Who else Remembers Jumanji (1996)? I remember it being shown on HBO a lot when I was a kid and I remember watching it each and every time I caught it running. In retrospect, Jumanji (1996) definitely wasn’t a movie for kids, but I guess that’s the testament to Robin Williams’ draw. With him gone, Hollywood literally had to get three comedians to fill in the gap for Jumanji’s reboot-slash-continuation-sequel thing.

Here’s my round-up of Jake Kasdan’s (Sex Tape (2014)) Jumanji (2017).

Please note that there may be spoilers.  Read at your own risk.

THE STORY:

Four Brandtford High School students are serving detention when they find an old video game consoled buried in their school’s basement. Deciding to ditch their work, they all agree to play the weirdly titled game, Jumanji. Nerdy Spencer (Alex Wolff) chooses the archeologist explorer Dr. Smolder Bravestone avatar, football player Fridge (Ser’Darius Blain) chooses zoologist Franklin ‘Mouse’ Finbar, high-strung achiever Martha (Morgan Turner) chooses fighter Ruby Roundhouse and ditzy Bethany (Madison Iseman) chooses cartographer Professor Shelly Oberon. It’s not until they all get sucked into the dangerous forest of Jumanji that they realize that they’re literally playing for their lives.

THE GOOD:

1. Jack Black was so good.  I mean, they were all good in their own ways but with the others there were moments when I went ‘oh right, that’s supposed to be Spencer’ or something. Jack Black played the vapid teenaged girl so well that you never once forget that it’s Bethany on screen.

   

2. This is connected to the first one. The connection wasn’t obnoxious and in your face about it, which was really nice because the nod to Alan Parish was subtle enough that the younger audience who might not have seen the first film wouldn’t feel left out. I really liked that they managed to connect it all though; the first Jumanji movie came out in 1995 and in this film, the board game was found in 1996. I think the way they did it was really smart.

   

3. They basically followed the same template of the first movie but they made the necessary upgrades. It was just as cheesy as the first one in terms of the moral lessons and what not BUT that’s not necessarily a bad thing. This movie feels like it was made in the 90’s and as somebody who grew up in that era, watching this movie made me feel very nostalgic. I liked that they ‘upgraded’ the board game to be a video game and by doing this, it kind of secures any future sequels to the franchise.
4. Karen Gillan is smoking hot. Good Lord. Although I did like that she got progressively more covered up as the story went on.

   

5. Nick Jonas! Who knew that he was in this movie? I sure didn’t. That was a nice surprise.

   

THE BAD:

1. There was no real tension to the movie. All of the characters were given three lives in the video game but it never really felt like any one of them could actually die. I guess they went with a lower PG rating than the first one? Because I remember the Jumanji from 1995 actually killing characters in the story.

THE UGLY:

1. The whole Alex-Bethany thing was just wrong. Given how vapid Bethany seemed to be, I highly doubt that she won’t be pursuing the adult Alex in the resetted timeline. Sure, the guy’s married with kids but when has that ever stopped a teenager? When that scene was playing, I saw flashes of Swimfan moments in my head. Cringe-y.

All in all, Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017) was an incredibly enjoyable movie to watch. It ran for almost two hours but not once did I look away from the screen. Sure, the story was fairly predictable and the characters couldn’t have been anymore cliché, but because there was, at least for me, a tie to the Jumanji from my childhood, I didn’t really mind. While performances were okay for everybody, it was Jack Black who absolutely stole the show. I can definitely see myself watching this movie in the future.

THE VERDICT: 7.5/10

*All photos are lifted from the film’s IMDB page.