De jungla a jungla

It would be a natural assumption that since Tim Allen is the main character in this movie, and that since this movie IS supposed to be a comedy, that some of Tim Allen's lines would have at least some humorous content to them. About 90% of his lines were flat and were spoken like they were SUPPOSED to be funny, but just weren't. As for the rest of the movie, why is it that since someone is raised in the jungle, they are complete idiots? His son could speak two languages, seemed rather intelligent, and yet, he'd kill someone elses fish and eat them, steal catfood from the cat and eat it, and do other stupid things that someone with common sense wouldn't do. The things he did were more embarrasingly stupid then funny and just didn't create all that many laughs. Now if we want to look at the point of view of the movie being meaningful as far as a father/son relationship...well...ok, a big time, job oriented guy with a hot new girlfriend finds out he has a son (with his devorced wife, who is of course, really cool) and the two don't get along until then end, when they suddenly do. Like we haven't seen that story before. All in all, just not all that well done. I think the idea could have worked but it was just a poor choice of a final script. Rent if you're bored, it'll entertain you, just don't expect anything all that good.

Michael Cromwell is a successful New York stockbroker looking forward to his marriage to a successful fashion model. However before he can do this he must finalise the divorce from his wife, who left him about 12 years ago. Unfortunately she lives on a tropical island off the coast of Brazil and he finds himself stuck on the island with her. If that wasn't bad enough he learns that the pale, 12 year old member of her tribe (Mimi-Siku) is actually his son. In order to avoid looking at the morality of her not telling him about this life, the story then requires Mimi-Siku to go to New York for reasons too boring to explain and "laughter" ensues and Michael learns some lessons that we all saw coming from a mile off.

It is rare for me not even to have the energy to type a decent plot summary for a film but for this one I make an exception. Part of the problem is the fact that the plot manages to be embarrassingly predictable from start to finish and provides nothing of value along the way. This is only made worse by the lack of laughs and the regular scenes of Mimi-Siku failing to fit in, one of the most embarrassing of which sees him dancing with his father on the street. It is a string of obvious scenarios all run together just as you'd expect and there is nothing of any interest developed along the way. There are plenty of "wild fish out of water in big city" films already kicking around and this offers no reason to add this to the list of the ones you've seen.

The cast are equally lost in the midst of all this stuff and resort to mugging and overplaying at every opportunity. Obviously Allen was going to do this anyway since this is what most of his films tend to be like. Martin Short does the same here and at least gets one, maybe two laughs as a result – which is more than Allen. The clearly well-off and white Huntington is hilariously poor as the boy of the film, he doesn't convince in any part of the film and is a big part of it being embarrassing. The rest of the cast have little to do and even a turn from Stiers adds no value.

Overall a roundly poor film that takes the "wild fish out of water in city" genre, ticks as many boxes as it can, writes lots of predictable and weak scenarios and places them all within a story that is so poorly developed that you pretty much know where it is going from the very start. No laughs and no interest – it might work as noisy nonsense to distract children but it has no value past that.

Tim Allen made this film at the height of his fame,and this is probably one of his better films.

The story itself is pretty simple. Business man learns he has a son raised in the jungle and then has to adapt to the son living with him in the city.

Allen plays a similar sort of character to the one he did in 'The Santa Clause' and the film really plays to his strengths. Although he has tried to do more edgy films (Crazy on the outside, which was pretty poor) Allen has always produced his best work with Disney and with John Pasquin as director.

The film also features a not well explored relationship between Allen's character and his love interest but far more interesting is the chemistry between Allen and Martin Short. They play of each other so well that it makes you wonder what went so wrong when 9 years later they teamed up for 'The Santa Clause 3'.

Overall if you're looking for a good Tim Allen film then look no further.

My opinion on Jungle 2 Jungle is not as harsh, the movie was cute. The fact that it was a remake isn't my complaint because it is really hard to find movies that haven't been remade from other foreign or alternative films. I give movies at least one chance. Tim Allen is, as usual, comedic while being a bit on the crazy side, but still funny in all the ways you would want him to be, if you like him. You are also introduced to Leelee Sobieski in her feature film debut (she had been in TV movies, but not really big movies till Jungle 2 Jungle came out). The movie in general is a great family flick, one that everyone can enjoy. I believe that is should be given at least one chance, so go out and rent this fun movie.

Silly fantasy movie as usually Disney's pattern family soft comedy, in a nutshell an average presentation, unpretentious clash of cultures, a teenager boy Mimi Siku (Huntington) raised in a jungle by his mother Dr. Patricia (JoBeth Williams) who works in a small native community at Venezuela, when he knows almost accidentally his unknown father Michael (Tim Allen) a workaholic commodities seller at Wall Street, who flying there just trying get the pappers of the divorce from his mother, the boy wants to know the big apple for stay a while, that is about marry again with the fancy snobbish model Charlotte (Lolita Davidovich) that stays baffled to know his fiancé already had a grow up son.

What supposedly an easy matter to overcame becomes a true nightmare with the wildest boy raising hell with Michael's bride and friends, likes as poisoned spider, darts, arrow and others oddities, also Michael has a partner with the crazy Richard (Martin Short) which both are involved in a risky bet with tons of coffee beans, which the price is in freefall after they had lost the opportunity to sell for fair price, under pressure Richard finds a buyer, Michael realizes that such man is Russian's mobster, he wants wash the money paying in cash for the commodities, Michael advises against the sale, however is too late.

Michael even knowing about his unknown son whom his former wife hides the truth, slowing he will getting attached with the naïve boy, also Tim Allen has enough gift to make comic pictures, this one has some moments as in the hut bachelor when at night excess of gas are easy flowing, harmful and easy to watch, with breathtaking landscape at Amazon's Tepuis at plateau borderline between Venezuela and Brazil on opening scenes, let it see!!

Thanks for reading.

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First watch: 1998 / How many: 2 / Source: Cable TV-DVD / Rating: 6.5.