2017 action sequel
Rating: 11/20
Plot: Four high schoolers are sucked into a video game and have to retrieve a statue's jewel eyeball in order to make it back to the real world.
This reboot of the Robin Williams Jumanji movie from the mid-90s almost works as well. Things are updated for the millennial crowd this is clearly created for, a boring board game replaced with an only-slightly-dated video game. It's also as loud as a movie for that millennial crowd needs to be. Big music, big animal noises, big action. Everything, especially Dwayne Johnson's arms, is big in this, almost to the point where it's obnoxious.
This is probably harmless fun, but it's very predictable. The characters go exactly where you could have guessed they'd go from the first moments you meet them. Even a surprise character appearance isn't a surprise at all. As the characters go through motions, wind up in peril, wisecrack, grow and develop, and work together to reach goals, you just kind of sit there and feel like you could have written the thing.
I don't have to apologize to you for wasting my time and seeing this in the theater. I think I'm going to see every Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson movie in the theater though because he's a once-in-a-lifetime talent. The Rock on the big screen? That's where it's at, kids, and I'm not sure how many more years of the guy we've got since he'll probably be our president in 2020 or 2024. Kevin Hart is in this movie to scream, Karen Gillan's potential as a strong heroine is wasted as she's forced to awkwardly become nothing more than a sex symbol and love interest, and Jack Black's act gets tired pretty quickly.
References to Jack Black's penis made me uncomfortable.
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