THE GIANTS OF THESSALY (1961)
aka I GIGANTI DELLA TESSAGLIA
Article 2163 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-16-2007
Posting Date: 7-15-2007
Directed by Riccardo Freda
Featuring Roland Carey, Ziva Rodann, Massimo Girotti

Jason and his Argonauts sail to Colchis to find the golden fleece while an evil schemer in Thessaly plans to take his wife away from him.

Just for the record, the giants here are metaphorical; they are giants in the heroic sense, being the perfectly ordinary-sized Jason and his Argonauts. No, this version of the story can’t hold a candle to Harryhausen’s version, but it is somewhat different from the usual sword-and-sandal movie in that it eschews the superstrong hero in favor of more average men, including not only Jason, but Orpheus as well. There are a few nice scenes; I like the battle with the one-eyed monster and Jason’s ascent of the statue, but overall there’s something rather dull about this movie; the characters never really come to life, and there’s too much dull dialogue to slow things down. Still, it looks like a little more care was taken with this one than some of the others I’ve seen; I just wish the results had been a little more interesting.