It’s a sort of a running gag that the book ‘Jaws’ isn’t really about a killer shark, though the movie is. Both of them heavily feature a large and angry man-eating fish.  It doesn’t really matter if the shark is a metaphor however, people still die. In a similar vein, I Kill Giants is a story about monstrous things that devastate anything they touch. But it’s about much more than that. And yes, the special effects for the giants are amazing.

I Kill Giants is the story of Barbara Thorson (Madison Wolfe), a troubled young girl who would rather spend her time with her nose buried in a fantasy novel than spending time with friends. An awkward geek with skills better suited to playing Dungeons and Dragons than surviving High School, Barbara is a girl with a mission. She is the only one who knows that giants threaten her small town. Whilst everyone else shakes their head and calls her names, she focuses on building the wards and traps.

Barbara’s family is barely holding together; her brother is always angry and her sister is working every hour to keep things vaguely resembling normal. Something awful is happening and it is something that Barbara is desperate to prevent. Her only confidant is Sophie (Sydney Wade), an English girl from Leeds who also has no friends. “No one has heard of Leeds, only London,” she laments.

Wolfe’s performance is striking and powerful throughout, both sympathetic and alienating at the same time. Wade provides much-needed balance to the narrative, a normal girl with normal expectations; it would be easy for the character to be too wet or too special, but instead, they make the right choice. Just a normal person in the face of the weird. The headliner is, of course, Zoe Saldana as the school psychologist, who does enough to drive the story forward and reminds this that this movie only really has three main characters; Barbara, The Giants and the ever-present threat they represent.

This is the first feature-length project for director Anders Walter (though his short, Helium, won an Academy Award).  It is a skilfully crafted piece, filled with tiny details that bring this world to life. It’s a carefully created work, especially as the source material means so much to many.

Joe Kelly and J. M. Ken Niimura’s comic book I Kill Giants works so well due to its brevity. The cartoon style blurs the lines between fantasy, reality and delusion effortlessly, in a way that only comics can do.  Anders Walter has completely understood the fundamental differences in the two media and adjusted his work accordingly. The result is a movie that has the exact same power and punch as the comic book, without losing any of the wit of the original.

I Kill Giants isn’t really about giants. It is about loss and growing up, and that’s something that we can all relate to.

I KILL GIANTS / CERT: 12 / DIRECTOR: ANDERS WALTER / SCREENPLAY: JOE KELLY / STARRING: MADISON WOLFE, ZOE SALDANA, IMOGEN POOTS, SYDNEY WADE / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW (VOD), JULY 2ND (DVD)