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''Giant '' is a 1956 American ''Warner Color'' drama film, directed by George Stevens from a screenplay adapted by Fred Guiol and Ivan Moffat from Edna Ferber's 1952 novel. The film stars Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson and James Dean and features Carroll Baker, Jane Withers, Chill Wills, Mercedes McCambridge, Dennis Hopper, Sal Mineo, Rod Taylor, Elsa Cardenas and Earl Holliman. ''Giant '' was the last of James Dean's three films as a leading actor, and earned him his second and last Academy Award nomination – he was killed in a car accident before the film was released. Nick Adams was called in to do some voice dubbing for Dean's role. In 2005, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". ==Plot== The movie follows a Texas family over a quarter century from the 1920s until after World War II. Themes of discrimination along race, class and gender lines, as well as the role they played in the social evolution of post-war Texas, are prominent. In the 1920s, Jordan "Bick" Benedict, Jr. (Rock Hudson), head of a wealthy Texas ranching family, travels to Maryland to buy War Winds, a horse he is planning to put out to stud. There he meets and courts socialite Leslie Lynnton (Elizabeth Taylor), who ends a budding relationship with British diplomat Sir David Karfrey (Rod Taylor) and marries Bick after a whirlwind romance. They return to Texas to start their life together on the family ranch, Reata, where Bick's older spinster sister Luz Benedict (Mercedes McCambridge) runs the household. Luz resents Leslie's presence and attempts to intimidate her. Leslie meets Jett Rink (James Dean), a local handyman who works for Luz (and whom Bick despises) and hopes to find his fortune by leaving Texas. Jett becomes secretly infatuated with Leslie. As Leslie spends time becoming acclimated to the harsh Texas heat, once nearly passing out, she discovers on a car ride with Jett that the Mexican workers' living conditions in the local town are terrible. After tending to Angel Obregon II, one of the Mexican children, she presses Bick to take steps to improve their condition. This starts a theme concerning Texans' attitudes towards Mexicans in general. When riding Leslie's beloved horse, War Winds, Luz expresses her hostility for Leslie by cruelly digging in her spurs. Luz dies after War Winds bucks her off. In her will, Jett is bequeathed a small piece of land on the Benedict ranch. Bick tries to buy back the land, but Jett refuses to sell. Jett makes the land his home and names it Little Reata. Over the next ten years, Leslie and Bick have twins, Jordan "Jordy" Benedict III (Dennis Hopper as a teenager and young adult) and Judy Benedict (Fran Bennett as an adult), and later have a daughter they name Luz Benedict II (Carroll Baker as an adult). After spurning the Benedict family's fair offer to buy the land, Jett discovers traces of oil in a footprint of Leslie's. He drills in the same spot and hits a gusher. Drenched in oil, he drives to the Benedict front yard covered in oil and proclaims to the family and their guests that he will be richer than the Benedicts. Jett next acts inappropriately towards Leslie, and this leads to a brief fistfight with Bick before he quickly drives off. In the years preceding World War II, Jett's oil drilling company continues to prosper. Determined to continue as a cattle rancher like his forefathers, Bick rejects several offers to drill for oil on Reata. Tensions in Bick's and Leslie's household revolve around their children. Bick insists that Jordy must succeed him and run the ranch, as his father and grandfather did before him – but Jordy wants to become a doctor. Leslie wants Judy to attend finishing school in Switzerland, but Judy loves the ranch, wants to study animal husbandry at Texas Tech, and falls in love with a local cow hand, Bob Dace. Both children succeed in pursuing their own vocations, each asking one parent to convince the other to let them have their way. Bick then tries to interest Dace, now his son-in-law (Judy's husband), to work on the ranch after he returns from the war but he refuses. Jett arrives and persuades Bick to allow oil production on his land, using the pretext that this will help the war effort. Realizing that his children will not take over the ranch when he retires, Bick agrees. Both Bick and Jett show evidence of a drinking problem. Luz II, now in her teens, starts flirting with Jett. Once oil production starts on the ranch, the wealthy Benedict family becomes even wealthier and more powerful, as evidenced by the installation of a new swimming pool next to the house which is seen attended by a senator. Now a young man, Angel (Sal Mineo) joins the army but gets killed in the war, and his body is shipped home for burial. After the war ends in 1945, the Benedict–Rink rivalry continues, coming to a head when the Benedicts discover that Luz II and the much older Jett have been dating. At a huge party given by Jett in his own honor at Jett's hotel in nearby Austin, Jordy's wife of Mexican descent, Juana (Elsa Cárdenas), is racially insulted by hotel staff. An irate Jordy tries to start a fight with Jett. Jett's goons hold Jordy, Jett punches him repeatedly and then has him escorted out. Fed up, Bick challenges Jett to a fight. Drunk and almost incoherent, Jett leads the way to a wine storage room. Seeing that Jett is in no state to defend himself, Bick lowers his fists, and instead topples Jett's wine cellar shelves creating a very loud crash heard by the entire assembly. The Benedict family leaves the party. Jett staggers into the banquet hall drunk, takes his seat of honor then passes out on the table. All the guests leave. Later, Luz II sees Jett recovering from his drunken stupor, talking to an empty room, and disclosing that he really wanted her mother, implying strongly that his interest in Luz II is really a displaced interest in Leslie. The next day, the Benedicts are driving home via a back road and stop at a diner. The racist owner, Sarge (Mickey Simpson), insults Juana and her and Jordy's son Jordan IV. When the owner goes on to eject an old Mexican man and his family from the diner, Bick tells Sarge to leave them alone. This leads to a fistfight that Bick ends up losing which results in all of the Benedicts being thrown out of the diner, but his family members are proud of him for standing up to the burly owner. In the final scene, back at the ranch, Bick and Leslie watch their two grandchildren, one biracial (Jordy and Juana's son), play in a crib and reflect on their life. Leslie tells Bick that she considered him to be her hero for the first time in her life after the fight in the diner, something he always tried to do with his ranching heroics. Reflecting on the Benedict family's legacy, Bick views it as a failure because their lives didn't turn out the way he planned, but Leslie considers their version of the family to be a success. The final shot pans to the face of each child, one white, one Hispanic, but both Texans. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Giant (1956 film)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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