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Ever since the days of Mork and Mindy, I’ve always loved Robin Williams -- and after watching Jumanji, I’m again reminded why. He’s just perfect in any funny-and-a-bit-touching movie -- like this one.
The story of Jumanji actually begins in the 1800s, when two boys fearfully bury a giant chest. It’s found again in 1969 by Alan Parrish, a young boy who’s being bullied at school and is being sent to boarding school by his wealthy and influential parents. Inside the chest, Alan finds an old board game -- Jumanji. That night, he and his friend, Sarah, begin to play the game, and they soon find that it has a mind of its own. After Sarah’s first roll of the dice, she’s attacked by bats. And when Alan rolls, he disappears.
Twenty-six years later, two orphaned kids, Judy and Peter (Kirsten Dunst and Bradley Pierce) move into the Parrishes' old house with their Aunt Nora (Bebe Neuwirth). Alan is now just an old story -- the town believes that he was brutally murdered by his father. The two kids find the game in the attic and begin to play. Judy’s first roll releases a giant swarm of mosquitoes. Peter’s turn brings a wild bunch of monkeys -– as well as a lion and a mysterious man, who turns out to be a grown-up Alan Parrish (played by Robin Williams).
When Judy takes a closer look at the board, she discovers that they’ll only be able to stop the insanity that the board game’s caused by finishing the game. But the game has four game pieces in play, and they can only continue if they get all four players to join in. So they have to find a grown-up Sarah (Bonnie Hunt), who’s been in serious therapy since Alan disappeared, and convince her to play. Meanwhile, monkeys and mosquitoes and rhinos (oh my!) are terrorizing their small New Hampshire town.
Despite the pathetic reviews that a lot of people gave Jumanji, I loved it -- and so did my husband. It’s sometimes a little bit scary -- or at least it had me on the edge of my seat from time to time. But mostly, it’s just plain funny. Williams is, of course, spectacular in the role of an over-grown kid. And David Alan Grier, who plays Carl Bentley, the police officer, is absolutely hilarious. This movie is, to put it in the most incredibly cheesy way possible, a stampede of laughs -- with monkeys on motorcycles, an Uzi-toting safari hunter, and even an indoor monsoon. It kept my husband and me in hysterics through the entire story -- and it’s definitely one of our new favorites.
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