There are sequels, prequels, franchises, remakes, reboots and continuations that can be extremely tiring, especially when there are either so many of them or they're not a well crafted film. However, some are fun and exciting no matter how many installations there might be. The "Jurassic Park" franchise is my favorite--I can never tire of it. Another is this film "Jumanji: The Next Level".
The gang, including Bravestone/Eddie (Dwayne Johnson), Mouse Finbar/Fridge/Milo (Kevin Hart), Bethany/Fridge (Jack Black), Martha (Karen Gillan) and Alex (Nick Jonas), is back but the game has changed. As they return to Jumanji to rescue one of their own, Spencer (Alex Wolff), they discover that nothing is as they expect. The players will have to brave parts unknown and unexplored, from the arid deserts to the snowy mountains, in order to escape the world's most dangerous game. Will they succeed, or will they end up being trapped in Jumanji forever.
Others to round out the cast is Danny DeVito as Eddie, Danny Glover as Milo, Awkwafina as Ming, Ashley Scott as Ashley, Madison Iseman as Young Bethany, Ser'Darius Blain as Young Fridge, Colin Hanks as Young Alex, Morgan Turner as Young Martha, Rhys Darby as Nigel, Rory McCann as Jurgen the Brutal and Marin Hinkle as Spencer's Mom.
This was efficiently directed as well as "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle" by Jake Kasdan ("Zero Effect" '98, "Orange County" '02, "The TV Set" '06, "Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story" '07, "Bad Teacher" '11, "Spring/Fall" (TV movie) '11, "Sex Tape" '14, "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle" '17) plus TV. It was truly pivotal that Kasdan directed this considering he directed the predecessor to this, so as to keep the same characters exactly the same in both. Another director could've directed this, however the potentiality of keeping the characters similar in each film would've been challenging. It was written by seasoned writers, Kasdan, Jeff Pinkner and Scott Rosenberg, based on the book, "Jumanji" by Chris Van Allsburg. As with the directing, both Pinkner and Rosenberg were instrumental in being part of the writing team in "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle", which certainly assisted in the storyline of this. All of these writers are seasoned with a multitude of experience between them all, and it shows in this fun film, however when the film started out, it went a bit slow--maybe purposed, but not sure--but as the film started to unfold, it progressed, albeit slowly, to be the film it was searching for. This ensemble cast has an incredible amount of chemistry, and DeVito and Glover only added to that chemistry. And the visual effects, predominantly designed by SPI (Sony Pictures Imageworks) and Weta Digital were seamless and truly enhanced the story which added to the fantasy and whimsy of the film.
The Jumanji franchise which started in 1995 with "Jumanji" has a premise where the storylines are limitless. And where the '95 version had the game come to our world, this film and its predecessor have the real world go into the world of Jumanji. This is one that must be experienced on the large screen. In fact, I wished I had seen this on its IMAX format, because it looked as though it would've rocked. It's a film that needed a bit more polish, but I still had so much fun with it.
Out of 4 Stars: 3 Rated: PG-13 123mins.
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