Jack the Giant Slayer (2013)

  You know what I hate?  False advertising.  This isn't an awful movie (although the CGI is kind of dreadful), but it did terribly domestically.  I think it's because the trailers for this movie made it seem like way more of a comedy than it actually is.  If they had either advertised it as an adventure/action movie or filmed it as a comedy, they would have been better off and the public would have been more informed.  There are only very rare instances where it is better for people to be left in the dark about a movie and those will usually tell you up front that you should go in blind.

As a boy, Jack (Nicholas Hoult) had been told stories about a magical land of giants with a taste for human flesh living in the clouds.  The land was accessed by way of magical beans and the only way the kingdom of men was spared was by the monks crafting a crown from the heart of a giant and dark magic.  Jack was inspired by the stories but figured that's all they were, until a monk (Simon Lowe) passes him a handful of beans in the market with the admonishment that Jack is to take them to the abbey and under no circumstances get them wet.  That night, one of the beans slips through the floorboards of Jack's house.  Meanwhile, Princess Isabelle (Eleanor Tomlinson) runs away from the palace rather than marry the king's advisor, Roderick (Stanley Tucci), and ends up at Jack's house to get out of the rain.  The subsequent beanstalk traps her in the house, quickly carrying it up to the giants' realm.  Jack and a party of the king's men, led by Sir Elmont (Ewan McGregor), travel up the beanstalk to rescue her.

It's an interesting take on the fairy tale that is only slightly ruined by the ending, which tries too hard to wrap the story up in a neat little bow.  Stanley Tucci and Ewan McGregor are always delightful to watch and Nicholas Hoult is growing into a damn fine actor.   The CGI giants are really terrible, though, and significantly push the suspension of disbelief required of the audience.  It's no good to have beautiful landscapes and fanciful worlds if the creatures in them look like they were drawn in crayon.  If you can go in with zero expectations, you'd probably find it's not as bad as you thought it was going to be but I can't in good conscience recommend it.