Apparantly the folks at Caterpillar Machinery are quite upset about the sequel to George of the Jungle. After seeing the direct to video film I can see why, as those large construction vehicles play center stage to being bad guy in a film that is aimed at kids and family.
As with most direct to video features, the original cast changes. No Brendan Frasier in sight, as George is now played by Christopher Showerman, who actually does a pretty good job. Some of the original cast is intact, with the voice of Ape, John Cleese being the most significant. The story centers around a major threat to the living area of George. In this outing, George and Ursula are happily married and have a son, George Junior. Life is good until Ursula’s mother arrives deep in the jungle with plans to get her daughter and 5-year old grandson back to civilization and will do absolutely anything to make that happen.
So what does Ursula's mother decide to do? She teams with Ursula’s obsessive ex-fiancé Lyle to hypnotize Ursula into leaving George and turn his jungle to mulch! That’s when all vines lead to Las Vegas. There, George, Ape, Shep and Tookie-tookie must rescue Ursula, and then swing back to save the Jungle from Lyle’s bulldozing bullies!
The movie actually works on several levels with much of the comedy being quite intelligent. The new George is also well acted, I didn't really even notice the difference once the film got going. In all this is an enjoyable, albeit, fleeting movie that makes for a better rental than a purchase.
The Disc:
Straight to video usually means filmed with video in mind. So there's not much to talk about in terms of transfer or sound. Both areas are adequate and about what one would expect in a film released in this manner. It's a decent quality 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer with decent 5.1 surround. There is actually a DTS 5.1 track which pleased me very much so. Why can't Disney offer this on their bigger titles though?
Extras on the disc begin with a Behind-the-scenes featurette that is your standard marketing fluff. The film apparantly went really smoothly despite the legal issues it encountered right before the release. Next up are Deleted scenes with audio commentary. One has to wonder why deleted scenes are even included in a direct to home feature but they are here. Finally there's a Jungle Bungles blooper real which I thought was quite humorous.
bottom line:
More than I expected but still nothing more than a family night rental. George of the Jungle 2 has an easy pace, good acting and solid story for plenty of family fun.
By - Brian Gray
