X
- 2018
- Not Rated
- RLJ Entertainment
- 1 h 46 m
- 2018
- Not Rated
- RLJ Entertainment
- 1 h 46 m
Summary Barbara Thorson (Madison Wolfe) is a teenage girl who escapes the realities of school and a troubled family life by retreating into her magical world of fighting evil giants. With the help of her new friend Sophia (Sydney Wade) and her school counselor (Zoe Saldana), Barbara learns to face her fears and battle the giants that threaten he...
Directed By: Anders Walter
Written By: Joe Kelly, J.M. Ken Niimura
- 2018
- Not Rated
- RLJ Entertainment
- 1 h 46 m
- 2018
- Not Rated
- RLJ Entertainment
- 1 h 46 m
I Kill Giants
74
6.7
Where to Watch
Summary Barbara Thorson (Madison Wolfe) is a teenage girl who escapes the realities of school and a troubled family life by retreating into her magical world of fighting evil giants. With the help of her new friend Sophia (Sydney Wade) and her school counselor (Zoe Saldana), Barbara learns to face her fears and battle the giants that threaten he...
Directed By: Anders Walter
Written By: Joe Kelly, J.M. Ken Niimura
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 10 Critic Reviews
74
90% Positive
9 Reviews
9 Reviews
10% Mixed
1 Review
1 Review
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 10 Critic Reviews
74
90% Positive
9 Reviews
9 Reviews
10% Mixed
1 Review
1 Review
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Magical, subtle, sensitive and touching, I Kill Giants is everything the bombastic “A Wrinkle in Time” is not.
Walter is riding a tricky line, but it’s his mixing of fantasy and reality, making the edges between the two porous, that ultimately sells the film.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 76 User Ratings
6.7
62% Positive
47 Ratings
47 Ratings
28% Mixed
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
11% Negative
8 Ratings
8 Ratings
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 76 User Ratings
6.7
62% Positive
47 Ratings
47 Ratings
28% Mixed
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
11% Negative
8 Ratings
8 Ratings
It's hard to say what the best part is... the dialogue, the photography, the CGI, Wolfe's performance or the twist ending. Giants is a story we've heard before but never so well told or fascinating to watch.
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Walter brings a sense of the epic to Kelly's uniquely sensitive story that bravely faces down the good and the evil that exists within us all.
Imogen Poots and Zoe Saldana add their names to the project but, although they give solid turns, their roles are secondary. The star is relative newcomer 15-year old Madison Wolfe, whose performance is note-perfect.
While the film isn’t as subtle as A Monster Calls or Where the Wild Things Are, it captures the messiness of suffering just as well.
That the perspective this time is from a girl’s point of view rather than a boy’s is significant. At least it is in theory. The scripter is Joe Kelly, who, along with J.M. Ken Nimura, created the comic. It’s not a knock to note that the main creative talents behind the camera are male — the women of the cast are clearly imbuing their characterizations with what they know. But there’s still something about I Kill Giants that feels projected, a work more informed by empathy than experience.
It’s well-intended, it’s heartfelt and in its small-scale fashion it’s surprisingly ambitious, but it’s also content to cheat its own premise and withhold its genre pleasures, which effectively undermines Barbara’s journey.
Madison Wolfe is a future star. Her performance is truly amazing. I watched this film with my daugther (12 years)and it is a perfect movie for her age. And it served as a great reference afterwards, when we talked about how kids treat each other and how to cope with loss.
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Very strong and important messages, if they were conveyed somewhat directly.
A compelling and very sophisticated protagonist brought to life by a great performance from Madison Wolfe, if Barbara Thorson was so nervy and rude that make me have less sympathy for her than I should have had.
A good balancing between the reality and the magical world, if not very good at the climax.
Very overwhelming and emotional ending that will definitely make you shed a tear, if the ending was faster than needed.
Gorgeous special effects for a low-budget film or maybe for any film.
Wonderful performance Zoe Saldana, Sydney Wade and Imogen Poots (especially from Imogen Poots)
The character of Taylor, the bully, is very very corny and stereotyped, and Rory Jackson made the character even worse with her over-the-top performance.
(7/10)
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I Kill Giants is a young adult drama with some fantasy elements that follows a girl, named Barbara, who believes that she hunts and kills giants. This film isn't quite as fantasy centric as I expected after seeing the poster for it. The main focus of this film is to show how Barbara deals with her fears and the problems she is currently facing. She's often bullied and referred to as the "weird girl" when she is at school, but when she is outside of school she seems rather outgoing and brave in her quest to "save the city" from the giants that she believes are coming to destroy everything. However, there are not really any giants. The giants are from her imagination and they represent something that has been looming over her for some time–a fact, which is revealed later in the film, that she does not want to accept. It is with that revelation that I came to sympathize with Barbara, because up until that point she really hadn't earned it. She is clearly smart, and I hate seeing anyone get bullied, but there were plenty of times outside of when she is getting bullied where she basically shoots herself in the foot. She creates problems for herself that could have been avoided. So while I was rooting for her all the way through, I couldn't help but get a bit frustrated with her as well. I do think that the final act of the film wrapped up well, though, and I was on board with the message this film is trying to get across. However, I do think that the fantasy and real world elements could have been more properly balanced and well blended. There are plenty of plot holes and some elements of the story just don't tie in well together. I also believe that this film would have benefited from the character of Barbara coming off as more likable through the first half of the film. Furthermore, this is a young adult drama but I think it would have a tough time holding the attention of a young adult audience. It's slow at times, and if the audience went in expecting lots of fantasy elements, or lots of action, they'd be quite disappointed. Overall, this is a young adult drama that might be more fit for an older audience, but the problem is that an older audience is going to see the problems with the story and characters much easier. That puts this film in a tough spot, and I think that's why it has gotten such a mixed reaction from people who have watched it. However, I will say that if this ever makes its way to a streaming service it might be worth a shot for you to try it out if you're into young adult films.
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It has a resemblance both in tone and thematic with When a Monster Calls but manages to distance itself and mark its own path.
The interesting resonates because the character is feminine and exposes her fierceness, anguish, anger, fear and pain and those are elements that are rarely explored in films like this and if they do they end up being reduced or minimized.
This is a coming of age drama that balances itself between real life problems and fantasy but it never loses sight of what it's trying to say, yet its proposal never dares to be more obscure and frontal and that wouldn't have been bad at all.
This film is nothing remarkable but it's sufficiently productive and functional, it's well done and well acted, especially remarking the work its young protagonist and I really believe it deserves more attention than what it will ended up receiving.
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Production Company
1492 Pictures,
Ocean Blue Entertainment,
XYZ Films,
Umedia,
uFund,
Man of Action,
Adonais Productions,
Having Me Films,
Image Comics,
Ingenious Media,
Parallel Films
Release Date Mar 23, 2018
Duration 1 h 46 m
Rating Not Rated
Tagline I find giants. I hunt giants.
Website
http://barbara-movie.jp/
Awards
Film Club's The Lost Weekend
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
CPH PIX
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
BUFF International Film Festival
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
