Jack the Giant Slayer

Jack the Giant Slayer
PG-13 -- 114 min. -- IMDB

I saw this movie about eight hours ago and I'm still trying to process what to write. Not because this movie makes you think, but for the opposite.

My interest was peeked by the idea of twisting the old story of Jack and the Beanstalk into something different. I always find the idea of doing that to a fairytale can be something extraordinary. I've had a bad run-in with one that was too easy, but I tried to keep an open mind when I saw this movie. Unfortunately, from the beginning, I had to close it again.

And when I say from the beginning, I mean form the beginning. I wish I knew the term for when you have two different scenes but can be shown together because they finish the other scene's sentences. It's not a montage, but I digress. The cinematography threw me off. The way that the scenes were shot you can tell that they weren't done in an interesting way. The way everything was shot was done the obvious way.

Then there's the plot. There really isn't one, and I suppose I wasn't expecting much. It was nice that there was a back story even though it was an easy choice. Giants are mad due to past history and Jack just happens to stumble into it. Throughout the whole movie I thought things were disjointed. I can't quite put my finger on it, but I know something didn't seem right. The ending didn't help with this. It left holes more than filling in the gaps.

Don't get me wrong, it's a fun movie to watch; it's just cheesy. It's fun to watch in the moment, but not a classic that you must watch again and again. And now that I've heard that it's a book, I wonder how it is. I'm skeptical but I might give it a try someday.

P.S. - There are parts that may frighten young kids. And everything with this deals with the Giants. The fact that they're man-eating is a big part. Some of their deaths are also quite gruesome.