jools_69

Gulliver's Travels is fun, a fantasy, not taking itself seriously light comedy. You won't learn anything, you won't cry, you won't witness historic cinema in the making. You will spend an hour and a half watching an enjoyable family film that doesn't pretend to be anything more than a fun adaptation of an age old tale by Jonathan Swift.

I marked the film 7 because I enjoyed watching it, isn't that enough? Must everything be critiqued so much that we lose enchanting family films that just cheer us up momentarily.

Sometimes; Now this might upset the media studies students who seem to be taking over IMDb, sometimes I don't want to have to concentrate on plots and sub plots, sometimes I just want watch a film and escape for a bit, is that OK with you, must everything be Cannes fodder? If you want to have fun and watch a dumb romantic comedy watch Gulliver's Travels, if you're an over serious sneering sceptic... don't. It's that simple.

Phew, that was a tough watch.. Not the production, Frieda is well made, but makes us all face up to our own prejudice and fear. I have no idea how this must have felt to the audience in 1947, I am sure many struggled to sympathise with Frieda, the enemy.

Today hatred is still rife, we live in a world that is still drawing dividing lines, for what.. where has it got us. Frieda tries to make us examine irrational fears and blind hatred. The film pushes us to see people as individuals.

I often look back at old cinema as a little simple, corny even, it is not often I sit in silence at the end and contemplate what I have seen, Frieda made me do this.

Should you watch this, yes if you like cinema that takes you somewhere and you like to empathise with tough subject matter. It is not an arty film and is extremely watchable.. But if you need whizzbangs and CGI this might not be the film for you.

All I can say to finish, I am glad I finally sat down to watch Frieda.