The Giant (2022)

'The Giant' opens inside of a 1930's Polish farmhouse, where a radio broadcasts the day's news. Our protagonist, Klara, naps in her father's oversized armchair. After a beat, Klara's environment begins to subtly shake as air raid sirens sound off from the distance. In an instant, explosions strike the earth causing thunderous booms, and bright flashes in the sky. Klara fires out of the arm chair, darting through the house until busting out of the kitchen door, towards the exterior basement cellar doors. Klara throws open the cellar doors, and makes her way down into the dark shelter beneath the house. Suddenly, Klara's attention is captured by the sound of something unusual under these circumstances... a faint bell. After a beat of stillness, the bell dings again. Klara moves cautiously towards the sound. The mysteriously opened path takes Klara to a large opening that reveals an ancient ruins. The space is filled with bells of various sizes, seemingly guarded by a giant stone sculpture. As Klara looks around, she notices a beam of natural light illuminating a small golden bell across the massive room. Klara moves at a snail's pace towards the bell, taking ease with each step. Klara eyes the small golden bell for a moment before making a move at it. She taps the bell, causing a wave of echoes and chain reactions to the other bells. As the roar of the bells finally fades away, the rubbing of stones and snapping roots begins as the stone sculpture rises from his knelt position. Klara moves quickly to a space of presumed safety, out of sight of the giant guardian. What was once ear-rattling bomb blasts is now replaced by crushing stone footsteps around her. Just when Klara thinks she's safe and in the clear, the giant's monstrous stone hand comes crashing down towards her. We cut to black, and slowly fade in to see Klara still curled up in her father's arm chair, eyes closed as tears stroll down her adolescent cheeks as the air raid sirens dissipate. She awakens from her nightmare, startled, but relieved that she's still alive. Klara steps outside onto the front porch, where she sees her home's farmland untouched, just as it was before her imagination ran a visual muck.