My Giant
USA 1998
Reviewed by Kevin Maher
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
On the Romanian location of a medieval film epic, talent agent Sammy Kanin is fired by his only client. Leaving, he crashes his car and is saved by Max, a local giant monk. With the promise of reuniting Max with his long-lost love Lillianna, who lives in New Mexico, Sammy persuades him to come to the US and star in movies. They arrive in New York. Sammy is broke, and so the only work he can get for Max is a job as a wrestler.
Sammy learns about a Steven Seagal movie filming in Las Vegas that would be perfect for Max. He asks his estranged wife Serena for the money to get to Vegas. Once there, Seagal likes Max and hires him. Through a medical check Max is found to have a terminal heart condition. Sammy contacts Lillianna but she refuses to see Max, and so he asks Serena to pretend to be Lillianna for one night. Moved by Sammy's altruism towards Max, Serena obliges. Their marriage is saved. Sammy takes Max home to Romania, reuniting him with the family he hadn't seen since he was a boy.
Review
My Giant is a strange and slightly disconcerting movie. Actor-producer Billy Crystal is omnipresent, self-aware and carefully cloying from the first frame to the closing credits. Yet unlike his own directorial efforts - Forget Paris and Mr. Saturday Night - what this film mostly resembles is an uninterrupted stream of Crystal's now famous Oscar Night movie parodies pasted together. And so we have Crystal the talent agent and his new-found giant star Gheorghe Muresan 'doing' sales parlance from Jerry Maguire, road scenes from Midnight Run, and misfit drama from King Kong and The Elephant Man - all bound by an oppressive sentimentality yet sadly without benefit of a punchline.
From an idea born out of Crystal's friendship with his Princess Bride's co-star Andre Roussimoff (aka Andre The Giant), who died in 1993, writer David Seltzer (The Omen) and director Michael Lehmann (Heathers) have created a movie of unerring derivativeness where everything is telegraphed and literal-minded. Muresan's gentle giant Max is dying because his heart is enlarged - it's literally too big. Sammy is a bad father because he misses his son's birthday party. Through Max's benign influence, Sammy discovers that beauty is on the inside: "He wanted to be small, I wanted to be big, but what we were looking for had nothing to do with size."
Ironically this cod appearances-are-superficial philosophy turns out to be utterly disingenuous in a movie that hinges on the aberrant demeanour of its central character. My Giant is dragged along by a series of throwaway sight gags - Max in a tiny sports car, Max at a tiny table, Max sitting on a tiny horse - which all depend on first impressions. Muresan, with his indented forehead, huge angular jaw and gargled delivery, is blatantly objectified as the movie's 'freak'. Yet unlike its classical precursor, Tod Browning's Freaks (1932) where physical abnormality is also fetishised but used to accentuate a dramatic crisis (in this case a deceptive love triangle), here the movie tries both to ridicule Muresan's size and deny it at the same time. When Sammy's senile aunt asks Max how big his penis is, it's a nasty moment, which coupled with Muresan's limited acting ability strains against all the easy rhetoric about the power of personality. Crystal himself, bereft of stinging one-liners, is strangely muted as the Hollywood agent. Unlike the mischievous Broadway Danny Rose or the cynical suits in The Player, Crystal's softer post-Jerry Maguire agent wants only to be a good father and is prone to eulogising about movies in Academy Award MC-speak. "Movies are like life," he gushes, "only bigger, and better. On a movie screen everyone is 40 feet tall!"
My Giant certainly looks pretty, thanks to the efforts of Scottish cinematographer Michael Coulter (The Neon Bible) - the frequently filmed Czech countryside (standing in for Romania) has rarely looked more lush on screen. Yet next to the howling inadequacies of director, scriptwriter and performers alike, this is ultimately a small reward from a substandard film.
Credits
- Producer
- Billy Crystal
- Screenplay
- David Seltzer
- Story
- Billy Crystal
- David Seltzer
- Director of Photography
- Michael Coulter
- Editor
- Stephen Semel
- Production Designer
- Jackson Degovia
- Music/Music Producer
- Marc Shaiman
- ©Castle Rock Entertainment
- Production Companies
- Castle Rock Entertainment presents
- a Face production
- Executive Producer
- Peter Schindler
- Associate Producer
- Lynne Boyarsky
- Production Supervisor
- Carl S. Griffin
- Production Co-ordinators
- Jeffrey Berk
- Czech Republic:
- Hilde Odelga
- New York:
- Lois Otto
- Production Managers
- Peter Schindler
- Czech Republic:
- Tomás Baloun
- New York:
- Steve Rose
- Location Managers
- George Herthel
- Czech Republic:
- Zdenek Fiala
- New York:
- Heidi Topper
- Post-production Supervisor
- Christy Dimmig
- Production Consultants
- Czech Republic:
- Jan Balzer
- Katerina Schauerová
- 2nd Unit Director
- Paul Weston
- Assistant Directors
- Mike Topoozian
- Bob Wagner
- Ken Wada
- Czech Republic:
- Petr Hartl
- Lucie Minariková
- Script Supervisor
- Marion Tumen
- Casting
- Pam Dixon Mickelson
- Associate:
- Barbara Allen
- ADR Voice:
- Barbara Harris
- 2nd Unit Director of Photography
- Chris Plevin
- Underwater Director of Photography
- Czech Republic:
- Mike Valentine
- Camera Operators
- Paul Babin
- Czech Republic, Underwater:
- Mike Valentine
- Czech Republic:
- Klemens Becker
- Steadicam Operators
- Mark O'Kane
- Czech Republic:
- Klemens Becker
- New York:
- Andrew Casey
- Wescam Camera Operator
- Czech Republic:
- Graham Berry
- Visual Effects
- Pacific Title/Mirage Digital
- Executive Producer:
- Joe Gareri
- Digital Effects Supervisor:
- David Sosalla
- Technical Supervisor:
- Patrick Phillips
- Special Effects
- Co-ordinator:
- Richard Ratliff
- Foreman:
- Wes Mattox
- Czech Republic Supervisor:
- David Harris
- Art Directors
- Tom Reta
- Czech Republic:
- Crispian Sallis
- New York:
- Woods Mackintosh
- Set Designers
- Les Gobruegge
- Christopher S. Nushawg
- Czech Republic:
- Adam O'Neill
- Jan Vlasák
- Set Decorators
- Kathe Klopp
- New York:
- Timothy Metzger
- Illustrator
- Oliver Dear
- Storyboard Artist
- Marc Vena
- Costume Designer
- Rita Ryack
- Costume Supervisor
- Mari Grimaud
- Wardrobe Supervisor
- New York:
- Timothy J. Alberts
- Make-up
- Key Artist:
- Peter Montagna
- Artist:
- Mark Landon
- Czech Republic Artist:
- Zdenek Klika
- New York Artist:
- Margot Boccia
- Hairstylists
- Key:
- Bill Farley
- Czech Republic:
- Ivana Langhammerová
- New York:
- Scott W. Farley
- Main & End Titles Design
- Nina Saxon Film Design
- Main & End Titles/Opticals
- Howard Anderson Company
- Music Conductor
- Artie Kane
- Music Orchestrations
- Jeff Atmajian
- Frank Bennett
- Brad Dechter
- Patrick Russ
- Music Editor
- Scott Stambler
- Music Scoring Mixer
- Dennis Sands
- Music Programming
- Nick Vidar
- Music Consultant
- Arlene Fishbach
- Soundtrack
- "What I Did for Love" by Edward Kleban, Marvin Hamlisch; "My Way" by Paul Anka, Gilles Thibault, Jacques Revaux, Claude François; "Whip It" by Mark Mothersbaugh, Gerald Casale; "I Got Plenty o'Nuttin" by George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin, DuBose Heyward, Dorothy Heyward
- Production Sound
- Jeff Wexler
- Don Coufal
- Scott Sherline
- Mark C. Grech
- Re-recording Mixers
- Paul Massey
- D.M. Hemphill
- Supervising Sound Editors
- Robert Grieve
- Gregory King
- Dialogue Editors
- Darren King
- Kim Drummond
- Sound Effects Editor
- Yann Delpuech
- ADR
- Editors:
- G.W. Brown
- Michele Perrone
- Foley
- One Step Up
- Artists:
- Dan O'Connell
- Claudette Cucci
- Mixer:
- John Cucci
- Editors:
- John Murray
- Meg Taylor
- Joel Shryack
- Romanian Language Consultant
- Irene Vianu
- Stunt Co-ordinators
- John Branagan
- Czech Republic:
- Paul Weston
- Helicopter Pilot
- Czech Republic:
- Frederick Valentine
- Film Extract
- Dirty Harry
(1971)- Cast
- Billy Crystal
- Sammy Kanin
- Kathleen Quinlan
- Serena Kanin
- Gheorghe Muresan
- Max
- Joanna Pacula
- Lillianna
- Zane Carney
- Nick Kanin
- Jere Burns
- Weller
- Harold Gould
- Milt
- Dan Castellaneta
- Partlow
- Raymond O'Connor
- Eddie
- Rider Strong
- Justin Allen
- Doris Roberts
- Rose
- Carl Ballantine
- rabbi
- Eric Lloyd
- young Sammy Kanin
- Jay Black
- Jay
- Lorna Luft
- Joanne
- Tony Belton
- man on street
- Lindsay Crystal
- Stephanie
- Peter Schindler
- Don
- Martin Faltyn
- cinema manager
- Miroslav Dubsky
- cameraman
- Dale Wyatt
- dialogue coach
- David Steinberg
- David Steinberg
- Ajay Naidu
- hot dog vendor
- Estelle Harris
- Aunt Pearl
- Elaine Kagan
- Myrna
- Philip Sterling
- Uncle Nate
- Max Goldblatt
- Jerry
- E.E. Bell
- ring announcer
- Michael Papajohn
- Lincoln Simonds
- tough guys
- Steven Seagal
- Steven Seagal
- Heather Thomas
- showgirl
- Rick Overton
- director
- Richard Portnow
- producer
- Nikki Micheaux
- P.A. Jeannie
- Lawrence Pressman
- doctor
- Yvonne De La Paix
- cleaning woman
- Miroslava Baburková
- Zoja Oubramová
- peasant women
- Vaclav Kotva
- Max's father
- Lena Birková
- Max's mother
- [uncredited]
- Walt G. Ludwig
- Mike, airport personnel
- Certificate
- PG
- Distributor
- Warner Bros Distributors (UK)
- 9,314 feet
- 103 minutes 29 seconds
- Dolby/SDDS
- Colour/Prints by
- Technicolor