Jungle2Jungle

Details At A Glance

General
Extras
Category Comedy Theatrical Trailer(s) None
Rating
Other Trailer(s) None
Year Released 1997 Commentary Tracks None
Running Time 100:31 minutes Other Extras None
RSDL/Flipper No/No
Cast & Crew
Start Up Movie
Region 2,4 Director John Pasquin
Studio
Distributor

Warner Home Video
Starring Tim Allen 
Martin Short
Lolita Davidovich
David Ogden Stiers
Jobeth Williams
Sam Huntington
Case Amaray
RRP $34.95 Music Michael Convertino

 
 
Video
Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame No MPEG None
Widescreen Aspect Ratio 1.78:1 Dolby Digital 5.1
16x9 Enhancement Yes Soundtrack Languages English (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384 Kb/s)
Italian (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384 Kb/s)
Theatrical Aspect Ratio 1.85:1
Miscellaneous
Macrovision ? Smoking No
Subtitles English 
Dutch
English for the Hearing Impaired
Annoying Product Placement Yes, mildly
Action In or After Credits No

Plot Synopsis

    Jungle2Jungle is another rehash of the idea of taking a "savage" out of one environment and putting them into another environment, and is reminiscent of even a few other recent Walt Disney efforts. And to be honest, it is not a particularly good variation of the story either.

    Michael Cromwell (Tim Allen) is a workaholic commodity broker (I can relate to that having been one) from New York, whose wife left him thirteen years ago after one year of marriage, and who now wants to remarry. Only problem is, they never formalized a divorce and the impending nuptials are thirty days away. So he drops everything to head off to the Amazon rain forest to find his wife Patricia (Jobeth Williams) to get her to sign the divorce papers. Naturally he finds her, but also discovers that he has a son, Mimi-Siku (Sam Huntington) that he never knew about. Mimi is just about to become a man in the tribe he and his mother live with, and the tribal chief sets him a fairly simple task for his rite of passage - bring the flame from the Statue of Liberty. So Mimi and Michael return to New York and a whole heap of trouble. It does not help that Michael's fiancee Charlotte (Lolita Davidovich) does not exactly like Mimi or his pet tarantula and that Michael's partner Robert Kempster (Martin Short) is a bit of a neurotic character, with a penchant for doing deals with the Russian mafia. Suffice to say, Mimi gets into a deal of trouble adjusting and goes back to the Amazon, shortly to be followed by a reformed Michael, plus Robert and his family, whose daughter Karen (LeeLee Sobiesky) Mimi has taken a shine too.

    Okay, this is a fairly typical syrupy Walt Disney story, but who can knock the dollars they have made out of these sorts of syrupy stories? Just don't ask about the quality of the filmmaking. As for being a comedy, well that is probably stretching it a little - and to be honest I have never found Tim Allen especially funny, even in the enormously successful Home Improvement. Indeed, the funniest moment in this film actually involves Charlotte's cat with Tim Allen as the sidekick - but then again I may be a little weird. Martin Short actually does a fine job here and Lolita Davidovich is totally believable as the self absorbed Charlotte. The rest are just typically Disney, in other words far too syrupy for their own good.

Transfer Quality

Video

    This actually is one of the better Disney transfers from the last batch of releases.

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1, and it is 16x9 enhanced.

    This is generally a very clear and a very sharp transfer throughout, with just a hint of edge enhancement on a couple of occasions during scenes in New York. Shadow detail is good throughout.

    The colours were consistently rendered, albeit not overly vibrant. I felt that this was a little too muted and could have done with bringing up the vibrancy of the colours, especially in the Amazon scenes, just a little. There was no oversaturation of colour at all and colour bleed was not a problem.

    There were no MPEG artefacts noted, and there were no significant video artefacts noted either - just the odd hint of a shimmer is about it, and I doubt that many would even notice it. The film was surprisingly free of film artefacts.

Audio

    The quality of the video transfer was not matched by the audio transfer however.

    There are two soundtracks on the DVD, both being Dolby Digital 5.1 tracks: the default English and Italian. I listened to the English default.

    Dialogue was generally easy to understand and clear, although there were a couple of times where the level of the audio seemed to drop which made the dialogue briefly a little difficult to follow.

    There did not appear to be any audio sync problems with the transfer.

    The score by Michael Convertino was completely unmemorable and had little effect upon the film.

    The balance and detail in the surround channels was a little inconsistent, at times very good but at other times sounding as if the surround channels had dropped out completely, being quite recessed. In general, I would have to say that this is a flawed soundtrack and I would have expected better in a 5.1 soundtrack.

    The bass channel was aggressively used during a few scenes, especially those involving music or action in New York, and was quite unnaturally balanced as a result. This really detracted from the film in my view, although I know my tastes regarding bass differ from most.

Extras

    A bundle of excellent extras can be found on this disc - err, sorry, just trying to be funny.

Menu

    This is a completely unremarkable, albeit 1.33:1 16x9 enhanced, menu.

R4 vs R1

    After checking out a few resources, I have been unable to verify that this is yet released in Region 1. However, given it being a Disney product, it would probably miss out on 16x9 enhancement upon release, so Region 4 is likely to remain the way to go.

Summary

    Jungle2Jungle is a not especially stunning variation on the misplaced person/environment story and hardly rates as a comedy. However, as a family movie it is not a bad view at all.

    The video quality is very good.

    The audio quality is good, albeit inconsistent.

    The extras are huge, over the top efforts that you will miss completely on our Region 4 release.

Ratings (out of 5)

Video
Audio
Extras 10,000,000 New Yorkers?
Plot
Overall

© Ian Morris
19th October 1999

Review Equipment
   
DVD Pioneer DV-515; S-video output
Display Sony Trinitron Wega 84cm
Audio Decoder Built in
Amplification Yamaha RXV-795
Speakers Energy Speakers: centre EXLC; left and right EXLR; and subwoofer ES-12XL