ON THE SILVER SCREEN: FANTASY "ISLAND"

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By Brian Lafferty

 

February 10, 2012 (San Diego) – After watching Journey 2: The Mysterious Island, I wondered what Six Year Old Me would have thought. Six Year Old Me would have loved it. He would have laughed, he would have been thrilled, and he would have had fun.

 

Twenty-Six Year Old Me, having seen lots of movies over the years and grown up a bit more mature and wiser, had a different reaction. It’s inoffensive and it’s ambitious; the cinematography and island have a grand design in its own artificial way. However, Journey 2 is heavily geared towards kids. Adults may leave the theater unsatisfied, as I did.

 

Journey 2 is a sequel to Journey to the Center of the Earth (the 2008 version with Brendan Fraser, not the 1959 classic with singer Pat Boone). Sean Anderson (Josh Hutcherson, the only remaining cast member retained) cajoles his stepfather (Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson) into venturing to Palau to find the Mysterious Island and rescue his grandfather (Michael Caine).

 

Journey 2 is all premise and high-concept. The island functions merely as a chessboard that moves the thinly drawn characters – more like caricatures – around like pawns. It’s as if the filmmakers didn’t realize that even a kids movie requires complex characters. Like The Goonies, which was about a group of kids on an adventure to locate a pirate’s treasure hidden underneath their small community to save their neighborhood from a developer. The reason that film is as endearing to adults as it is to kids is because the boys have distinct, funny personalities and quirks. They’re characters everybody can identify with and get behind.

 

The razor-thin plot does the actors no favors. They often look lost at sea. They act as if they don’t know who their characters are, what their motivations are, and why they act the way they do. That the quintet (which includes Luis Guzman and Vanessa Hudgens) tries to find a way off the sinking island is ironic; the actors, in trying to navigate their cardboard characters, resort to overacting.

 

It doesn’t help that they’re fed an overdose of expositional dialogue. Rarely have I seen a film that contains wall-to-wall dialogue explaining plot points and anything that’s even remotely complicated. Kids are smarter than you think. Would it have hurt the filmmakers to have a little faith in their audience? I know the screenwriters wanted to make the film easy for kids to understand but the screenplay has the air of an adult talking down to a child. I felt insulted.

 

Journey 2 is yet another 3D excursion. I really wish this fad would die. For every film that uses it well like Hugo, there’s at least upwards of a hundred 3D releases that don’t. Director Brad Peyton enjoys flicking objects at the audience; when this film comes out on home video, it’s going to look pathetically awkward.

 

The only worthy aspect of this film is the island itself. For all of the movie’s shortcomings, a lot went into the design of the island. Cinematographer David Tattersall must have used every color of the rainbow. His jungles are filled with saturated green foliage. The underwater sequences are painted with a dreamlike blue.

 

If your kids really want to see this movie, and you don’t want to spend the money, there’s a viable alternative. Rent the original Mysterious Island (1961). It’s notable for the stop motion special effects (designed and executed by special effects master Ray Harryhausen). Comprised of giant bees, crabs, and other animals, the effects are still powerful even in the age of CGI. Most of all, it inspires more awe and is more memorable than Journey 2 will ever be.

 

C-

 

Journey 2: The Mysterious Island is now playing in wide release.

 


A Warner Bros. release. Director: Brad Peyton. Screenplay: Brian Gunn, Mark Gunn, and Richard Outten. Original Music: Andrew Lockington. Cinematography: David Tattersall. Cast: Dwayne Johnson, Michael Caine, Josh Hutcherson, Luis Guzman, and Vanessa Hudgens. 94 minutes. Rated PG.

 


Brian Lafferty can be reached at brian@eastcountymagazine.org. You can also follow him on Twitter: @BrianLaff.

 


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