The Jungle Book 2

After following Shanti (Whitman) into the man village, Mowgli (Osment) finds that he is missing the freedom of the jungle. In the jungle, Baloo (Goodman) is missing his singing partner and however much Bagheera (Joles) tries to cheer him up he can't stop Baloo thinking about going to get Mowgli back. What none of them know is that Shere Khan (Jay) is back and looking for revenge on the Man-Cub.

The Jungle Book 2 just stinks of desperation as Disney continue to ransack their Classic's vault to try and create interest in 2D animation again.

This should have been straight to video fare, as it has none of the charm or fun of the original 1967 classic. The animation looks cheap, the story doesn't really move on and most of the songs are rehashes from the first movie. Yes there are four new songs but they use "The Bare Necessities" so many times that you forget all about them.

Most of the characters are back with the noticeable exception of King Louie but most of the supporting cast such as the Vultures, Bagheera, Colonel Hathi and Kaa have only very small parts to play in this new adventure. Mowgli, Baloo, Shanti, Ranjan and Shere Khan hog the limelight and the movie seems to suffer for it.

On the upside is the excellent vocal talent. John Goodman and Haley Joel Osment give their all in the roles and sound like, as well as having respect for the original, they really had fun making this film. The rest of the cast do a great job of recreating the voices of the characters with Tony Jay doing a perfect Shere Khan.

Rudyard Kipling and the people behind the much-loved original film would be extremely disappointed with this continuation of the story. While it is still a decent children's movie, the parents watching it with them will feel as disheartened as I did, when you know that all the popularity of one of the best animated films of all time is just been used to make Disney some more money. Stay at home and watch the original instead.

Recap: a short recap of the original 'Jungle Book' story, 'Legacy - The Making Of Jungle Book 2': a behind the scenes documentary, 'Jungle Rhythm' music video, 'W-I-L-D' music video, Smash Mouth 'Wanna Be Like You' music video, 'I Got You Beat' and 'Braver' deleted musical sequences, 'Mowgli's Jungle Ruins Maze' game: help Mowgli through ancient jungle ruins so he can return to his village, 'Disney's Song Selection': Sing to the movie and individual songs with on-screen lyrics, Interactive menu & Scene access

The Usher Home | Hush, Hush... | The Big Story | The Usher Speaks

Stuck @ Home | Coming Soon | Links | Contact the Usher

2003