Movie Review Gulliver's Travels

Gulliver's Travels (2010) 

Directed by Rob Letterman

Written by Joe Stillman, Nicholas Stoller

Starring Jack Black, Jason Segal, Emily Blunt, Amanda Peet, Chris O'Dowd, Catherine Tate

Release Date December 25th, 2010 

Published Deember 25th, 2010

The thing about "Gulliver's Travels" is that there isn't all that much wrong with it and I still can't recommend it. The cast headed up by Jack Black is uniformly game and hard working. The story is a classic hence why Jonathan Swift's story has lingered for more than 200 years. So, what really kept me from liking this harmless, desperately wanting to be loved movie? I'm still working on that.

Gulliver (Jack Black) is the head of the mailroom at one of New York's largest newspapers. He's been at this job for a while, something that would not satisfy most adults. When Gulliver finds out that the new guy, Dan (T.J Miller), that he has trained for a single day is now his new boss, Gulliver vows to do something with his life.

That something is finally asking out the paper's travel editor Darcy (Amanda Peet) who Gulliver has had a crush on for years. Unfortunately, Gulliver chickens out on the asking out part and in his haste to escape social mortification accidentally backs into a writing assignment. After faking a writing sample Gulliver is off to Bermuda where the infamous triangle awaits.

Of course we know that soon after Gulliver boards his boat he will be arriving in Lilliput, the island home of the miniscule Lilliputians lead by King Benjamin (Billy Connelly), his daughter, Princess Mary (Emily Blunt) and her betrothed, General Edward (I.T Crowd genius Chris O'Dowd). After being captured by the General and imprisoned, Gulliver makes a friend, Horatio (Jason Segal) who happens to be Princess Mary's true love, imprisoned by the jealous General.

From that set up we get Gulliver becoming a hero defending Lilliput against other mini invaders, Horatio released from prison and wooing Mary with Gulliver's modern diffidence and the surprise arrival of Darcy in search of Gulliver after discovering his faked writing samples lifted from Fodor's among other sources.

There is a battle against a giant robot and an island where Gulliver is dwarfed by even larger beings. These ideas are introduced by director Rob Letterman and just sort of happen and are discarded. There is no lingering effect. Some of this stuff is funny, most of it might bring about a smile or a chuckle but mostly the humor of "Gulliver's Travels" evaporates as quickly as it appeared.

The thing is though; there is nothing really wrong with that. Chuckles and half smiles aren't bad when you want a minor distraction. A movie should aspire to a great deal more but when so many other movies rob audiences of life force, I'm looking at you Fockers, one is tempted to grab a giggle wherever you can find them.

Also, it's fair to say that "Gulliver's Travels" meets every expectation of its underwhelming trailer. Jack Black tumbles and riffs, Emily Blunt and Amanda Peet are pretty and the 3D is completely meaningless and unnecessary. Jack Black gets the same laughs in the movie that he does in the trailer and a few more half smiles and giggles here and there. It's everything the marketing promises.

I am hesitant to give even a half hearted recommendation to "Gulliver's Travels" in part because of a quote from the legendary, and greatly missed, Gene Siskel who once asked "Is this movie as good as a documentary about these same actors having lunch together?" Gulliver's Travels fails that test miserably. Listening into the lunch conversation of Jack Black, Jason Segal, Chris O'Dowd, Billy Connelly and Oscar nominee Emily Blunt would be infinitely more entertaining than "Gulliver's Travels."

Movie Review Pokemon Detective Pikachu

Detective Pikachu (2019) 

Directed by Rob Letterman 

Written by Dan Herdandez, Rob Letterman, Benji Smart, Derek Connelly 

Starring Ryan Reynolds, Justice Smith, Kathryn Newton, Suki Waterhouse,Bill Nighy 

Release Date May 10th, 2019 

Published May 8th, 2019 

Pokemon Detective Pikachu is some hardcore fan service. In fact, if you are not immersed in the universe of Pokemon, you aren’t likely to find much to enjoy beyond the occasional Ryan Reynolds quip. Reynolds himself is a kind of Pokemon fan service as giving this franchise the voice of one of the world’s most popular and charismatic actors is akin to one of the cool kids passing up the cool kid table in the cafeteria so he can sit with the A.V Club and they can absorb some of his aura. 

Pokemon Detective Pikachu opens in pure, visual chaos. A car is escaping from a mysterious lab facility while being chased by a powerful Pokemon called a Mewtoo. The Mewtoo appears to blow up the car, knocking the vehicle over the side of a bridge. The driver appears to have been killed but the swirling vortex of CG chaos makes it impossible to know what happens and since this is our introduction to the story, we are at a loss to care much for what is happening. 

The film slam cuts from the car crash to a field in a small, vaguely Asian town. Tim Goodman (Justice Smith) is one of the few people in his small town who doesn’t have his own Pokemon, a tiny, animal-like creature, who people capture using a special ball that opens up to capture the Pokemon, but only if the Pokemon likes and trusts its new owner or master or trainer? I’m not familiar with the terms and the movie is less than forthcoming for newcomers. 

Tim’s lack of interest in Pokemon is a reaction to his father’s dedication to Pokemon, as a law enforcement officer with his own Pokemon partner named Pikachu. Work took his father away and Tim resents Pokemon for his dad not being around when his mom died. Tim is soon thrust back into his father’s world however when he receives a message that his father was in a deadly car accident. 

Tim must travel to his father’s home in Rhyme City, the rare place where Pokemon and humans live in harmony together. Everyone has their own Pokemon and peace reigns as the two species live in harmony under the watchful leadership of Howard Clifford (Bill Nighy). Howard created Rhyme City as a utopia for Pokemon and humans alike. Naturally, however, there are snakes in Eden and Pikachu is on the lookout. 

Pikachu was believed to have died in the crash that killed Tim’s father so when the two come face to face in Tim’s father’s apartment, they nearly kill each other. In what we are told is a completely unfathomable anomaly, Tim has the ability to hear Pikachu speaking English. No one else on the planet has the ability to communicate with a Pokemon directly and this will not be used in any useful way beyond quips, lots of quips, mildly amusing, inoffensive, only occasionally funny, quips. 

Together, Tim and Pikachu will team with ace junior reporter Lucy Stevens (Kathryn Newton) to find the source of some strange Pokemon behavior. This strange behavior harkens back to the days before humans and Pokemon became friends and it is the key to finding out who is behind Harry’s disappearance, the dangerous Mew-Too and the apparent intention to create a rift between Pokemon and humanity. 

Rob Letterman directed Pokemon Detective Pikachu and he has packed it full of stuff that Pokemon fans will adore. There are Easter eggs on top of Easter eggs with appearances by fan favorite Pokemon doing fan favorite Pokemon things. Characters from the longtime Pokemon cartoons make cameos, I am assuming, special attention is paid, ever so briefly, to a character even I recognized from years of cultural osmosis. Fans will be excited and the inclusion could hint at a wider Detective Pikachu-Pokemon cinematic universe. 

Or so I assume, only Pokemon fans will be able to tell me if I am right or wrong about that. The bottom line issue that I have with Pokemon Detective Pikachu is with the remarkable amount of fan service. The movie is very bland and basic in its general storytelling and so the only thing left in terms of making Detective Pikachu special would either come from making it funny, which it really isn’t or in making it so packed with Pokemon stuff as to render story unnecessary for the hardcore devotees. The makers of this movie went with the second option and left non-Pokemon fans scratching our collective heads waiting for Ryan Reynolds to get funny.

The story takes elements of the mystery genre and mushes them up into a highly predictable story arc. The opening scene is meant to provide a mystery that will play out over the course of the movie but the story cheats this opening repeatedly throughout the movie to fit the narrative. This particular narrative feels as if it was altered numerous times, something strongly indicated by 6 credited writers for Pokemon Detective Pikachu. 

If you can’t tell who the bad guy is from the cast list you aren’t really trying. It’s glaringly obvious throughout where the movie is headed, albeit the actual endgame of the story is a tad bizarre, but by then it was hard to care. In fact, a lot of fans might really have liked what the movie plays as an evil scheme, but that’s an odd digression for another, spoiler filled time. Weird ending aside, there isn’t a story beat in Detective Pikachu that will surprise you from the mismatched partners, the convenient bouts of amnesia, to a third act separation that is so perfunctory the screenwriters should step on screen to introduce it while thanking and giving credit to every screenplay guide ever written.

But, as I stated earlier, I am not the audience for this movie. I am not a Pokemon fan. I have nothing against Pokemon, I know plenty of people who find Pokemon delightful. I am just not into it, it doesn’t do anything for me and since the movie isn’t very funny, even Ryan Reynolds is missing that classic Ryan Reynolds wit, there isn’t much for me to invest in. Fans of Pokemon will likely flip for all of the neato Pokemon stuff in Detective Pikachu but if you are not part of the cult of Pokemon, you’re better off sitting this one out.