Jungle Cruise (2021)
Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra
Dr. Lily Houghton enlists the aid of wisecracking skipper Frank Wolff to take her down the Amazon in his dilapidated boat. Together, they search for an ancient tree that holds the power to heal – a discovery that will change the future of medicine.
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38 films that influenced Jungle Cruise
What critics say influenced Jungle Cruise
Whether it’s the clear inspiration of the untouchable classic The African Queen , the unavoidable flavor of any Indiana Jones entry, a surprising amount of similarity to Stephen Sommers’s The Mummy , or even the shocking number of recognizable beats and concepts from another Disney theme park ride that was turned into a movie.
As long as you don't compare it to The African Queen, Jungle Cruise is an amusing action adventure that's mediocre and harmless without taking itself too seriously, except for one scene where the Frank recalls his traumatic past that feels tonaly uneven when juxtaposed with the rest of the film.
Based on the theme park ride, “Jungle Cruise” is a celebration of the ride; a cheeky, frolicky fun homage to “The African Queen,” “Romancing the Stone” and then throw in all what Disney does best.
In fact, the original ride was designed with John Huston’s 1951 classic film, The African Queen , starring Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn as an inspiration.
That movie was 1951’s The African Queen , the key inspiration for Walt Disney and Harper Goff when designing the Disneyland Jungle Cruise ride.
Based on an opening day Disneyland ride heavily inspired by John Huston’s The African Queen , the long-delayed Jungle Cruise is unnecessary, unoriginal and practically unwatchable.
Based on the theme park ride, “Jungle Cruise” is a celebration of the ride; a cheeky, frolicky fun homage to “The African Queen,” “Romancing the Stone” and then throw in all what Disney does best.
Those hoping for something akin to the 1999 The Mummy or Romancing the Stone should be suitably thrilled by the comparable chemistry between Johnson and Blunt, always emitting the type of will-they-or-won’t-they vibe that makes them such a fantastic onscreen pair.
For long time adventure fans, this really is the throwback blockbuster we’ve been waiting for, with plenty of nods and homages to greats such as Romancing the Stone , The Mummy and Indiana Jones.
The script from Glenn Ficarra and John Requa (among other names) is surely looking back towards classics like Romancing the Stone and Indiana Jones for inspiration, but the most prominent influence is actually Disney’s other IP based on a theme park ride, Pirates of the Caribbean.
Their relationship is reminiscent of Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas in “Romancing the Stone.”
For anyone old enough, or old-movie-centered enough, to care (which is maybe five percent of this movie’s prospective audience), the banter between these two could be said to evoke Bogart and Hepburn — or, at least, Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner in “Romancing the Stone.”
Whether it’s the clear inspiration of the untouchable classic The African Queen , the unavoidable flavor of any Indiana Jones entry, a surprising amount of similarity to Stephen Sommers’s The Mummy , or even the shocking number of recognizable beats and concepts from another Disney theme park ride that was turned into a movie.
Worse, while the film’s rollicking adventure is often reminiscent of the Indiana Jones films and 1999’s The Mummy , its mythology is largely a rehash of 2003’s Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl , another movie based on a Disney theme park ride.
Also along for the ride is her dandy brother McGregor (a very game Jack Whitehall), whose “I better not get dirty on this grand adventure” energy is so evocative of the sibling character in “The Mummy” that Whitehall should tithe half of his residuals directly to John Hannah (“Jungle Cruise” owes a lot to the spirit of that late ’90s hit, though its way of paying homage tends to be more in the vein of “distractingly bad CGI” than “vivid location photography”).
Those hoping for something akin to the 1999 The Mummy or Romancing the Stone should be suitably thrilled by the comparable chemistry between Johnson and Blunt, always emitting the type of will-they-or-won’t-they vibe that makes them such a fantastic onscreen pair.
It's reminiscent of Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz in The Mummy , in that you fully believe everything they go through together, including their frustrations with one another, which makes the bond they eventually form much more emotionally satisfying.
It even borrows its central dynamic from 1999’s The Mummy , as a brother-and-sister duo of academics enlist a rogueish adventurer to help find a lost corner of civilisation.
Action beats are lifted from Raiders Of The Lost Ark , music comes (mystifyingly) courtesy of Metallica (in collaboration with composer James Newton Howard), and there are endless references to The Mummy .
Manically directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, this latest derivation of a theme-park ride shoots for the fizzy fun of bygone romantic adventures like “Raiders of the Lost Ark” (1981).
Seemingly channeling Ronald Lacey in Raiders of the Lost Ark , he devours scenery as the main baddie, but, given how good he is - it's a sin how limited his screen time is until the finale.
An occasionally amusing, low-rent version of those Disney “Pirates of the Caribbean” films with a large dose of “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” “Jungle Cruise” is a copy of a copy directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, the guy who used Blake Lively as bikini-clad bait in the “Jaws” knockoff “The Shallows.”
It’s a bland misfire that borrows heavily from 1981’s “Raiders of the Lost Ark” and 1951’s “The African Queen.”
It’s obvious by that premise director Jaume Collet-Serra (“The Commuter”) and screenwriters Michael Green, Glenn Ficarra and John Requa set out to make an old fashion, swashbuckling action-adventure movie in the vein of “Romancing the Stone” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” Indeed, the film contains blockbuster-sized set pieces with thrilling chases, spectacular stunts and danger lurking around every river bend.
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Worse, while the film’s rollicking adventure is often reminiscent of the Indiana Jones films and 1999’s The Mummy , its mythology is largely a rehash of 2003’s Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl , another movie based on a Disney theme park ride.
Disneyland added references to the “Pirates to the Caribbean” film franchise in 2006 after the 2003 film “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl” was successful enough to warrant a 2006 follow-up, “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest.”
3 Stars (out of 4) Tweet Back Side of Water By Jeffrey M. Anderson Based on the great, pun-filled Disneyland ride, Jungle Cruise falls between the disappointment The Haunted Mansion and the fantastic hit Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (both 2003).
Of course, one can’t always expect to generate lightning in a bottle the way Disney was able to with 2003’s Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl .
There were few who expected Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl to be particularly good, let alone score Johnny Depp his first Oscar nomination and launch a wildly successful franchise that would ultimately net more than $4.5 billion at the worldwide box office.
There’s a whole list of cinematic inspirations, really, which would surprisingly include Werner Herzog’s Aguirre, the Wrath of God and Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid .
In fact, one could also make the argument that it’s more indebted to Humphrey Bogart’s The African Queen and Werner Herzog’s Aguirre, the Wrath of God than to the ride.
Aguirre was a real person, a cruel and vile human, who most modern viewers probably know from Werner Herzog’s magnificent Aguirre, the Wrath of God, with an unhinged Klaus Kinski starring as the titular terror.
Movie fans may remember Aguirre from Werner Herzog's masterpiece Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972), wherein he searched the Amazon for the lost city of gold, El Dorado (he was also a real person).
Still, that might depend on where the film “Jungle Cruise” sails–will setup future lucrative cruises like Johnny Depp’s “Pirates of the Caribbean” or sink like the George Clooney futuristic 2015 vehicle “Tomorrowland”?
Disneyland added references to the “Pirates to the Caribbean” film franchise in 2006 after the 2003 film “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl” was successful enough to warrant a 2006 follow-up, “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest.”
Davy Jones from Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest was, and is, a marvel.
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As for the slapdash and freewheeling screenplay, it oftentimes feels more like a riff on the 1985 version of King Solomon’s Mines crossed with Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid than it does anything else.
“The Jungle Cruise” is one of those films that is so obviously constructed of ideas borrowed from other movies that some may be tempted to make a game out of it with their fellow audience members by seeing who can come up with the most titles of obvious inspirations—mine ran the gamut from the expected likes of “The African Queen,” “Romancing the Stone” and “Pirates of the Caribbean” to such comparative curve balls as “Medicine Man” and Werner Herzog masterpiece “Aguirre, the Wrath of God.” Unfortunately, it never quite lives up to the standards set by its inspirations and if you are a movie cannot manage to equal the accomplishments of the likes of “Medicine Man,” you know that you are in trouble.