century and wins by default,
Jett being too drunk to defend himself or to hit; he's also too drunk to make the grand speech that was to climax the celebration, and he ends up alone in the ballroom. The Benedicts have it out with each other, young
Jordan accusing his father of being as much a racist as
Jett, and
Leslie caught in the middle between her husband and her son. It looks like the Benedicts may lose each other, until an encounter with a racist diner owner forces
Bick to stand up and get knocked down (more than once) defending his daughter-in-law and his grandson.
Seen today,
Giant seems the least dated of any of
James Dean's three starring films, in part because it addresses issues that remain relevant more than 50 years later, and also because it has the best all-around acting and the best script of any of the three. Taken in broader terms, it's even better, with two of the best performances that
Elizabeth Taylor and
Rock Hudson ever gave, and perhaps the second best of
Hudson's whole career (after
Seconds) -- the only unfortunate element at modern theatrical screenings is the tendency of younger viewers, who only know him in terms of the revelations late in his life of his being gay, to laugh and snicker at elements of
Hudson's characterization; but his work is so good that the titters usually fade after the first 30 minutes or so.
~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
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