World of Giants Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		3.5
Audio		3.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		3.5

World of Giants Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman October 27, 2023

Irwin Allen had quite a little run in the sixties with several science fiction tinged series which were "must see tv" for Baby Boomer boys in particular. If Lost in Space is arguably the best remembered of these efforts, the "Space Family Robinson" actually didn't go where no parents, children, and/or other hangers on had gone before for as long as Admiral Nelson and his cohort plied the depths of the oceans in Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, with the underwater effort lasting four seasons as opposed to Lost in Space's three. There were two other notable Irwin Allen series during this same general timeframe which didn't even last that long, though rather immense budgets for that era may have also played into their quicker than expected demise. The Time Tunnel* joined the still running Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea on the ABC network, but only managed to eke out a single season, and ABC was also the home for Land of the Giants, which lasted twice as long, meaning it trundled off into the vast wastelands of reruns and/or syndication after only two seasons. All of these series tended to have above average production values, and they were all (save for Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea) graced with some really cool themes featuring batteries of percussion instruments by one Johnny Williams (he'd drop that "ny" soon enough), but Land of the Giants in particular may have been hampered by the recurrent and ultimately somewhat comical use of a giant prop arm and hand that was frequently utilized in any given episode, hovering ostensibly threateningly over the series' "little people" (actually, supposedly "normal" sized, albeit in a world where everything was hugely magnified). It seems very probable to me that Allen must have seen World of Giants during its brief syndication run, as Land of the Giants doesn't just use the same general premise (which admittedly had already been exploited in feature films like The Incredible Shrinking Man), it also uses some of the same "perils", including a first episode interaction with a housecat which is quite similar to a scene actually utilized in the credits for Land of the Giants.

*Note that the link points to a Region B release.

Marshall Thompson, who would later essay the title role in another CBS series that aired more or less simultaneously with Lost in Space, Daktari, is on hand here as agent Mel Hunter, who had been on a secret mission "behind the Iron Curtain" and who was exposed to some super secret rocket fuel that (of course) resulted in him shrinking to around six inches. The otherwise unidentified "Bureau" for which Hunter works is eager to utilize Hunter's talents as they can, and they have paired him with agent Bill Winters (Arthur Franz), who transports Hunter around in a specially designed briefcase with an airhole and a little chair with a seatbelt. Somewhat hilariously, it evidently took the show's creative team a couple of episodes to realize there were no women in the cast, and it's only then that Marcia Henderson shows up as Miss Brown (AKA "Brownie"), the nurse who aided Hunter after his accident and who becomes his "secretary" as things develop. One of the kind of interesting things about this formulation is that there are almost romantic sparks between the regular sized Miss Brown and the miniature Mel Hunter, but there's also some on screen "chemistry" between Brown and Winters.

This was a Ziv Television Programs outing, the entity responsible for a number of other shows that dotted the fifties television landscape like Highway Patrol and Bat Masterson, and production values are often surprisingly high, even if (again, like Land of the Giants) certain "huge" props like a telephone are repeatedly used throughout many episodes. The series' production designer was Robert Kinoshita who created Robby the Robot for Forbidden Planet and who later handled art direction for none other than Lost in Space. There are some fun composite shots that help contextualize the relative sizes of the characters, along with a few wonkier effects (somewhat hilariously, it almost looks like someone put something akin to a Ken doll in a scene as a stand in for Hunter, shot from the rear). Point of view shots are frequent and which also help to emphasize the height disparities, with the camera peering up at "normal" sized people.

The plots are pretty standard, though there are a couple of fun moments with guest stars and/or bit players like Allison Hayes, Peggie Castle and Gavin MacLeod. The series finale is just flat out gonzo, at least for those who, like I do, have a penchant for "cool jazz", as Hunter is assigned to figure out whether a goateed blind pianist at a jazz joint is an agent imposter (because what spy wouldn't pretend to be a blind goateed jazz pianist?). The series attracted some fairly well known directors, including Byron Haskin, Nathan Juran and Jack Arnold. A conceit whereby Hunter speaks directly to the camera seems to be getting set up early in the series as a recurring feature, but becomes more intermittent as things progress.

World of Giants Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

World of Giants is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of ClassicFlix, which is evidently launching a new "Rare Television" imprint (see the supplements section, below), with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.33:1. The back cover of this release provides a ton of production history for the series, but also includes this "announcement":

With countless rare and almost never seen TV shows not available, ClassicFlix has established the Rare Television line to focus exclusively on such properties and making them available in affordable, no frill editions.

ClassicFlix begins the actual presentation of the series with two text cards offering the following information:

16mm film material for World of Giants is from the collection at the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research.

ClassicFlix spent over 350 man hours restoring World of Giants . For 16mm prints, they look remarkably sharp and were in generally good condition at the time of their scanning, however, sections in some episodes were so severely warped and deteriorated they were beyond complete repair.

Putting aside for a moment the somewhat hilarious fact that there's a Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research (my own wife who hails from Wisconsin and was a news anchor in Milwaukee for some time had never even heard of it), the elements utilized for this transfer are in at least decent shape almost all of the time, though as a brief look at some of the screenshots I've uploaded to accompany this review will reveal, there are recurrent signs of age related wear and tear, including some pretty long lived scratches (typically toward the edges of the frame). Densities and contrast are pretty highly variable as well, aside and apart from the old school compositing for the special effects sequences. Still, detail levels are perhaps surprisingly intact given a 16mm source, and grain is also perhaps unexpectedly fine looking a lot of the time. There are moments here that certainly drift down toward 3.0 territory, and so some may feel an "average" score of around 3.25 is warranted.

World of Giants Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

World of Giants features a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono track that manages to deliver dialogue well enough, but which is hampered by near nonstop background hiss and/or noise. You almost start to tune out the high frequency anomalies after a while, but quieter scenes in particular may bring it more to the forefront. There's no commanding Johnny Williams theme here, and in fact not much music at all, and no one is given an on screen credit for the scoring. There are no subtitles offered.

World of Giants Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Image Gallery (HD; 5:38)


• 21 Beacon Street Clip (HD; 3:44) is another series few have probably heard of which seems to be the next on the slate for the Rare Television imprint.

Additionally the insert features episode synopses on the inside cover.

World of Giants Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I'm frankly a sucker for a lot of vintage television, no matter what some may feel the "inherent" quality of many of those enterprises may be, but my hunch is if for no one else, at least any now aged Baby Boomer male who thrilled to the weekly exploits of any of the Irwin Allen series back in the day should find this an appealing distraction. Technical merits are somewhat constrained by the baked in flaws of the source elements, but on the whole are decent. With caveats noted, Recommended.