Originally published in 1726, “Gulliver’s Travels” is a classic work of fiction by master satirist Jonathan Swift, and has been adapted numerous times for TV and movies. The latest big screen version from Rob Letterman is due out this Christmas and stars Jack Black as a modern-day Gulliver, who is re-imagined as a loser mailroom clerk inadvertently dispatched on a writing assignment to the Bermuda Triangle. Clearly the best chance at capturing the original intent of Swift’s work is to cast a guy from Tenacious D in the lead role of an adaptation directed by the same man responsible for the tepid “Shark Tale” and “Monsters vs. Aliens.” Black has showed plenty of range in films before, but he looks to be in full-on broad comedy mode in this trailer, where the basic joke seems to be “Boy, Jack Black is large!”
The first trailer for “Scott Pilgrim vs. The World” was quirky, but more than enough to keep me interested. The latest trailer gives me a much better handle on the story and the characters and showcases plenty more arcade-style visuals. Director Edgar Wright is extremely talented at paying homage to a genre without ripping it off or seeming derivative, as he has so aptly proved with “Shaun of the Dead” and “Hot Fuzz.” My only qualm in this trailer is that Michael Cera always seems to be playing the same role of an awkward 18-23-year-old. Nonetheless, with Wright at the helm, this will be a project worth watching. One of my favorite films is the underrated 2004 documentary “Gunner Palace,” a film chronicling the activities of a group of soldiers operating in the early days of the Iraq War. It was a raw and somewhat amateur film, but it excelled by allowing all the soldiers to present their stories and their views without having some greater political agenda. The new documentary “Restrepo” has that same unrefined energy to it as it follows a year of operations in Afghanistan’s Korengal Valley. The trailer seems to indicate the same lack of structure that I found so appealing in “Gunner Palace,” and it will hopefully be an equally enlightening cinematic experience.
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