Screamin' Steven Reviews: Jungle Cruise

"If you're lucky enough to have one person in this life to care about, then that's world enough for me."

With movie theaters open again, "Jungle Cruise" (which was slated to release last year), comes on the heels of other theme park ride adaptations from Disney like "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "Tomorrowland". After the disappointment of "Tomorrowland", it was surprising that Disney would attempt another theme park ride movie. 

"Jungle Cruise" stars Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt, Jack Whitehall, Jesse Plemons and the great Paul Giamatti. With an A-list line up, did this movie succeed? The movie follows Lily Houghton (Blunt) and MacGregor Houghton (Whitehall) who are looking for someone to take them up river in search of "the tears of the sun" a mythical tree whose petals can cure any illness, heal any injury, and lift any curse. While this is going on, Prince Joachim (Plemons) and Aguirre (Edgar Ramirez) are also seeking the tree. 

As the movie carried on I started noticing some similarities to another movie. Many of the elements of this movie seem to very similar to the 1999 film "The Mummy". The three main characters are basically the same three main characters in "The Mummy". In "The Mummy" we have an adventurer, an expert from England and her annoying tag-along brother, exactly like this movie. In "The Mummy" a character was trying to bring back his lost lover from the dead, very similar to a character in this movie. 

Overall, the movie is pretty good. It's a fun adventure movie. However, this movie is over 2 hours long and there is absolutely no reason for this movie to be this long. I really think they could have cut at least 20 minutes out of the movie and it would have felt like flowed better. I've always been a fan of Dwayne Johnson, so I'm always intrigued to see the movies he makes. Emily Blunt was fine, not great, not bad. Will kids like it? I'm not sure they will or won't. This movie feels like something kids wouldn't sit through, but I would have said the same thing about the "Pirates" movies. What I do appreciate about this movie, is that this is the type of adventure film Walt Disney would have produced back in his heyday, so it was nice seeing the company keeping up with tradition.