GIANT (1956) ** It's a Texas soap opera, but suffers from the lack of sympathetic characters, realistic plot line, and most of all, the brevity of a "Dallas" episode. The acting is good. Rock Hudson is an excellent Texan, or rather excellent at being a Texan. Elizabeth Taylor is a chick from a family in Maryland that has black servants. As soon as she gets to Texas she starts bitching about the way they treat Mexicans. Racism is a recurring theme, particularly in the last 30 minutes, and the message was progressive for the time, I guess. James Dean is wildly uneven, but that means some moments of brilliance-particularly the proposal scene. He begins grotesque, alcohol and money make him human then grotesque again. The make-up people do a great job of making the actors look old, Dean is particularly striking. I think the moral is that smart girls shouldn't marry guys that spend a lot of time chasing cows.
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