The Jungle (2013)

I love this movie so much

hyped garbage

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Despite not being a fan of the found-footage genre, the great cover art and a relatively interesting premise(plus, although it has been a while, I remember enjoying the director's previous movies, they do need re-watches) were what drew me in. The Jungle is not a bad movie, the locations have a very beautiful yet claustrophobic look, the sound has a genuine spookiness done with subtlety, the acting is reasonable considering the material and there are splashes of suspense and tension. And it is a long way from the worst of the found-footage genre, Hunting the Legend and all of those from The Asylum are far worse. However, despite its potential, The Jungle didn't deliver for me. The shaky camera work is so excessive and in your face that it's nauseating, maybe it was a deliberate effect but it just felt too much. The script could have been much tighter, it relies on too much repetition- with a lot of chasing and running around screaming-, there is too much talk in places and the exposition at the beginning doesn't tell us very much. The story of course is deliberately slow-burning and has moments but the suspense and tension only come in splashes and not consistently, coupled with the repetitive nature, the slow pacing and the too-long amount of time it takes to build up The Jungle did feel more tedious than thrilling. At no point did I care or feel any degree of empathy for the characters despite the actors' best efforts. Larry especially is one of those who we dislike from the get go and the more the movie progressed the more the dislike turned to hate, he came across as arrogant and self-absorbed who didn't seem to give a toss about anybody else with him. As for the creature, apart from a growl, glaring eyes and the cover art it is literally non-existent, again a deliberate effect most likely but one that made the conflict not credible in the least bit and in the end you just don't care what it is. The pay-off at best is unsatisfactory, very close to not being one in fact. So overall, didn't deliver personally but could have been far worse. 4/10 Bethany Cox

There is little that can be said about this film that others before me haven't already written. It is a terrible film that had so much potential but decided to through that off the mountain in favour of utter trash.The main character is someone who strolls of into the jungle and acts like he knows every inch of it. He totally ignores advise from the native peoples and regularly put others around him in danger. He is an arse and frankly, I would have shot him within the first day. To then disrespect other peoples beliefs just defies belief. This in its own right makes this film utter crass. If anything needed saving, its everyone else, from him! Strangely, the two "natives" are better acted than any of the others particularly the tracker.As to the "monster/demon" Don't make me laugh. I agree with another reviewer, it should have been a super sized leopard or beast or something along that line. Not seeing the creature involved properly works in some films but not in this one. It just leave you bored and utterly disappointed. Thank god I hadn't just bought this. It would have been an utter waste.My advice - go watch paint dry. Its far more entertaining and far more riveting. Gremlins was more believable than this.Rant over. Good luck to any of you that actually sit down and watch it. You've been warned!!!

I'm all in favour of movies like Blair Witch Project with that "held camera" type of shooting.The jungle starts off as something that could have turned into a great low budget movie. Instead it goes on a downhill road from the very beginning.Starting with the main characters on their way to the jungle - without any actual detail of what the jungle looks like but a bunch of trees - as they dwell deeper all we get is the main character that comes across as persistent and egocentric guy trying to find A leopard... Even the fact that they bumped into the natives could've leave you guessing if you're going to find a secret cult or ritual.. but no. There is no actual development to the characters and as time goes by you'll find yourself looking at the time, wondering how much longer until it ends. After a "close encounter", 4 minutes before the movie finishes, we get a glimpse of what the creature looks like which is nothing but as what could be described as a hairy man with a wolf mask.. Something more plausible and appealing could've happened here... Not to mention that throughout the movie there is no actual scenes where this "hairy masked man" could be seen and all we get are branches braking and big roars.It leaves the viewers without nothing to expect and with an end feeling of the so called "deja vu" - seen it all before..

As soon as I saw the very first frames of camera-work on this movie, I know this was going to be bad. Another one of these horrible 'found footage' movies, mockumentaries, or call them whatever need be.The story in this movie is about conservationist Larry Black and his brother Ben who travel to the lush jungles of Indonesia in search of the endangered leopards. With the help of two native Indonesians, the foursome venture into the thick jungle, hoping to find proof of these endangered great cats. But they come to face the horror of being stalked by something ferocious.Right, well the storyline itself had somewhat of something that resembled the possibility of being interesting, but it was all ruined and shot to pieces (pardon the pun) by some really questionable and horrible camera-work. I am pretty sure that my three year old son could manage to hold a camera more steady than what you see it practically all of these 'found footage' movies.So the audience is to believe that there is some hybrid feline / man running around out there in the Indonesian jungle? And better yet, that these brothers and their Indonesian trackers died to make this documentary. And given the ending to the movie, then just exactly how would this 'found footage' have been recovered from the creatures den? It was just so lame, so horribly, epically lame.The only reason that the movie doesn't get a 1 out of 10 rating is because it is somewhat better than watching a screen of only static. But, mind you, not that much better. This movie gets a 2 out of 10 rating simply because of the lousy camera-work and the whole faked and staged 'found footage' genre is generally a waste of time, space and film.