admin
An ancient war between the humans and giants starts when a magic bean gets wet and creates a beanstalk leading up to the home of the giants, which floats in the sky.
It didn’t really make sense in the original fairy tale, either, okay. Anyway, there’s also a magic crown in play, which enables the wearer to control the giants. As you may well imagine, a magic crown can cause trouble when in the wrong hands.
Nicholas Hoult plays the titular Jack, while Eleanor Tomlinson is the princess Isabelle. Ewan McGregor is Elmont, the head of the royal guards.Ian McShane plays King Brahmwell, who, big surprise, is Isabelle’s father. Stanley Tucci is Roderick, head advisor to King Brahmwell and fiancé to Isabelle. Bill Nighy lends hisvoice to the character of General Fallon, the leader of the giants. Ewan McGregor, Ian McShane, Bill Nighy and Stanley Tucci lend acting credibility to the film as the supporting cast. This is where the real magic of the film happens.
When the main focus of a movie is a teenage romance, a reliable cast of actors who have been at it for a while helps to cut through the annoyance of that.
McGregor is as charming and handsome as ever and the others are as solid as ever. To be perfectly honest, in places in the movie, it seems a little beneath the talent level of these guys, but I’m hesitant to complain too much as they’re what make the movie fun to watch. That’s not to say that Nicholas Hoult and Eleanor Tomlinson are bad, it’s just that they’re playing teenagers, and I’m sick of seeing that.
“Jack the Giant Slayer” suffers from all the minor annoyances that most family movies have.
The plot is predictable; the elements are the same things viewers have seen before, such as the poor farmer and the princess falling for one another; and the characters are a bit flat.
One of the biggest issues for me was the opening sequence, which featured very terrible-looking CGI from the 90s.
The opening CGI shots look like a cheap Christmas special animation. I think it was a stylistic choice on the part of the director to differentiate it from the nice CGI later on, but it just looks really terrible.
The viewing audience has moved on from that type of graphics.
The other big issue was the style anachronisms. Jack’s clothing basically consists of a hoodie, a jacket, a modern belt and modern pants. It’s really startling when everyone else is in period clothing, albeit with a modern twist. Elmont/Ewan McGregor’s hair is a thing of beauty, but I suspect it’s moments away from becoming self-aware.
I don’t know what kind of old-timey hair gel he uses, but it defies all the laws of physics. His hair gets completely drenched, and it miraculously dries back into spiky position.
Elmont also spends some time in a giant’s oven and his hair gel still maintains its hold. I’ve already bought into the idea of a magic crown and magic beans, but I refuse to buy into magic hair, even if it is pretty.
Despite that, it’s a solid film that’s enchanting in its own right. The plot is very clean; it neither gives too much or too little information. It avoids the pitfalls of other films in this re-imagined fairy tale trend, such as “Snow White and the Huntsman” and “Hansel and Gretel,” which aimed for too serious a tone for the subject matter.
“Jack” does a good job at keeping it fairly light-hearted, which is kind of what I want from a fairy tale.
I go to fairy tales for a predictable, light-hearted story, and that’s what “Jack the Giant Slayer” gives me. – mtvmoviecritic.com
Online Reporter