My Movie Review on The Jungle Book (2016)
Greetings, my good friends.
This is your friendly-as-always film, TV show, and episode reporter here with another movie review.
And today, I'll be giving you all my analysis on Disney's "The Jungle Book (2016)", which follows with my review of the 1967 cartoon of the same name.
Normally, I would often give a summary of a film. However, due to already doing the animated film, and since the summary would have pretty much been the same as the one I gave the cartoon version, I decided to skip that. The biggest things that would matter, though, would be if Mowgli can avoid Shere Khan, as well as if he will be forced to leave the one home he has known in exchange for another.
But a new question is also involved in this story:
Who is Mowgli? As a man-cub, that is.
But, anyway...
When I first saw the trailers for this movie, as well as heard the announcements of who was going to be involved, such as Jon Favreau being the film's directors and Bill Murray being the voice of Baloo, I was immediately intrigued. And so, I saw this movie in theaters with my family and a couple of my friends.
Wanna know the results?
The movie is total awesomeness!!!
The casting of the film's ensemble and their performances, for instance, was astounding! And so were the characters and character development.
To start off, Neel Sethi did an awesome job portraying Mowgli. Amongst all of the film's special effects, he infused the realistic-feeling that the film was going for even more. He was so engaging, and he even gave Mowgli excellent personality and emotion throughout. Mowgli himself had amazing character development in this film, which particularly came from finding his role and identity as a human and how he shapes himself.
Bill Murray's performance and his character of Baloo were likewise pretty spot-on. I love how far Murray went in being able to make the character of Baloo his own. He gave a lot of the funniest lines and moments, and incorporated an extremely laidback and dry con artist vibe. The best part about it was that Murray made the character lovable despite how laidback and dry Baloo often got, perfectly living up to his comedic style and career. I likewise loved how Baloo developed from a con who uses Mowgli for his own gain to Mowgli's new caring and protective friend.
Ben Kingsley was also really amazing with his portrayal of Bagheera. Like the late Sebastian Cabot, he gave the character an excellent sense of authority and wisdom. However, unlike Cabot, he also gave his character a brilliant military-feel, as well as incorporating a strict, but loving, fatherly side to him as a mentor and guardian. Bagheera himself had development that helped him stand apart from his animated counterpart, in that he learns that he must let Mowgli do what he can do as a human rather than training him to be something he isn't, like a wolf.
And Idris Elba...
Man, his performance as Shere Khan was magnificent! Every moment his character was on the screen, Elba gave Shere Khan a consistently intimidating feel, like that of a classically villainous bounty hunter. The character himself was also so intimidating, threatening, and unpredictable, that one would even think he was a real tiger.
I think it's safe to say that the rest of the film's lead ensemble and characters were amazing too.
Christopher Walken gave an astoundingly charismatic performance as King Louie, and to me, his character was not just like a king, but like a leader of gangsters, which was amazing. The decision to make the character a gigantopithecus for this film instead of an orangutan was something that I found made the character all-the-more dangerous and frightening, which was great, because that's what a character like him needed to be.
Scarlett Johansson additionally gave her character of Kaa an entrancing and hypnotic performance, which can range from a motherly sort of tone to one that's ready to stick a knife in your back. The character's upgrading from a mere predator to a creature that can also provide answers for others proved to be really beneficial for the plot.
Finally, Giancarlo Esposito gave his character of Akela an excellent sense of authority and leadership, and Lupita N'Yongo gave her character of Raksha an emotionally warm and surrogate feel to the motherly wolf. I'd also like to add that I loved how the wolves were given much larger roles in this movie compared to the animated film.
The direction by Jon Favreau, and the story and screenplay by Justin Marks, was likewise astounding. They gave the movie brilliant dramatic and thrilling moments, warmth and heart throughout, as well as humorous moments on the side. Their work with the characters is most commendable, because they made everything largely character-driven. The characters took on some personalities and characteristics of the voice actors, which was neatly done. The dialogue that Favreau and Marks came up with was brilliant too, with some even holding hints of nostalgia on the side. Overall, Marks and Favreau were able to successfully extend themselves creatively for this film, and they did it wonderfully, especially to where they didn't make this movie a direct copy of the original.
The extensive use of special effects in this film is quite honestly one of the best I've seen. The crew behind them were literally able to make the environments and animals seem so real. And, like I already said, the sense of realism they were aiming for was especially accomplished by Neel Sethi's screen presence. If I have to choose what my favorite part about it is, it's how real-looking the animals were and how the effects team incorporated the expressions portrayed by the performers into the characters. It was also interesting how they able to incorporate Christopher Walken's facial features into King Louie.
Finally, the music that was done by John Debney was astonishing! Debney gave the music the perfect rhythm and tone to match every scene that would come up, a resonance to match the emotions and circumstances revolving around the characters, and even a strong Indian jungle vibe that can make others feel like they're in the location itself. For instance, whenever Shere Khan came on the screen, the music would carry a sense of unpredictability and thrills to accompany him, and it's enough to make one want to know what's going to happen next.
In conclusion, "The Jungle Book (2016)" is what I'd like to call one of Disney's best films from their live-action remake bonanza, thanks to Favreau and Marks's awesome creativity, the stellar performances and cast, everything! It may even be the best of Disney's recent remakes.
So, I rate "The Jungle Book (2016)" a complete five out of five stars. I certainly hope that Favreau's work on "The Lion King (2019)" will be able to prove itself like this film did.
Before I conclude this post:
To Jon Favreau and Justin Marks: I can't wait to see the sequel for this movie that you guys came up with. I'm really excited, and I hope you two do a great job making it. I'm not sure whether it's saying or asking too much, but I'm particularly hoping that you guys bring Kaa and King Louie back for the sequel, because the two of them hold so much potential for another appearance and to have larger roles.
I highly encourage you two to do so. Please?
