Jumanji (1995 film)



Jumanji is a 1995 American fantasy adventure film about a supernatural board game that makes wild animals and other jungle hazards materialize upon each player's move. It was directed by Joe Johnston and is based on Chris Van Allsburg's popular 1981 picture book of the same name. Industrial Light & Magic provided computer graphics and animatronics for the special effects.

The film stars Robin Williams as Alan, a man who emerges from the game's unseen jungle world, along with Kirsten Dunst as a kid named Judy Shepherd who plays the game with her brother, Peter Shepherd (Bradley Pierce), David Alan Grier as Carl Bentley, a hapless shoemaker-turned-police officer, Adam Hann-Byrd as Alan when he was a boy, Laura Bell Bundy as little Sarah Whittle, the girl who played the game with Alan when they were children, while his adult version was interpreted by Bonnie Hunt, Jonathan Hyde plays a double role as Alan's father and Van Pelt, a big-game hunter intent on killing Alan--Van Pelt is patterned after Alan's father. The cast also features Bebe Neuwirth as Judy and Peter's aunt. It was shot in Keene, New Hampshire, where the story is set, North Berwick, Maine (the Parrish Shoes factory) and Vancouver, British Columbia. In 2005, a spiritual sequel to Jumanji, Zathura, was released.

Plot
In 1869, two boys bury a chest in a forest near Keene, New Hampshire, and hope that no-one ever finds it. A century later in 1969, 12-year-old Alan Parrish flees from a gang of bullies to a shoe factory owned by his father, Sam, where he meets his oldest friend Carl Bentley, one of Sam's employees. When Alan accidentally damages a machine with a prototype sneaker Carl hopes to present, Carl takes the blame and loses his job. Outside the factory, after the bullies beat Alan up and steal his bicycle, Alan follows the sound of tribal drumbeats to a construction site and finds the chest, containing a board game called "Jumanji".

Alan takes the game home and attempts to run away after having an argument with his father about attending the Cliffside School for Boys. However, his friend Sarah Whittle gives his bike back. The two begin playing Jumanji, which acts strangely: When a player rolls the dice, the player's piece moves itself and a message appears on the board. When Alan makes his first move, the message states that he must wait in a jungle until a five or an eight is rolled, and he is sucked into the game. A swarm of bats released by the game then attack Sarah and chase her out of the house.

Twenty-six years later in 1995, Judy and Peter Shepherd move into the Parrish house with their Aunt Nora after losing their parents in a skiing accident. Judy and Peter hear Jumanji's drumbeats and play the game in the attic, and as a result, giant mosquitoes attack them, and reddish-orange monkeys destroy their kitchen. Realizing that everything will be restored when the game ends, they continue the game despite the danger. Peter rolls a five, releasing both a lion and an adult Alan, who locks the lion in a bedroom. Alan goes to the now closed shoe factory. On the way, he meets Carl, working as a police officer, and discovers that the town's economy was devastated by the factory's closure. In the factory, a homeless man reveals that Sam abandoned the business to search for his son until his death in 1991. After Sam's death, his wife and Alan's mother Carol-Anne continued the search until her own death.

Alan joins the game with Judy and Peter, but when rolling the dice has no effect on the board, Alan realizes they are continuing the game he and Sarah started years ago. Finding Sarah, now a psychic who had gone insane after Alan's disappearance, Alan tricks her into rejoining the game and the following moves release man-eating vines from a giant flower, a big-game hunter named Van Pelt who is intent on killing Alan as he is a product of the game itself and largely inspired by Sam Parrish, and an animal stampede (rhinoceros, African elephants, zebras and pelicans). Among other things, Peter transforms into a monkey after trying to cheat while Alan is taken away by Carl and Carl soon recognizes Alan; Peter, Sarah and Judy battle Van Pelt in a local department store; a monsoon floods the house; a crocodile attacks the group; Alan is sucked into the floor by quicksand; an earthquake breaks the house in two; large poisonous spiders come out and Judy is shot by a poisonous barb from a flower. Finally, Alan wins the game just in time when Van Pelt is about to shoot him, causing all jungle elements (including Van Pelt) to be sucked back into the board in a form of a whirlwind.

After that, Alan and Sarah suddenly find themselves back in 1969 again, once again children, but with full knowledge of their lives after they started playing. Alan reconciles with and admits to his father that he was the one who damaged the machine. Carl gets his job back, and Sam allows his son to attend a local school if he wishes to do so. Alan becomes terrified, thinking that Judy and Peter are still in the attic, but Sarah reminds him that it's 1969, before Judy and Peter are even born. Sarah hands their game tokens to Alan as a way of showing that they were never in the game. Alan and Sarah chain up the Jumanji board and throw it into a river.

Later in 1995, Alan and Sarah are married and expecting for their first child. Alan has taken over the shoe business, Carl still works in the factory as the plant supervisor, and Sam is retired, but still alive along with his wife. Judy, Peter, and their parents meet with Alan and Sarah at a Christmas party, where Alan and Sarah offer the children's father a job in the shoe company and discourage them from going on the ski trip that would have killed them.

Meanwhile, two French-speaking young girls hear drumbeats as they walk along a beach, and we see the Jumanji board half-buried in the sand.

Cast

 * Robin Williams as Alan Parrish: A man trapped in Jumanji for 26 years. He is the main protagonist of the film.


 * Bonnie Hunt as Sarah Whittle: A psychic driven into madness after Alan's disappearance.


 * Kirsten Dunst as Judy Shepherd: A young girl in the Shepherd family and Peter's older sister.


 * Bradley Pierce as Peter Shepherd: A young boy in the Shepherd family and Judy's younger brother.


 * David Alan Grier as Carl Bentley: Alan's oldest friend and an employee at Sam's shoe factory who later becomes a police officer.


 * Jonathan Hyde as Sam Parrish: Alan's father. Hyde also portrayed Van Pelt, a big-game hunter from the game and the main antagonist of the film.


 * Bebe Neuwirth as Nora Shepherd: Judy and Peter's aunt and legal guardian.


 * Malcolm Stewart as Jim Shepherd, Judy and Peter's father.


 * Annabel Kershaw as Martha Shepherd, Judy and Peter's mother.


 * Patricia Clarkson as Carol-Anne Parrish, Alan's mother.


 * Gillian Barber as the Realtor.
 * Adam Hann-Byrd play child Alan Parrish.
 * Laura Bell Bundy play child Sarah Wittle.

Soundtrack
All music composed by James Horner.

No. Title Length

 * "Prologue And Main TItle" 3:42


 * "First Move" 2:20


 * "Monkey Mayhem" 4:42


 * "A New World" 2:40


 * "It's Sarah's Move" 2:36


 * "The Hunter" 1:56


 * "Rampage Through Town" 2:28


 * "Alan Parrish" 4:18


 * "Stampede!" 2:12


 * "A Pelican Steals The Game" 1:40


 * "The Monsoon" 4:48


 * "Jumanji" 11:47

Total length: 52
 * "End Titles" 5:55

Commercial songs from film, but not on soundtrack
Written by Gioacchino Rossini
 * Una Voce Poco Fa

Performed by Agnes Baltsas and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and

Night & Day
 * Chorus conducted by Ian Marin

Written by Cole Porter Serenade in D, Op. 44


 * Composed by Antonin Dvořák


 * Performed by Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields

<p style="font-weight:400;">Conducted by Neville Marriner Locomotive Breath

<p style="font-weight:400;">Written by Ian Anderson

<p style="font-weight:400;">The Ballad of Gilligan's Isle (Theme from Gilligan's Island)
 * Performed by Jethro Tull

<p style="font-weight:400;">Written by Sherwood Schwartz & George Wyle

Reception
<p style="font-weight:400;">Jumanji did well in the box office; it took in $100,475,249 in the United States and Canada and $162,322,000 overseas, totaling to $262,797,249.

<p style="font-weight:400;">The film earned mixed reviews from critics, with review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reporting that 50% of 32 professional critics have given the film a positive review, with a rating average of 5.6 out of 10. Metacritic posts an average rating of 39%, based on 18 reviews.

Reboot
<p style="font-weight:400;">In July 2012, rumors emerged about a reboot of the film already being in development. Columbia Pictures president Doug Belgrad had a conversation with The Hollywood Reporter, saying: “We’re going to try and reimagine Jumanji and update it for the present.”. On August 1, 2012, it was confirmed that Matthew Tolmach will be producing the reboot alongside William Teitler, who is the producer of the original film.

Trivia

 * There is a deleted scene where Peter and Judy are having dinner with Aunt Nora and another scene where they are asleep.