Powerful

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

A delightful kiddie fantasy in the mould of the SINBAD films - and just as good as, if not better than, any of them! This production has a quaint feel to it of a make-believe world which never existed, a world full of weird monsters and heroic peasants. Non-stop action and plot twists help to keep things running along smoothly, but the icing on the cake is the sheer quantity of weird and wonderful creatures appearing at every opportunity! The evil villain of the piece, Torin Thatcher (complete with moustache, beard and high collar) has himself surrounded by all manner of zombies, witches and demons. The makeup used is effective-looking and quite possibly scary for younger viewers. Animation is used to make the witches glow and shoot various flames and rays at people, delightful in a tacky sense. The real fun comes from the stop motion effects, which are spectacular. Although lacking the finesse of Ray Harryhausen's creations (probably due to lack of time and money), these are still something to behold and quite passable for a children's film. We get giant horned monsters, a funny-looking serpent, and even a flying demon for the finale.Kerwin Matthews stars as the heroic lead and even has a glint of charisma about his wooden persona. But it's Judi Meredith who dominates things as the squeaky clean princess who eventually gets transformed into a witch herself - in a novel twist, a mirror reveals her secret, true self - that of a pale woman in a red dress, with yellow serpent eyes! There is something about Meredith's appearance as a witch which makes her strangely beautiful - compare her to Barbara Steele in CURSE OF THE CRIMSON ALTAR and Amanda Donohoe in LAIR OF THE WHITE WORM and you'll see what I mean, these serpent-like ladies are irresistible! Support comes from a Viking (!) and a young orphan boy, who are turned into a dog and a chimpanzee respectively! You'll never see anything quite like this. Also lurking about is an annoying leprechaun (aren't they always...) offering advice while being trapped in a bottle.It's the visual, fantastic images which remain in the memory after watching. Highlights such as a corridor full of sword-wielding arms and a helpful skeleton pointing the way are truly excellent, a shame there aren't more films around like this. Who can forget the scene where Jack whips an army of armoured knights with a skeleton's arm, turning them into clouds of smoke? JACK THE GIANT KILLER is a superb children's film, one of the best I've ever seen, and eminently rewatchable. It's even on par with JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS, which is saying something! For kids of all ages, see and enjoy.

Stay calm. It's going to take a little longer than usual to tell the whole story.When I was in kindergarten I used to go to a community center after school. The people who ran the community center would occasionally show us tykes movies. Mostly it was fare like "E.T.", "Honey I Shrunk the Kids" and "The Little Mermaid", all of which we watched multiple times. But there was one movie that they showed whose title I didn't learn. We watched this movie only once, but a few scenes stuck in my mind: someone gives the princess a box from which a dancing figure emerges; someone walks down a staircase and casts a spell on the box, causing the figure to turn into a monster which kidnaps the princess; someone tries to save the princess.I remembered these few scenes vividly, but nothing else about the movie. For years I wondered what the movie was called. Finally, I wrote an article in one of IMDb's query sections. I described the scenes that I had vividly remembered for all these years and asked if anyone knew the movie's title. Someone quickly answered: "Jack the Giant Killer". So, I've finally seen the whole movie. And it's a really fun movie. It was a surprise to see that I had only remembered the first ten to fifteen minutes of the movie, but I might not have originally seen the whole thing. Whatever the case, the whole movie is something that you're bound to love. Princess Elaine is one smokin' hot gal, but she looks especially sexy in her evil form. Something about the chalky skin and yellow eyes makes her extra good-looking.It's so funny how the mind remembers certain things perfectly and other things not at all.

When I saw this movie as a kid in 1972? I enjoyed it.I am no longer a kid, and its no longer 1972. It was released in 1962 and it shows. Special effects have improved, and so have many aspects of movie making. Today the monsters may be scary for a 5 year old, but are laughable for a 10 year old. The only audience that may still enjoy this movie are the 6-10 year old audience. Maybe.I found the Leprachaun to be the best part of the movie, and he had very limited appearances.For its time, maybe it was worth a 6, but for todays audiences I'd avoid it. I give it a 5, but its probably worth a 4. Its watchable in a way because its so bad.

It's the fairy tale land of Cornwall, England, and the Black Prince Pendragon (Torin Thatcher) plans to abduct Princess Elaine (Judith Meredith) so as to gain control of the land. However, his plans are at first thwarted when farmers boy Jack (Kerwin Matthews) slays the giant sent by Pendragon to claim the Princess. But Pendragon is not to be denied and a battle between good and evil commences.There's quite a back story to this United Artists feature film. It's loosely based on the traditional tale "Jack the Giant Killer" and features the use of stop motion animation. The mere mention of stop motion automatically brings to mind the great name of Ray Harryhausen. In 1958 director Nathan Juran had helmed The 7th Voyage of Sinbad with both Matthews and Thatcher starring as the good and evil characters respectively. A big success for Columbia, Harryhausen had offered it to UA producer Edward Small who turned it down, much to his regret. So here, four years later, he gathered the same crew for what essentially is a retread of the plot of Sinbad's seventh in the hope of replicating said success. Harryhausen, however, said no, perhaps understandably, so his creatures were created for "Jack" by Project Unlimited under the watchful eye of one time Harryhausen understudy Jim Danforth. While the other effects, filmed in "Fantascope" come courtesy of Howard A. Anderson and Augie Lohman.Columbia sued Small on the grounds of plot similarity, thus holding up the release of the film in the UK for several years (it wasn't banned as some people seem to think). Once released the film was panned by the critics and many parents were outraged that the film was too violent and scary for youngsters. Small would take this personally and intending to make something of the movie, had it re-dubbed and made into a musical. The result of which is just garbage. Thankfully the film was finally restored to its original glory on DVD and found a whole new generation of fantasy adventure fans with a bent for the lost art of stop motion animation. Kerwin Matthews passed away in 2007, a handsome swashbuckling actor, Jack The Giant Killer was his last foray into the fantasy adventure genre. It's at least comforting to know that he got to see this little treasure of a film finally get accepted by an audience.The film itself delivers everything one expects of the genre. The creatures are effective, even if the jerkiness shows that it's not Harryhausen at the helm; tho this is off set by a wonderful sequence as electricity cloaked witch demons attack Jack's ship. There's a dashing hero, a pretty princess, a vile and chilling evil doer, hell there's even the little imp of the lamp (Don Beddoe) for some limerick shenanigans. From its delightful story book opening to its final battle between hero and villain, Jack The Giant Killer is a rich and playful fantasy. 7/10