Most remember the mid-nineties film Jumanji, which was a huge hit at the time and many look back with nostalgic appeal. Like anything that was or is popular, it will be receiving a reboot or re-imagining with none other than Dwayne Johnson. This is what is known about the Dwayne Johnson Jumanji release date and rumors of this remake/reboot/re-imagining/sequel, or whatever.
According to US magazine, Dwayne Johnson announced on Instagram last Friday, April 22 to announce that he is on board for the remake of Jumanji, posting: "It's official. We'll produce and deliver to a whole new generation a title that I love and is one of my all time favs." Johnson also said that he was meeting with producer Matt Tolmach and director Jake Kasdan. The shooting will begin this fall, and The Rock promise "to deliver something cool and special...and not screw the whole damn thing up".
Dwayne Johnson seems to be cast in films that are related to franchises. He plans to star in Rampage, a film based on a video game where three gigantic monsters destroy a city. He will also appear in Baywatch, as Mitch Buchannon, the role that David Hasselhoff played back in the nineties on television.
For those that missed Jumanji, it was originally a book published in 1981 by Chris Van Allsburg. The story was a simple one of two children, Peter and Judy, playing a board game that causes a lot of magical things to happen in the house, only to be cleared up like a reset switch once the game ends. The book was a huge hit and its author won the Caldecott award for its realistic illustrations.
It was made into a movie in 1995 with Chris Van Allsburg writing the story. The film kept the same plot of Peter (Bradley Pierce) and Judy (Kirsten Dunst), but added another element to the story. The game had two more players with Sarah Whittle (Bonnie Hunt) and Alan Parrish (the late Robin Williams). Alan and Sarah had started playing the game in the 1950s, and then Alan was sucked into the world of the game itself until Peter and Judy started playing the game in 1995. The adaptation was not well-received by critics (scoring a 39 on Metacritic), but audiences enjoyed it enough to double the film's 50 million dollar budget.
Jumanji survived with a TV series loosely based on the premise of the movie, and also spawned a 2002 book Zathura, which was also made to a movie in 2005. The film and book had the same premise of a magical board game that would bring the players all kinds of supernatural trouble, with Zathura having a space theme while Jumanji had a jungle influence.
Considering that the first Jumanji movie ended with the possibility of a sequel as the cursed board game essentially lived on, it is possible that the Dwayne Johnson version could tie-in directly. There are rumors that Dwayne's co-star from Central Intelligence and co-host at the MTV 2016 Movie Awards, Kevin Hart, will be in the film as well.
We will have to find out when Jumanji appears in theaters on July 28, 2017.
