The Jungle Book Review

The Jungle Book is a technical marvel.  The blending of live-action and CGI is seamless and the animals come to life with such vivid realization.  Frankly, the most unconvincing thing in the entire movie is Mowgli's acting, which really detracted from my enjoyment of this one.

Other than the gorgeous CGI, one of the great things this movie has going for it is the voice acting.  Led by massive names like Bill Murray, Ben Kingsley, Lupita Nyong'o, Scarlett Johansson, and Christopher Walken, these animals are given such range and depth.  It is even clear that the characters were designed to look slightly like their voice actors, which was really cool to watch, as you could almost see the actors' faces as the animals growled their lines.  The most powerful performance was given by one of my favorite actors, Idris Elba, who played the menacing tiger Shere Khan.  Khan's motivation is a believable one, at least at first, and Elba helps give this film an extremely formidable villain, one that will not soon be forgotten.

The obvious weak spot in the acting was from newcomer Neel Sethi, who played the mancub Mowgli.  I feel bad for picking on a kid, but when you have a film with a $175 million dollar budget, it stands out when the main character yells every line, whether it be a sad, angry, or funny comment.  This is not a new complaint for me, as I am generally unimpressed and annoyed by kid actors.  Not to say there haven't been some amazing performances, such as Jacob Tremblay in Room or Quvenzhané Wallis in Beasts of the Southern Wild.  The existence of these great child performances leads me to believe that there are some great young actors out there, but one was not discovered in this film.  I realize that Sethi was doing his acting in front of a green screen, but I still could not get over his line delivery.

Another thing that lessened my enjoyment of The Jungle Book was the struggle to maintain a consistent tone.  The entire movie was set up as this very dark and gritty take on the child's classic.  But after a handful of jump scares and deaths, the filmmakers seemed to remember that this is a kid's movie, so they throw in some songs designed to mirror the classic movie.  This leads to a very strange blend of adult and child themes.  One second, Christopher Walken's massive orangutan self is singing a song to Mowgli and the next, he is chasing him and somehow sneaking his one thousand pound body through a tiny space to provide a jump scare.  While I do realize this is an unpopular opinion, this tone did not work for me.

Despite my complaints, I do believe The Jungle Book was a gorgeous, competently made film that just had some struggles managing their reinventing the film while trying to recreate the old one.

GET TO THE POINT:

• GORGEOUS visuals
• Great voice acting, especially from Idris Elba as the villain, Shere Khan
• Poor acting from Neel Sethi, the young actor who played Mowgli
• Struggle in switching between a dark, gritty tone and the classic film's lighter tone

Rating:

2 1/2 out of 5 mancubs