Toy Story stars Tom Hanks and Tim Allen originally were attached to the project, which has languished for years as Disney looks for its next Pirates of the Caribbean. Disney brought on Johnson a couple of years ago, and now the project is moving toward production under the direction of Jaume Collet-Serra, who most recently directed mid-range dramas The Shallows and Run All Night, starring Liam Neeson.
Michael Green is said to have written the current draft of the script, and he did pretty well with Logan, which earned him, James Mangold and Scott Frank an Academy Award nomination this year for Best Adapted Screenplay — something rare for a superhero film.
That creative line-up suggests a darker tone than the straight-up comedy every assumed we would be getting when the voices of Woody and Buzz were involved. But Johnson almost always brings a light tough to his action films, and Blunt's good with a quick line, too, so who knows?
Remember one of the sources of inspiration for the look of Disney's Jungle Cruise ride was the 1951 Humphrey Bogart/Katharine Hepburn film, The African Queen, about a hard-drinking steam launch captain and a Methodist missionary who team up to attack a German gunboat in Africa during World War I. Mismatched male and female leads? Check. Gun battles and action sequences? With this team — check. Throw in some jokes about Trader Sam and the backside of water, and it looks like we might be good to go here.
Jungle Cruise is scheduled to begin filming in May, according to Variety's report. Disney has not announced a release date. Blunt's Mary Poppins Returns, which co-stars Hamilton's Lin-Manuel Miranda, releases this Christmas.
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Is it me or does it seem like Disney is passing on movies, but they get made anyway. Jumanji seems a bit "Jungle Cruise-y".
I thought there was supposed to be a Haunted Mansion movie too. I have a feeling this was turned into Crimson Peak.
Michael Green also wrote Alien: Covenant, which is among the dumbest movies of all time, so that's not so encouraging.
That said, if the movie causes Disney to update the ride, and hopefully remove its blatantly racist elements, it will have been worth the movie. (Though here's hoping they don't add five The Rocks, the way they added five Depps to PotC.)
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