Village of the Giants

Village of the Giants
by Bert I. Gordon

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Movie Reviews of Village of the Giants

Movie Review: To say it is Bert I.'s finest film would be faint praise.
Summary: 5 Stars

It is, and you can believe me, because I am a believable guy, the BEST BAD MOVIE OF ALL TIME!

All the things that make Bert I. Gordon movies what they are are present here, in full- and silly- force. In fact, it is as if all Bert's planets aligned at once, and he found his true calling, moving beyond mere Colossal Beasts and Cyclopean things and giant Spiders, to those most photogenic of glandular mishaps: Giant women! Not to say that there isn't a giant tarantula in this film, or a colossal beast in the whiny form of a young Beau Bridges, but Bert's camera clearly favors the elephantine charms of Joy and Tish (as well as the average-sized pulchritude of Toni) over the evermore passe thrills of mere oversized creatures. Like, giant grasshoppers are SO 1957!

Other things contribute to the overall pleasing quality of this film's ineptitude, not the least of which is, despite Bert's recurrent leering, a basically naïve sensibility: movies had not become too dirty or trashy yet. The bad teens are about as menacing as wheelchair-bound octogenarians- they wear cardigans, for goshsakes. And while there is a definite cheesecake factor at play here, it is in the G-rated manner of the Frankie-and-Annie Beach Party films, not the slimy type in evidence in later Hammer horrors.

Other bad movies are equally as "bad." Al Adamson, Jerry Warren, Colman Francis, Ed Wood's later stuff, even Bert himself a few years later... all of these guys make lousy films. But they're sleazier somehow- not as *fun.*

Fans of the Hideous Sun Demon know well how star Robert Clarke's trousers became soaked with sweat during filming in the hot sun, to the point where it looked as though the Sun Demon couldn't control his bladder. That led to unintentional hilarity for B-lovers.

Now imagine several howlingly funny instances like that for every minute of this film's 80-minute run time. Dialogue, plot, effects, music, direction- everything is side-splittingly ...here. There are more laughs in this movie than in Jim Carrey's entire filmography.
And far from being the bewildering, incoherently awful mess that Plan 9 is, this movie is very straightforward; it just does everything in such an over-the-top and utterly wrong fashion.

Now, in the manner of the copy on those lovably hyperbolic posters from days gone by, I will outline only a fraction of this movie's treasured moments:
See! Beau Bridges try to pick up a chick by telling her his dad is the biggest man in the meat business!
See! Where John Ratzenberger got his inspiration for Cliff Clavan the mother-dominated postman in Beau's wink-wink nudge-nudge performance!
See! Ronnie Howard create a substance which turns normal things into giants, and act surprised when they leave!
See! Tommy Kirk claim the giant ducks for his own, raising his arms as though he just scored the winning touchdown!
See! The infamous ride of a young cowboy on Joy Harmon's bust!
See! Bert I. Gordon's directorial genius, as shots of the tail feathers of ducks being tortured by gaffers are intercut with shots of boogieing girls' rear ends!
See! Song after song after song after song, each one more hypnotically campy and dated than the last!
See! "Giants" moving very s l o w ly, to signify how totally, you know, HUGE they are!
See! Cops not notice the 30-foot tall teens in technicolor clothing standing ten feet away!
See! Tommy break a fake chair over Beau's skinny, knobby, hairy plaster leg, then listen in incredulity as Beau shouts, "O o o o o o oww!" and pouts!
See! Several scenes of interminable length while the bad "teens" shake it before the camera! See Beau make fine use of the ever-popular dance technique known as 'The White Man's Overbite!'
See! Midgets longing to be giants!
See! Much more wonderful, terrible stuff than I could tell you about if this review were five times this long! This really doesn't even begin to touch how comic the dialogue, or performances, or the direction are!

See! Yourself buying this dvd posthaste! Then, buy one for a friend!

See! also: Hideous Sun Demon; Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine; Astounding She-Monster; Jail Bait; Brain From Planet Arous; Phantom Planet; Attack of the Fifty-Foot Woman (1958); Magic Sword!