8. Jumanji

Hemal Jhaveri May 24, 2022

This week on Ten Movies:

The Rock isn’t just immense, he’s charming and funny, cinematic gifts on display in this family-friendly action-comedy. Worth your time? Hemal and Brian agreed, for once.

In “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” a band of mismatched high school students are sucked into an evil video game, where they inhabit the bodies of Dwayne Johnson, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, and Karen Gillan. Also one of the Jonas Brothers, eventually.

Much of the movie’s comedy derives from this conceit – a nerdy 17-year-old suddenly finds himself in the body of a gigantic action hero. The Rock pulls this off with a confident joie de vrie, as do his co-stars, especially Jack Black, channeling a queen bee cheerleader

Technically this is the third Jumanji movie, building on the oddball two Robin Williams movies from the 90s – Jumanji and Zathura, but the filmmakers have wisely elected to mostly starting from scratch, keeping only the outward trappings of the earlier films.

Hemal and Brian, your beloved co-hosts, have been bitterly divided on the cinematic works they’ve watched for this season of Ten Movies, but Jumanji was a rare point of concurrence.

Don’t miss an episode –Subscribe on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or Subscribe to our Newsletter