Jungle Cruise Movie Review

Jungle Cruise (2021)

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Written by: Michael Green and Glenn Ficarra & John Requa (screenplay by), John Norville & Josh Goldstein and Glenn Ficarra & John Requa (screen story by)
Directed by: Jaume Collet-Serra
Starring: Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt, Edgar Ramírez, Jack Whitehall, Jesse Plemons, Paul Giamatti
Rated: PG-13
Watch the trailer

Plot
Inspired by Disneyland's theme park ride, a riverboat captain takes a scientist and her brother through a jungle in search for the Tree of Life.

Verdict
This feels like a movie made based on surveys of what people like. This isn't very engaging because we've seen everything in this movie before. If the audience is children, they'd enjoy it more than adults, but plenty of kids' movies can provide something for both. This starts out with mild comedy that soon disappears. This isn't bad, but it does lack creativity and squanders potential.
Skip it.

Review
The most bewildering thing is the Metallica song that starts during the production company image. Metallica re-recorded "Nothing Else Matters" for the movie. It's a strange collaboration.

There's quick scene of cursed men that doesn't mean much because it's a hook for later in the movie. The true start features botanist Lily (Emily Blunt) stealing a precious artifact. She's quite stealthy for a botanist.

Emily Blunt and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson play Lily and Frank.

This is sillier than I would have guessed, but that's not a bad thing. Frank (Dwayne Johnson) is a cruise captain in the jungle. He makes a lot of simple double meaning jokes that get better the longer he strings them out. That's a trait that seems to be forgotten half way in.

The German antagonist (Jesse Plemons) is a bit much. It's already easy to see this as an Indiana Jones riff with a botanist liberating an artifact, but German soldiers solidify the connection. I still don't know why that was needed..

The voyage into the jungle would be tense enough without a German submarine chasing them. I highly doubt the rivers are deep enough for the submarine. He finds the conquistadors though I don't know why. What reason they have for actually helping him, I'm not sure. If anyone would forsake their word it seems that the conquistadors would.

This is progressive for a Disney movie. Lily's brother talks to Frank about who he loves and how society frowns on it. Disney doesn't fully commit to normalizing it, as it's never directly referenced, but it's just nice to have some variety with Disney characters. The German commander is certainly over the top, but the movie doesn't do enough with him. There are just too many characters for this type of movie.

This is an action movie that is just checking the boxes as to what an action movie should include. Don Aguirre and his conquistadors are just odd. They are cursed due to their transgressions, but I don't know why that means they become snake man, tree man, and bee man. I don't think it was ever explained. I wish the movie had made them creepier. This really feels like it was made based on metrics. The Rock's inclusion alone could point to that being true.

I have to wonder if Disney is content to remake animated movies into live action/CGI and to copy Pirates of the Caribbean.  This is a paint by numbers type movie with a checklist of what to include for an action blockbuster. Lily and Frank's most interesting characteristic is their constant bickering. If you thought at the beginning that was foreshadowing that they'd end up together, you might be right. It didn't feel justified.