Giant (1956) on Netflix
Wealthy Texas rancher Jordan "Bick" Benedict Jr. buys a stallion in Maryland and marries Leslie Lynnton. His sister Luz resents the new bride, and ranch hand Jett Rink is infatuated with her.
- Netflix3.8/5
- IMDb7.6/1044,435 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes88%
Trailer
Plot summary
Leslie Lynnton, a socialite from Maryland, marries Jordan "Bick" Benedict Jr., a wealthy Texas cattle rancher she meets when he comes east to buy a prized stallion, and moves to his family's ranch, Reata. Bick's strong-willed sister Luz resents Leslie and tries to keep control of the household. Leslie also finds Texas society bound by patriarchal rules and racial hierarchies. Jett Rink, a ranch hand drawn to Leslie, shows her Biendecito, the rundown village where the ranch's Mexican laborers live in poverty; she presses Bick to improve their conditions and asks that the family doctor see Ángel Obregón II, the baby son of a ranch worker. Bick is at first unwilling to have the doctor treat non-white patients.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Giant (1956)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Giant was the last of Dean's three films as a leading actor and earned him his second and final Academy Award nomination; he was killed in a car crash before the film was released.
- Stevens, known for his meticulous approach to filmmaking, spent an entire year editing the film; following the death of James Dean late in production, actor Nick Adams was brought in to overdub several of Dean's lines as Jett Rink, which were deemed nearly inaudible during post-production.
- Director and critic Francois Truffaut said in his 1956 review of Giant that it was "Three hours and twenty minutes of deadly boredom tinted with disgust" and a "silly, solemn, sly, paternalistic, demagogic movie without any boldness."
- The character of Jett Rink was partially based on Glenn McCarthy, a flamboyant Texas wildcatter whose rags-to-riches rise helped shape the part; author Edna Ferber met McCarthy while staying at his Shamrock Hotel in Houston, an encounter that contributed to the fictional Emperador Hotel in novel and film.
- The film earned $35 million in ticket sales during its original studio release in 1956, a record for a Warner Brothers film that was not surpassed until the Warner film Superman in the late 1970s.
- Like the fictional Reata, which spans over half a million acres, the real King Ranch encompasses approximately 825,000 acres and extends across six Texas counties, including the majority of Kleberg County and a significant portion of Kenedy County.
- Giant is Edna Ferber's third novel dealing with racism, after Show Boat and Cimarron, and it was a blockbuster, selling 52 million books by 1956.
- Director George Stevens offered Rock Hudson a choice between Elizabeth Taylor and Grace Kelly for the role of Leslie, and Hudson selected Taylor for the part.
