Village of the Giants (1965)

Sorry, this movie sucks

Best movie of this year hands down!

A lot of fun.

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Thanks to young Ronnie Howard's formula, a small village gets filled with giant critters including dancing ducks, carnivores cats, friendly Fido's the size of a one story building and a pet tarantula too big for its mason jar. Still cute little Opie Taylor at the time, Howard was sort of the Andy Hardy of his time, and oh what trouble he causes in this deliciously bad science fiction "musical"? Yes indeed, there are Dancing Ducks. These friendly little quackers get ahold of some of Ronnie special formula ("the goo") and pretty soon are on a spit roasting for one of the biggest picnics this small-town community has ever seen. It's truly in bad "taste" that sees the dancing duck enliven a little party where the teenage population is down, not realizing that their intrusion will have them as a roast. It seems like the tongue was in the cheek of the people who wrote this, and if the duck isn't enough, the scary spider, the crazy cat and the friendly Pooch will certainly have you amused And when some of the Teen swallows some of Howard's formula, it really goes over the top, especially when the growing young ladies loose theirs. Oh, and speaking of Andy Hardy, one of the teen actors is played by Tim Rooney, son of the original Andy Hardy who would be jealous of the idea that Opie Taylor gets here.In addition to leading young man Tommy Kirk is a very young Beau Bridges. This hits its nadir in a sequence where giant teenagers (that alone is scary in itself) begin a dance while another one (Johnny Crawford), not made into a giant, hangs onto the sequined bra of one of the blonde bimbo beatnik type chicks who invaded the tiny community. If the opening scene of these juvenile delinquents rolling around in rain soaked mud doesn't have you rolling your eyes, this sequence (where the hapless young boob hanging on for dear life) definitely will. The presence of the few adults who don't even do a double take after seeing all the giant teens. After the film settles down into its juvenile plot, it becomes rather dull, with really wretched attempts at acting. The blonde crazy women seem like the types who would later flock to Charles Manson's country camps. At times, the really bad special effects make those on "The Amazing Colossal Man" and "The Attack of the 50' Woman" seem worthy of Oscars in comparison. If remade today, this needs to focus on the idiotic teenagers who text walking down the street, and make them crash into buildings because they are not paying attention to where they are going.

Turn off the brain for this campy craziness. Ron Howard, in his Opie days, invents "goo," which, when ingested, causes super growth. Beau Bridges leads a bunch of bad teens, Tommy Kirk (of Disney comedy fame) is the leader of some good teens, and you are the befuddled audience trying to believe what is transpiring on the screen.Natch: the idiotic bad teens get a hold of the goo, and turn into colossal idiotic bad teens who take over a small town somewhere. Apparently, the presence of 30 foot hostile giants does not interest anyone outside of the town, so the townsfolk are left to fend for themselves. Of course, nobody in the town except the good teens bother to do anything about it.Once the giants appear, the action is limited, probably due to a lack of budget for special effects. The growth sequence is about all they really focused on, where they --oh, never mind. It's the highlight of the film, though, trust me. Progressively cheaper and cheaper effects parade their way through the story after that. My favorite is the scene where they try to "tie up" a giant Beau Bridges. You see two plastic poles (supposed to be his legs) being roped by the good teens. They then try to fasten the ropes with hot rods orbiting the "surprised" victim. Every once in a while, they show Beau making spasmodic and confused expressions in slow motion. By the way, whenever they show a character in slow-mo, you know it's one of the giants.The movie knows it's idiotic, and makes no effort to conceal it. Good for a laugh at how absurd it is.

As mentioned in the summary line, "Village Of The Giants" has many of the elements of the live action Disney comedies of the early 60's: mildly bemused humor with a 'way out' attitude, safely toned down for the kiddies ("The Barefoot Executive"); teen gang dynamics romance, and dancing ("The Monkey's Uncle"); a magical chemical substance that breaks the laws of physics via cheesy process shots ("Flubber"); a juvenile genius ("The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes") and even Tommy Kirk (ex-Mousketeer and juvenile lead from many of the old Disney movies, by then in exile from The Magic Kingdom). My guess is that Bert I. Gordon, who tried his hand at many different genres (including fantasy, horror, and film noir)(all badly) decided to make a Disney film - only slightly hipper (music by the Beau Brummels, blonds in bikinis, drug jokes, etc) racier by 60's standards) and campier."Village" is intentionally camp and cheesy, all right. And it's even vaguely funny. Not "ha-ha" funny, but pothead funny - if you were stoned or drunk, you might get a mild chuckle out of the proceedings.In its favor, "Giants" features some pretty nice eye candy in the form of the blond girl members of the 'bad' teen gang that comes to town to make trouble for "our" wholesome, law abiding teen gang. (This is speaking as a male, of course). They're pretty hot, if you like the Pam Anderson platinum blond go-go dancer type. They also dance real good. And the Beau Brummels contribute a couple of nice, lively pop songs that are much rawer and funkier than anything you would hear in a Disney film from that time.Against: practically everything else. Beau Bridges eventually matured into a fine actor, but the movie tries to peddle him as a cool guy and a teen idol, which is ridiculous given his mole-like, opaque features, constipated expression and pale, flabby body. He has great hair and complexion, and that's it. Poor Tommy Kirk tries his best to carry the film as the teen 'hero' of the town, but at this point in his career, it was basically over for him. As a result, he tries too way hard and the movie makes him such a goody two shoes that you can't help but cheer when giant Beau backhands him for a loop. The special effects range from barely acceptable (a couple nice shots of the giant kids gathered on a theater stage) to ludicrously bad (the giant mannequin legs that Tommy breaks a chair against). The screenplay is completely brain dead even as it tries to veer from heavy handed irony to action to comedy, managing to be none of those things...not even good camp. I don't want to pick on the supporting cast, though, because the screenplay called for cardboard cutouts to go through the motions and allows none of the 'minor' members of the cast any room for something as evocative as actual 'acting'. BTW, what was the deal with the red headed go-go dancer? Was it supposed to be sexy when she vibrates all over like a blender set on 'puree'? Was she supposed to be shaking her 'bippy'? It wasn't a go-go dance, it was a muscle control exhibition...! Wait, stop, take a breath. (Whoofa, whoofa, whoofa. OMMMMMmmmmmm...)OK, the movie is basically harmless. It's just really stupid, so stupid as to nullify even the 'camp' entertainment value. MST3K covered it in one of their later 'Sci-Fi' channel episodes, which is pretty funny. Go watch that one if you can, or don't. You won't be missing much.

If you want to watch a well made movie, this isn't it. 'Village of the Giants' seems to be a B movie that was intended to attract young kids and the teen audience of the early 1960s. What you will find here is a poorly directed, low budget, movie with bad acting, cheap special effects, and a plot that goes no where. You'll see a lot of bikini clad teenagers, go go dancing to some mild, early rock and roll music played by the Beau Brummels. The camera does show a lot of cleavage shots and wiggling butts that surely was and is one of the movies main attractions. This movie was most likely considered a little racy for it's day. Quite a bit of this movie brings up the anti authority, good teen versus bad teen issue. This is all very mild by today's standards. Actually this makes it humorous in today's world and it can be mildly entertaining if not taken too seriously. It is nice to see Ron Howard as a child actor in this movie playing the part of 'Genius'. You'll also find a couple of ex Mickey Mouse Club members in the cast. 'Village of the Giants' could be considered one of those 'it's so bad it's good' movies. You have to view this as a fun, but stupid movie and by no means look at it with a critical eye. Under the harsh light of criticism,'Village of the Giants' will disintegrate into the smallest piece of dust.