Stoutor It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

kapelusznik18 ***SPOILERS*** A lot of strange things have been happening in and around the town of Pine Ridge that reach a breaking point for those living there when local cattleman Harold Banks was found beaten to death by what at first was suspected to be an escapee from a near mental institution. It's when professor Cleveland played by the venerable "Eternal Colonel" himself Morris Ankrum, in a rare non military role, shows up or rolled into town with his lovely and available, yes she's not married, daughter Janet, Sally Fraser, that things really started to get out of hand.That's in the towns handsome and single and unattached hard as well as soft rock specialist Wayne Brooks, Edward Kemmer, by him taking a shine more to Janet then to the rocks that he's studying. It turns out that Wayne had found a 500 year old lizard encased in a rock formation that came to life after he cracked it open with a dose of radiation! As for the professor he's interested in finding the remains of this giant Spanish Conquistador named Varges "The Diablo Giant", Buddy Baer, who vanished with his men in and around Pine Ridge some 500 years ago. It soon becomes apparent that Vargas is alive and well in them hills when a bolt of lighting struck his burial site at Devil's Crag and brought him back to life! Rampaging through the area Vargas murders Ann Brown, Joline Brand, as she was fetching water from a nearby well.It turns out that it's Wayne who's suspected in Ann's murder in that a Spanish medallion that belonged to him was found at the murder site.***SPOILERS*** It took a while for Wayne to convince the local Sheriff Parker, Bob Steele, that he's innocent after a number of brutal killings that included that of the wise old Indian Joe, Billy Dix, while Wayne was still in custody. With a search party organized by Sheriff Parker that included the late Ann's brother Charlie Brown, Gary Crutcher, who by going on his own almost ends up getting himself killed by Vargas. Tracked down in an abandoned cabin the big guy as he checked out is finally trapped on a skimpy bridge, that could barley support his 400 plus pound weight, by Wayne and while fighting him he ends up losing his footing and drops down and washed away into a 100 foot waterfall. Where he ends up draining intro a radioactive crater never to be seen or heard from again!

bensonmum2 Local geologist Wayne Brooks (Ed Kemmer) teams up with visiting archaeologist Dr. Fredrick Cleveland (Morris Ankrum) to search the local mountains for the remains of a 300+ year old Spanish conquistador and a reputed giant of a man named Vargas. Another draw for Brooks is the opportunity to spend a little time with the Dr.'s vacuous but attractive daughter, Janet (Sally Fraser). The team is about to give up when Janet accidentally discovers a Spanish graveyard. But is there more here than helmets and breastplates? It's not long before the giant Vargas makes his return and sets his own sights on young Janet and anything else he can maim and destroy.By all rights, I've most likely overrated Giant from the Unknown. It features a multitude of easily identifiable weaknesses – a plot that moves at the break-neck pace of a slug, the dim-witted Janet randomly stumbling on the Spanish artifacts, Sheriff Parker's beyond ridiculous persecution of Brooks (Why in God's name would anyone think that Brooks would be running around the country-side slaughtering cows and destroying hen houses?), Bob Steele's laughably bad performance as Parker, the whole notion of Vargas "living" in a sort of suspended animation for 350 years, and the poorly done special effects in the film's finale. Giant from the Unknown literally has everything you could hope to find in any regular bad movie. It would be easy to write it all off as badly made 50s junk, but for whatever reason and despite these many shortcomings, I found myself inexplicably enjoying the movie. Entertainment can be different from one person to the next. And, it's often difficult to put a finger on what you find entertaining in a movie. All I know is that for most of Giant from the Unknown, I was entertained. I went for the characters, I got a kick out of legend Jack Pierce's Vargas make-up, and I enjoyed the acting of Keemer and especially Ankrum. Ankrum is one of those actors who's good in everything I've seen him in. Sure, it takes some patience to get through the slow parts in Giant from the Unknown (and there are a bunch of 'em), but it's worth it. There's a good little movie here if you just look for it. Like I said, it's difficult to explain, but I'm giving this one a 6/10.

ferbs54 Truth to tell, I wasn't expecting a whole lot from "Giant From the Unknown." I'd seen two of director Richard Cunha's later works, "Missile to the Moon" and "Frankenstein's Daughter," and had found them both incredibly awful, albeit entertainingly so. Indeed, the latter might just be my favorite bad movie of all time. Still, it was to my surprise that "Giant," although certainly not a good movie by any reasonable definition, turned out to be yet another entertaining diversion from director Cunha. In it, a Spanish conquistador, buried 500 years ago by Indians in what is now California, rises from the earth to cause more mayhem. As played by Buddy Baer (brother of heavyweight prizefighter Max), and featuring a makeup job by Jack "Frankenstein" Pierce, this giant does make for one imposing sight. Scientist Morris Ankrum, his daughter Sally Fraser, and an ex-student, Edward Kemmer, all happen to be in this CA mountain community when old Vargas goes on his rampage, and the three make for appealing leads. This film features a fair amount of suspense, some startling moments, not too many unintentionally funny lines, and a fairly compact story line. Granted, some of the backdrops look as phony as can be (that lake, that ersatz dam), and some details don't make much sense if one ponders them later, but darn it, this movie was kinda fun! Maybe I've been watching too many shlocky films lately, and my standards are starting to slip, but still, I did enjoy this one. The DVD looks nice and crisp, too, although the source material seems damaged in spots. All in all, I certainly do not regret having rented this one out....

ghenrikson-1 Though the premise is of course absurd, "Giant from the Unkonwn" is a cut above most B-grade horror films of its era. The difference lies in the cast. Bob Steele, veteran of over 200 films and a familiar face in Westerns, does a very good job as the local sheriff. His gestures, facial expressions and easy mastery of the material give the film its backbone. Morris Ankrum, who plays the inevitable scientist, likewise brought an impressive background to the role. He is probably best known today for his recurring role as a trial judge in Perry Mason, but like Steele he had already been in hundreds of movies when "Giant" was filmed. The supporting cast is good, and manage to approach the silly premise of a giant conquistador on the rampage with a straight face. It's a worthy effort, though it would have been nice to have a better script and a slightly less silly premise.