Jungle Cruise is one of Disney's occasional forays into making feature films based on theme park rides, starring Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt, Jesse Plemmons, Jack Whitehall, Paul Giamatti, and Edgar Ramírez.
Dr. Lily Houghton (Blunt), action botanist, steals an arrowhead that is supposedly the key to finding "the Tears of the Moon," flowers that grow in the Amazon and can cure any disease or lift any curse. She travels to Brazil with her reluctant sidekick and brother MacGregor (Whitehall, channeling his father) in search of it, hoping to use the flower as a medicine to help the world!
Once there, through a series of wacky mishaps, they wind up hiring Frank (Johnson), a local tour guide and hustler who peppers his tours with dad jokes (some apparently taken straight from the actual Jungle Cruise ride), all the while pursued by Prince Joachim (Plemmons), the son of Kaiser Wihelm. Joachim is also looking for the flower to help Germany win the war (that'd be the Great War), and is very happy to go full-on Dr. Doom to do it.
The twist, here, is that the conquistadors who invaded the area 400 years ago and spread the legend of the Tears, were cursed to never die and never leave sight of the river. Led by Aguirre (Ramírez, mostly under a lot of CGI snakes), they're trapped in a pit, because if they can't see the river they turn to stone or something. And who trapped them? Why, it was Frank! Actually Fransisco Lopez de Heredia, Aguirre's cartographer, who was along for the conquistadoring but took issue with Aguirre's willingness to kill natives and was likewise cursed.
Anyway, this all comes to a climax where the petals bloom, Lily manages to grab only one, and uses it to break the curse on Frank...but that's OK, because then there's a second one, so happy endings all round. Except for Aguirre and his men, who get turned to stone and trapped and tortured forever, but fuck 'em, they're the bad guys.
It's a cute movie. It doesn't have the same charm as Pirates of the Caribbean, and Dwayne Johnson, while certainly fun to watch, doesn't bring as much to the table as Johnny Depp did, but Emily Blunt manages to strike a nice balance between lucky, clever, and skilled in her portrayal of Lily, and I always love watching Jack Whitehall. Kudos to Disney for making the character gay, but 10 demerits for never actually saying or showing anything that couldn't be worked around for homophobic audiences. Paul Giamatti and Jesse Plemmons get to chew scenery nicely as the villains, and there's a big CGI jaguar that gets drunk. Fun for the whole family!
My Grade: B-
Rewatch Value: Medium-high
Next up: Raya & The Last Dragon
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