Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017)

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017)

6/10

Starring

Dwayne Johnson

Jack Black

Kevin Hart

Karen Gillan

Nick Jonas

Directed by Jake Kasdan

A much different take from the first movie that I can tell you.

The actors here are all well-trimmed for the role they played (not saying they performed than the ones in the first), and their reactions and characterization will leave you anticipating when they will be in the position to show forth such magnificent acting again. All together with the script and the production I feel the movie is just a little above the bar of mediocrity for me.

We remember the first Jumanji done in 1995 and starring the Late Robin Williams, this movie is a standalone sequel to that and payed tribute to Williams as his character Alan Parrish home for twenty-six (26) years in the game was shown, with his name engraved on it.

What is this movie all about?

This standalone sequel is also based on the children’s book Jumanji by Chris Van Allsburg and it is the third installment in the Jumanji franchise (the second named Zathura: A Space Adventure (2005) which is also based on a Allsburg children’s book, it is not worth remembering or seeing.)

The movie had this similarity to the first, in the beginning a young man picked up the game this time the board game changed itself to a cartridge for the user to be able to play on his gaming console. The new user named Alex Vreeke slotted the game into the gaming console and was sucked into it. Twenty Years later, a bunch of high school kids were all placed on detention together when they came across the game.

The group plugged the game and had to select characters on the screen, the moment the game starts they are sucked into it and their high school bodies were transformed to the various characters they selected when they tried to play the game.

Now they are in the game for real, with three lives and must overcome many obstacles, find the treasure, defeat the boss of the game and complete the main task to get back home.

The main challenge to this plot was not just the three lives each had, which was fun to see how each lost their lives, but the change in body had nothing to do with each one’s real persona. This was a challenge to them and they had to learn to adapt to these new characters as those characters had the strengths needed to complete the game.

The movie is not bad to see with the kids who will more than enjoy this movie, but do not be expecting much than a above average script with good acting performances.
A sequel was done in 2019 called, Jumanji: The Next Level.