Expectations: I know a lot of people were trepidatious about this new retelling of The Jungle Book because they regard the first one as such as classic. To be honest, I don't know if I've ever sat through the full run of the original so it was never a film I was very nostalgic about. Removing the musical aspect that was so prevalent in the original increased my anticipation for the film. I thought it would separate the film as its own story. Plus, I am not the biggest fan of musicals. After early reviews came out and spoke of the film so positively, it became a must see for me. I'll take any excuse to support Jon Favreau's work.

Review: The Jungle Book is in a technical sense an extraordinary film. The fact that all the animals and environments are computer generated is remarkable. The story is also enjoyable and Bill Murray as Baloo is amazing. Unfortunately, being a huge fan of Favreau's other films like Chef and Elf I feel that this movie fell short. I think the wide praise the film gets is largely due to its undoubtedly revolutionary CGI. I just did not find myself having much of an emotional connection with a majority of the characters and I was disappointed to see that the story was so similar to the first. I would have liked to see a different take on the traditional tale. Many of the plot elements felt generic and I found myself wondering if I would ever remember the film if it weren't for the animation. It's hard to speak negatively of the film as I don't want to make light of Favreau's work. I think that The Jungle Book will be a vital film in Hollywood's future. Favreau has given filmmakers confidence in creating stories with this type of animation. Just today I heard about the development of a Mouse Guard movie and its use of what is described as "Jungle Book like" technology. I think we are going to see more and more of this in the next few years. The thing that took me out of a lot of the film was Neel Sethi's Mowgli. I completely understand how hard it is for any actor, especially one that young, to work with a green screen and animals that are not even really there. Sethi did the best job he could but it did not work for me in the movie. Maybe Favreau could have told a Jungle Book inspired story with just the animals. Although I was not as huge of a fan of the film as many were, the amazing CGI bumps it up to a 2.5/4.

Films like The Jungle Book: Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, The BFG, Paddington