The original Jumanji is one of those movies that my generation grew up with. We knew the book, were excited to see the movie, and delighted in seeing the dangerous jungle world come to life. Add in the nostalgic and slightly sad addition of Robin Williams, and you've got a movie that's oddly beloved for a specific group of people. So how do you use the same premise to win people over? Well this trailer is a good start.
The Skinny: Breakfast Club Jungle Tron
As everyone has pointed out this film has a lot in common with a couple of beloved eighties movies. Four teens are stuck together in some form of detention and stumble across a video game called Jumanji and are sucked into a dangerous jungle world as their video game avatars. Chaos and laughs to ensue, as the four try to work together to finish the game and get out.
What Stands Out
Aiming For A Younger Crowd..Kinda
This movie seems designed for two audiences. The first is the young people who will be taken to see any PG movie. I didn't hear anything close to a curse word in the trailer and the sense of humor looks like it will have a lot to do with getting used to the avatar bodies, meaning lots of physical comedy.
The avatars, however, look like they've been chosen for the adult crowd including Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, and Karen Gillan. The resulting sense of humor will be...interesting.
Big Difference: Location and Big Time Special Effects
Rather than attempt recreate the original film's chaos with wild animals in a small town, the game appears to be a completely isolated environment with hordes of people hunting them, tons of fauna running all over the place, and helicopters? It's going for big action and it'll be interesting to see what kind of set pieces the movie delivers.
Video Game Logic
There's a couple of small references to this in the trailer, but it seems that the movie is operating under video game logic, aka the Karen Gillan avatar can knock people off motorcycles with spin kicks, and each member of the team has a special skill. Like Team Fortress or Overwatch but in a safari setting. It'll be interesting to see how that plays out both in action and thematically.
Verdict: Cautiously Optimistic
Big budget kids movies are an easy thing to get wrong and I just got burned by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's Baywatch so I'm hoping for the best, and preparing for the worst.
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