In the vein of last year’s Snow White and the Huntsman and Mirror Mirror, Jack the Giant Slayer expands upon its fairy tale beginnings, maximising the plot and the laughs – but perhaps not always to full effect.
As the film opens, our hero Jack (Nicholas Hoult) is down on his luck. He’s an orphan (standard) and lives in a leaky cottage in the kingdom of Cloister with his crotchety uncle. Short of money, Jack is sent into town to sell their horse, only – and this is the part you may remember – he ends up exchanging it for a handful of beans.
Inevitably, one of the beans goes rogue beneath Jack’s floorboards, sprouting a giant beanstalk that, unluckily for Cloister’s inhabitants, climbs all the way up to a realm of legendary human-eating giants and – in the process – snatches away the kingdom’s adventure-seeking Princess Isabelle (Eleanor Tomlinson).
Soon enough the King and his men, led by Ewan McGregor’s Elmont, are on the case and Jack finds himself climbing the beanstalk in search of Isabelle, unaware that the King’s treacherous right hand man Roderick (Stanley Tucci) has hatched a dastardly plan that could spell ruin for the kingdom.
Director Bryan Singer – the man behind X-Men and Superman Returns – is no stranger to tackling big stories, larger-than-life characters and crash-bang-wallop setpieces. But, despite the $195 million budget, there is a strangely lacklustre feel to this film; at its worst, it even feels a little cheap.
The CGI is hit and miss, the laughs aren’t big enough – despite charming turns from Tucci and McGregor – and the plot, though bolstered by a few good twists and turns and a strong back story, is tied up rather too easily.
Perhaps the biggest problem is that Hoult is just a little too subtle for the lead role. Though he certainly looks the part, and there’s a likeable modesty to his performance that is rare amongst young stars, he’s just not leading man material. Together with co-star Tomlinson – who is not helped along by her utterly bog standard, paper thin part – Hoult more closely resembles a blank-eyed Ralph Lauren model, better suited to the pages of a glossy fashion mag than the branches of a beanstalk.
As a rollicking kids’ film, Jack the Giant Slayer just about scrapes a pass. There’s a genuinely thrilling sequence surrounding the giants coming to Earth and launching an attack on the kingdom, and the sting-in-the-tale ending is a nice little pay off to the film’s less than serious approach. But ultimately, for such a tall tale, Jack the Giant Slayer sets its sights pretty low.
Released in UK cinemas on Friday 22 March 2013.
Out now to buy on DVD, Blu-ray and 3D Blu-ray.
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