In the 1920s, Jordan 'Bick' Benedict, head of a wealthy Texas ranching family, travels to Maryland to buy War Winds - a horse that he is planning to put out to stud. There he meets and courts socialite Leslie Lynnton (Elizabeth Taylor), who ends a budding relationship with British diplomat Sir David Karfrey (Rod Taylor) and marries Bick after a whirlwind romance.
Some critics consider Giant to too bloated and sprawling, but by its era's standards, it exposed idelogical cracks in the American Dream, the myth of melting pot, women's allotted place in society.
The combination of director George Stevens and source novelist Edna Ferber, both given to expressions of overblown high seriousness, yields a long, slow, achingly self-important movie.
An excellent film which registers strongly on all levels, whether it's in its breathtaking panoramic shots of the dusty Texas plains; the personal, dramatic impact of the story itself, or the resounding message it has to impart.
A real movie is big, grand, magnificent and regales you with all the power that movies can wield upon a viewer's imagination and spirit. George Stevens' 1956 production, Giant, is a real movie.
Sweeping saga of American prosperity that reveals its racist underbelly; glorious star vehicle that upends rigid gender roles; modern western that questions the validity of frontier land ownership.
