CLASSIC IMAGE: IT'S A SMALL WORLD IN THE "LAND OF THE GIANTS"!

Small scale, big dangers! The heroes (and monster hand!) of LAND OF THE GIANTS. Images:  FOX.

To celebrate the recent packed with extras UK release, from REVELATION FILMS, of the first season of the classic Irwin Allen two year running adventure series LAND OF THE GIANTS, which originally premiered on the US ABC TV in September 1968 (and made by 20TH CENTURY FOX), here's a great publicity shot of the actors (with giant hand to boot!) who played the gallant, fighting the odds crew and passengers of the sub-orbital transport vessel Spindrift, whose ship, having encountered a strange phenomenon in space, crash-lands on an alternate Earth-like planet where, with everything five times bigger than anything on their own world, and trying to repair their ship so as to escape, they soon find themselves constantly on the run and on their guard against its inhabitants, who stand tall like a race of giants within their surroundings, and whom show a keenness to capture and experiment on those they regard as "the little people"!

A helpless Captain Steve Burton (Gary Conway) watches as Valerie Scott (Deanna Lund) is about to become part of an unwanted science project.

Season One titles:YouTube - Land Of The Giants: Theme Music [HD Digital Remaster - Main Titles Season 1] For My Lovely GB! :-)

Launching a fascinating new take on the GULLIVER'S TRAVELS concept, the series format ultimately proved too bold in its execution, leading to an unfair demise in early 1970 due to its glossy and ground-breaking high production costs, on a weekly basis, in creating such huge sets, props and the occasional creature for our heroes to struggle against or traverse. LAND OF THE GIANTS would be one of the last and best of the Irwin Allen TV series staples before he moved into the big budget arena of disaster movies film-making like THE TOWERING INFERNO, and, with its originality intact, could quite easily be re-made now as an intriguing cinematic adventure story. This durable series, with a memorable cast (including heroic leads Gary Conway and Don Marshall, the almost anti-hero Kurt Kasznar and babe-tastic Deanna Lund), great guest stars (including Michael Ansara, Jonathan Harris and David Opatoshu), high production values and jazzy and exciting music scores from a pre-STAR WARS John Williams, was a morning/mid-afternoon mainstay treat on the UK's CHANNEL FOUR in the late eighties and early nineties and was very popular with audiences old and new, young and old. It was hoped that, with a renewal of interest in the series in worldwide reruns, that there might be some kind of reunion film with the surviving cast, but alas it was not to be. Still, as an iconic slice of classic and KOOL TV, LAND OF THE GIANTS will continue to endure...

Check out this great website devoted to all things GIANTS: Squeezynz Land of the Giants - a fan tribute to a classic series

The complete series of LAND OF THE GIANTS is also available on US Region One DVD from FOX HOME ENTERTAINMENT in a visually inspired package set (see image above) that I wish had been released in the UK.