Perhaps it all starts when we are children, looking up at the adults around us. We become fascinated with the idea of giants, and we put these towering people in our stories. Perhaps they are the villains, perhaps they are the misunderstood heroes, but they loom large – in more ways that one – in our consciousness, so it’s only natural that there would be a lot of giant movies out there in the world.
But, in part because the special effects are expensive, there aren’t as many great giant movies as you might think. Steven Spielberg’s new adaptation of The BFG certainly qualifies, but what about the others? Which of the giant movies from days gone by are still being treasured in our memories? What are the best and most unforgettable giant movies, anyway?
Join us as we take a look at ten films that made giants an indelible part of our dreams, and if we forgot one, let us know!
The 10 Most Memorable Giant Movies:
Top Photo: Walt Disney Pictures
William Bibbiani (everyone calls him ‘Bibbs’) is Crave’s film content editor and critic. You can hear him every week on The B-Movies Podcast and Canceled Too Soon, and watch him on the weekly YouTube series Most Craved, Rapid Reviews and What the Flick. Follow his rantings on Twitter at @WilliamBibbiani.
The Ten Most Memorable Movie Giants
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Gulliver's Travels (1939)
The second feature-length animated movie (after Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs) was an adaptation of the first part of Jonathan Swift's fantasy classic, in which a shipwrecked man finds himself on an island where the inhabitants are all really, really tiny. This version of Gulliver's Travels is strange and historically significant, and worth watching.
Photo: Fleischer Studios
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The Amazing Colossal Man (1957)
A soldier is caught in a nuclear weapons test, and begins to grow exponentially in size in Bert I. Gordon's The Amazing Colossal Man. The visual effects waffle between competent and silly, but the film is an honest attempt to inject pathos into a bizarre storyline, and has more of an emotional impact than you might think.
Photo: American International Pictures
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Attack of the 50 Foot Woman (1958)
Depending on your perspective, Attack of the 50 Foot Woman is either sexist or feminist, telling the story of an heiress with a philandering husband, whom nobody believes when she says she had an alien encounter. While the men all talk about having her committed, she turns into a giant and exacts her revenge. The film takes too long to get going, but it's an intriguing cultural curio from any perspective.
Photo: Allied Artists Pictures Corporation
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The Princess Bride (1987)
Andre the Giant may be small compared to the other fictional giants on this list, but at 7'4" he towered over practically everybody in the real world. He appeared in a few films, but his scene-stealing performance in the fantasy classic The Princess Bride will ensure that the late, great wrestling star will live on in our hearts forever.
Photo: 20th Century Fox
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The BFG (1989)
Before Steven Spielberg took a crack at Roald Dahl's gigantic children's story, an animated TV movie was produced in the late 1980s, and it's a very sweet adaptation of a very sweet tale that stars David Janson (Danger Mouse, Duckula) as the title character, a big friendly giant who befriends an orphan child.
Photo: Celebrity Home Entertainment
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Attack of the 50 Ft. Woman (1993)
The arguably feminist original film was remade into a full-fledged feminist allegory by Waiting for Guffman director Christopher Guest, in an early HBO original movie that boasted (for the time) superior visual effects. Still campy, but still fun.
Photo: HBO
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Dude, Where's My Car? (2000)
The cult favorite Dude, Where's My Car stars Ashton Kutcher and Seann William Scott as lovable dopes who piece together an incredibly eventful, but totally forgotten night of partying. Naturally, it all ends with a giant attractive woman attacking our heroes at an arcade. One more memorably dumb joke in a memorably dumb comedy.
Photo: 20th Century Fox
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Monsters vs. Aliens
An animated homage to 1950s monster movies stars Reese Witherspoon as the voice of Ginormica, a woman who gains her independence after growing 50 feet tall, losing her fiancé and saving the planet from an alien menace, with a team of friendly monsters by her side. A fun genre throwback made with a lot of energy and heart.
Photo: Paramount Pictures
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Captain America: Civil War (2016)
All of the Marvel Studios heroes (well, almost all of them) come to blows in the middle of Captain America: Civil War, and it's an action sequence for the ages. Perhaps the best moment comes when Ant-Man puts his shrinking powers into reverse and grows into Giant Man, to the shock and awe of his fellow superheroes.
Photo (from Ant-Man): Marvel Studios
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The BFG (2016)
Steven Spielberg brought state of the art visual effects to Roald Dahl's children's story, bringing The BFG to life like never before, in a beautifully acted and heartwarming production. Mark Rylance and Ruby Barnhill are terrific in a movie that defies blockbuster conventions.
Photo: Walt Disney
