See it in 3-D, see it as big as you can, and see it in a theater you trust to project it right. Grabbing whole handfuls of both the original Rudyard Kipling stories and the 1967 Disney animated adaptation, Jon Favreau’s take on THE JUNGLE BOOK is perhaps his strongest film to date in terms of blending live-action with a heap of special effects that manage to be both photorealistic and fantastical. This tale of a young Indian boy raised by jungle animals, most of whom can talk, weaves the boy Mowgli (newcomer Neel Sethi, who looks so much like the cartoon Mowgli, it’s scary) into an entirely artificial environment with all CG animals (the entire film was shot in downtown Los Angeles, according to the credits), but you wouldn’t know it from the breathtaking backgrounds, landscapes and utterly believable creatures that both protect and pose a danger to the boy.
The film also has subtle messages about man encroaching on nature, the danger of destructive forces in the jungle (one character wants to be the first animal to possess fire), and the loose definition of family. But beyond those messages, Favreau is about wish fulfillment aimed directly at children, and if a few adults get caught in his collateral wake, all the better. Favreau is a filmmaker who has always known how to tap into the minds and interests of younger people, whether those interests are Christmas (ELF), games (ZATHURA), superheroes (IRON MAN & IRON MAN 2), or playing cowboys and space monsters (COWBOYS & ALIENS). I’m not saying all of these films match the quality of THE JUNGLE BOOK, but the intuition is the same. This new film is the ultimate trip to the zoo or a safari, where a kid can interact, maybe even be friends, with many of the most dangerous creatures on the planet. It’s a fantasy, but there was a time in my life where (probably when “Wild Kingdom” was still on the air) that I wanted to meet all of these animals.
Adapted by Justin Marks, THE JUNGLE BOOK establishes that Mowgli was left in the jungle as an infant and found by the panther Bagheera (voiced by Ben Kingsley), a predator that walks the line between ferocious and kind, and brings Mowgli to wolves to raise him. Lupita Nyong’o and Giancarlo Esposito play his wolf parents, Raksha and Akela, who bring him up as one of their own, alongside their other cubs, including best friend Gray (Brighton Rose). But the vicious, human-hating tiger Shere Khan (Idris Elba, who is apparently doing mostly voice work this year in ZOOTOPIA and the upcoming FINDING DORY) lost an eye to human aggressors and wants nothing more than to kill all of them, including the innocent Mowgli. Rather than give up their adopted son, they send him away under Bagheera’s care to go back to the humans.
Along the way Bagheera and Mowgli get separated, and the boy meets up with an array of animals he’s never been exposed to before, including the weirdly seductive python Kaa (Scarlett Johansson, putting on an almost inappropriately sexy voice); King Louie (Christopher Walken), a gigantopithecus, who lives in an ancient temple populated by a swarming army of other monkeys; and the bear Baloo (Bill Murray), part con artist, part best pal, who offers Mowgli the chance to kick back and forget the dangerous work around them. And for time, that seems like the best place to be from everyone’s perspective, including ours.
Favreau has a few particularly nice touches in his take on THE JUNGLE BOOK. Mowgli’s backstory and exactly how he got left in the jungle in the first place are addressed in a flashback while he’s under Kaa’s hypnosis. The filmmaker also includes a couple of the animated film’s most memorable song cues, but one of them would count as a full-blown musical number (stay through the credits to hear a couple more familiar songs done by the voice actors; it’s worth it). But it’s Favreau’s overall attention to detail in the stunning 3-D environment that is the most impressive. The live-action and visual effects are blended so seamlessly that at some point early on, you’ll just stop looking at the animals or backgrounds as anything artificial.
THE JUNGLE BOOK works best as soon as you give yourself over to it. It’s a sumptuous visual treat, exploding with life, color and energy. There are a couple of sequences with Mowgli simply running through the jungle, climbing trees, jumping from limb to limb, swinging from vines, and you’ll wish you had the fortitude to be that happy being so active. Truthfully, there is a great deal of comfort to be drawn from the familiar, but Favreau isn’t whole-heartedly cutting and pasting moments; he’s allowing the other source materials to inspire and inform his production. It’s a fine line, but he walks on the right side of it, and the resulting film is a thing of elegance, a wild and sometimes scary ride, and a celebration of the natural world, which might seem ironic, but this film is about as far from cynical as you can get. See it, then see it again.
