Jungle Boy

I'm not normally the kind of person to give shout outs on my blog but I'm prepared to make an exception today because (a) she's a really important person to me; and (b) without her I would never have even discovered that this movie existed. So this blog is dedicated to Aimee, without her I'd have no post today. Thank you.

So moving onto the actual review. Today's animated classic comes courtesy of Cards Plus (DVD PTY LTD and all that bullshit), who apparently felt that in order to compete in the savage world of Birthday cards they needed to include short animated movies. There are several others out there but the one I happened to recieve in the mail was Jungle Boy. Not Jungle Book just so you're aware, they're completely different. This is about a young boy becoming estranged from his parents in the jungle and being raised by the animals. Oh wait sorry it is the same. Well except it's worse. Much much worse. I'm not even sure the person who wrote the blurb on the back of the card watched it. Here's what it says...

"When little Mowgli toddles into the heart of the Seeonee Wolf Pack, who adopt him, the jungle will never be the same again. With the help of his teachers, the big-hearted bear, Baloo and the wise panther, Bagheera, the boy learns the language of the wild and the secrets of Jungle Law."

However here's what I wouldv'e said. Having already been raised by animals into a young man Mowgli must bridge the gap between man and nature in order to save the jungle he calls home. There's also a romantic subplot and some musical numbers The picture on the cover doesn't really even look like the movie, Mowgli is far too young. Maybe the people who wrote the blurb just watched the Disney version instead, for which I couldn't blame them. I don't remember Baloo and I don't remember the boy learning the secrets of jungle law. Mind you this 44 minute animation does have this habbit of just being completely unmemorable, it just sort of happens barely registering in the background of your mind. The movie tries to squeeze an aweful lot into those 44 mins but this means that lots of plot and characterisation takes a backseat. For example Mowgli's biological parents thought their son had been swallowed up by the earth when it opened up during a jungle excavation. Even if you swallow the troubling notion of taking your only child in a basonet into the unexplored jungle and sitting it on the ground while you dig, what happens next in the story is bat shit crazy. Some random hunter calls them up around 18 years later and mentions seeing a boy who behaves like an animal to which they basically say "That's just vague enough to be our son who must've been raised by animals instead of crushed by rubble, let's fly back to this remote jungle right away and have a more thorough look like we should've probably done at the fucking time." But of course more sensible plot progression needs to be sacrificed to make room for the couple of random, uncatchy songs that get shoehorned in for no conceivable reason beyond trying to copy Disney.

At the end of the day I'm not really sure what I can say about this movie. It's certainly bad (any movie in which guns are inexplicably pink can't really be good after all), but for a movie that will only ever have a limited audience and undoubtedly had a minescule budget it's much better than you'd expect. My main gripe is how inaccurate the blurb is, which is more baffling than anything else. But even if it's not the completely shit movie it appears to be I still don't really understand why they made it? It certainly has nothing to do with Birthdays. It seems like an aweful lot of extra effort and expense just to make a greetings card. I certainly can't imagine it makes them a fat profit. And this is what this company does, I mean it's right there in the name "Card Plus DVD." This is what they do? This is their buisiness model? You know what I think? I think this whole company is just a front for some money laundering scheme or so some guy can tie up his drug money in a legitimate looking buisiness. Except of course it doesn't look legitimate at all. It looks sus. Really, really sus. Just look at that picture above. Look at the bear's face as he eyes-off boy Mowgli. Sus.