Jack the Giant Slayer

The movie opens with a farmer telling his son Jack the story of King Eric and the Giants.  Elsewhere, at that same moment, the queen is telling her daughter the same tale, so we switch from one to the other.  The tale tells of some monks who sought to visit god by creating a beanstalk that would allow them to climb to heaven.  Instead, they found a land of giants who descended upon the lands of men, bringing destruction.  King Eric had a crown forged from the black heart of a giant and was able to control the giants with it.  He sent them back to their abode and had the beanstalk cut down.  Such is now the stuff of legend.

 

Years later, Jack (Nicholas Hoult) is sent by his uncle to sell a horse and cart.  He gets distracted by a performance of King Eric and seeks to protect a lady from ruffians.  The lady proves to be Princess Isabelle (Eleanor Tomlinson) who was watching the play incognito.  By the time Jack gets back to the horse and cart, he finds the cart is gone.  Still trying to sell the horse, he gets beans from a monk who assures him the abbot will pay dearly for them.  However, don’t get them wet!  His uncle is less than pleased, scattering the useless beans across the floor, one of which falls between the floorboards.  He storms off to sell something else, leaving Jack to mope.

 

Coincidence of coincidences, Princess Isabelle arrives at the humble farmhouse in the middle of a storm that very night.  She is fleeing home because she doesn’t want to marry Roderick (Stanley Tucci).  Her banter with Jack is cut short when a beanstalk lifts the house.  Jack falls but Isabelle is carried upward.

 

Though his generals counsel that he cut down the beanstalk, the King (Ian McShane) sends a rescue party to recover his daughter.  Elmont (Ewan McGregor) leads a party of 10 men as well as Jack and Roderick.  Sure enough, they encounter giants and are easily overcome.  All except Jack.  For no apparent reason, Jack is a sneaky fellow who manages to be in the right place at the right time.

 

There are some bits that are goofy.  Elmont managed to escape the land of the giants by riding the freshly cut beanstalk all the way down, jumping off just as he was lined up with the castle moat.  Likewise, Jack and Isabelle were on the beanstalk and swung from a vine to land on a haystack; well done, Jack.  Elmont is a much more interesting character.  He has some great lines and is sort of a happy-go-lucky soldier who grins a lot.

 

Inevitably, the princess ends up with Jack, which was weird.  Sure, it was a foregone conclusion but he’s a peasant and she’s a princess.  His great claim is that he used King Eric’s crown of Giant Control to once again send the giants home.

 

The end is rather peculiar since it shows the crown being made fancier until it becomes the British crown, held in the Tower of London.  Oh, this is all English history?  I did not realize.