Zathura: A Space Adventure (2005)

Zathura: A Space Adventure (2005)

7/10

Starring

Josh Hutcherson

Jonah Bobo

Dax Shepard

Kristen Stewart

Tim Robbins

Directed by Jon Favreau

Zathura: A Space Adventure is the 2005 non-connected sequel to the 1995’s movie Jumaji. Zathura on its own is a very good movie, it is fun, interesting and like Jumanji (1995) boast of some fantastic child actors. Jonah Bobo takes this movie to a new level with his performance, it was him and him alone that did it for me in the movie.

Zathura like Jumanji is written by children's book author Chris Van Allsburg in 2002. Although the author made connections between Zathura and Jumanji in his book, you will not see such in this movie.

The movie plot follows two brothers, Walter (Josh Hutcherson) and Danny (Jonah Bobo). Also in the movie we have their sister Lisa (Kristen Stewart) and their Dad (Tim Robbins), but the movie’s main focus is on the brother’s relationship.

Walter and Danny are four years apart, with that comes sibling rivalry. With Danny not completely innocent of causing trouble.

After we go through both of them getting on their father’s nerve for not being able to get along, Danny found a game in the basement called Zathura. He takes it up to Walter and ask if they could play together. When Walter says no, Danny tries to play alone and like Jumanji things start to happen.

After his first push of the game button meteor showers stormed the living room, leaving the house in a mess. The children open the door of the house to see where they were because of the view of the sky which they could see because of the holes left by the meteor show, only to find their house floating in space.

The children take the game up to go show their sister who didn’t believe them. When Walter played his turn, she gets frozen (Stewart is essentially not really part of the movie as she was either not present or frozen).

The two read the rules which requires they finish the game to get back home. As you can guess with each time they play, something new happens making it difficult for them to finish.

One of their turn brings a warship against them, another turn brings them help, a stranded astronaut (Dax Shepard). It was he who joins and helps them as they continue to play the game.

Zathura was not a box office success, and it was not until much later that the movie is considered to be a Jumanji sequel before the next two which followed starring Dwayne Johnson. I liked this movie back then when I was younger and still do now.

I’m not much of a fan of the new versions to the series and I have to be honest I prefer this to both Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017) and Jumanji: The Next Level (2019).