Taglines: Something big is going down.
Lemuel Gulliver (Jack Black) has been working in the mailroom of a big publishing company in Manhattan, New York for ten years. He has a crush for the editor for travel stories Darcy Silverman (Amanda Peet) and unintentionally applies for a travel writing job when he tries to ask her out on a date. Through cut and paste from websites like Frommers and Time Out, Gulliver manages to impress Darcy and is sent to Bermuda as Darcy knows a man who knows the secret of the Bermuda Triangle. Gulliver who has never operated a boat before, take a boat out to find the mysterious Bermuda Triangle. Gulliver then encounters a heavy storm and ends up ashore on a beach in a land called Lilliput.
Long story cuts short, Gulliver is tied up by the Lilliputians, led by General Edward (Chris O’Dowd) and is shortly being referred as ‘The Beast’. However, after saving Princess Mary (Emily Blunt) from the kidnappers and Lilliput’s King Theodore (Billy Connolly) from a fire by urinating on the castle, Gulliver is suddenly being regard as Lilliput’s hero.
A bigscreen adaptation of “Gulliver’s Travels,” with Jack Black taking on the title role of Lemuel Gulliver, a free-spirited travel writer who, on an assignment to the Bermuda Triangle, suddenly finds himself a giant among men when he washes ashore on the hidden island of Liliput, home to a population of industrious, yet tiny, people.
Gulliver’s Travels is a 2010 American fantasy adventure comedy film directed by Rob Letterman, produced by John Davis and Gregory Goodman, written by Joe Stillman and Nicholas Stoller with music by Henry Jackman and very loosely based on Part One of the 18th-century novel of the same name by Jonathan Swift, though the film takes place in the modern day. It stars Jack Black, Jason Segel, Emily Blunt, Amanda Peet, Billy Connolly, T. J. Miller, Chris O’Dowd, James Corden, and Catherine Tate and is distributed by 20th Century Fox.
The film was theatrically released on December 25, 2010 in the US. The film opened to $6.3 million for its opening weekend, landing at #8 in the US; this ranks it as the 84th worst opening for a film with a wide release tracked by Box Office Mojo. The film grossed $42.8 million in the US and Canada and $194.6 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $237.4 million against a production budget of $112 million.
About the Proüduction
This new incarnation of “Gulliver’s Travels” began with a call from producer John Davis to Jack Black. Shortly thereafter, Black was aboard as the titular hero and as an executive producer on the project. “I jumped at the chance to be a part of this,” says Black. “It was irresistible: Me…Gulliver…traveling….being a giant in another world. The elements were all there to make a big movie.”
When Jonathan Swift penned his novel in the 18th century, the world hadn’t yet been fully explored, so the idea of an island populated by tiny people didn’t seem that far-fetched. Black, Davis, director Rob Letterman, co-screenwriter Joe Stillman (“Shrek”) and co-producer (and Davis Entertainment executive) Brian Manis endeavored to make the story relevant and fun for contemporary audiences. They briefly considered setting Gulliver’s adventure on a distant planet before deciding to have Gulliver travel through an “inter-dimensional portal” – not to a distant planet but to an alternate world that juxtaposed modern-day and old-school sensibilities. “One of our principal goals was that audiences would always believe in Lilliput,” says John Davis. “We wanted to put you right there with Gulliver.”
Bringing in director Rob Letterman was an important step in bringing a fun sense of verisimilitude to Gulliver’s adventures in Lilliput. Previously, Letterman had examined the interactions of a newly-super-sized character with her new environment and friends in the blockbuster 3D animated feature “Monsters vs Aliens,” so he was a perfect fit for “Gulliver’s Travels”. But Letterman, Black, Davis and the screenwriters –Nicholas Stoller (“Forgetting Sarah Marshall”) had joined the team to do additional work on the script – faced some daunting new questions about Gulliver and his world, such as: Do the Lilliputians have to shout at Gulliver to be heard? If so, how do you keep that from looking and sounding peculiar on screen?
As they devised solutions to these challenges, the focus remained on Gulliver’s journey and character arc. When we meet Black’s Lemuel Gulliver, he is a small man in a big pond — the monstrous canyons of Manhattan, where he toils in a clerical position at a newspaper. He talks a big game, but he’s achieved very little because he is always afraid he will fail. “Gulliver dreams of becoming a travel writer – he’s always aspiring for something bigger and better,” says Black. “But he doesn’t have the courage to put himself out there. Fear is his obstacle. But once he gets to Lilliput, he’s like a king.” Echoes Rob Letterman: “In New York, Gulliver feels really small and wants to do big things, but he’s afraid to make it happen. When he lands in Lilliput, he starts to feel really big, but it’s a feeling based on false pretenses.”
After a rough start with the Lilliputians that sees Gulliver tied up and wheeled through the Town Square, then outfitted with a pulley system through which the Lilluput leaders control his every move, Gulliver begins to win over his captors. He impresses the Lilliputians by mounting productions of his life story, including his adventures vanquishing Darth Vader, surviving an icy near-death experience in the frozen Atlantic after the sinking of the Titanic, and leading the world in his capacity as President the Awesome (his VP is Yoda). Gulliver even helps a commoner (Jason Segel) woo a princess (Emily Blunt) – employing, as Gulliver calls it, some “grade-A court-age” – and singlehandedly defeats an armada of the Lilliputians’ arch-nemeses, the Blefuscians.
Through all of Gulliver’s tall tales and reluctant heroic displays, Jack Black makes the character likable and childlike, bringing his signature energy and humor to every scene. “Jack is the epicenter of the film,” says Rob Letterman. Adds executive producer Benjamin Cooley: “Jack brings an innocence to Gulliver; there’s something in his eyes that’s both endearing and edgy. He’s like a big child in the film.” Black’s unique and comic sensibilities are counterbalanced by those of his co-stars, including Jason Segel, as Horatio, Emily Blunt as Princess Mary, Amanda Peet as Darcy Silverman, Billy Connolly as King Theodore, Chris O’Dowd as the traitorous General Edward, and Catherine Tate as Queen Isabelle.
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Gulliver’s Travels (2010)
Directed by: Rob Letterman
Starring: Jack Black, Emily Blunt, Jason Segel, Amanda Peet, Billy Connolly, Chris O’Dowd, Catherine Tate, Stewart Scudamore, Stewart Scudamore, Olly Alexander, David Sterne, T.J. Miller, Emmanuel Quatra
Screenplay by: Joe Stillman, Nick Stoller, Jonathan Swift
Production Design by: Gavin Bocquet
Cinematography by: David Tattersall
Film Editing by: Alan Edward Bell, Maryann Brandon, Nicolas De Toth, Dean Zimmerman
Costume Design by: Sammy Sheldon
Set Decoration by: Richard Roberts
Art Direction by: Robert Cowper, Phil Harvey, Rod McLean, Peter Russell
Music by: Henry Jackman
MPAA Rating: PG for brief rude humor, mild language and action.
Distributed by: 20th Century Fox
Release Date: December 25, 2010
