Filmmakers Turn Good Book Into Dumb Movie - 'Jumper' Review...

Posted on February 14, 2008 - 5:42pm by michael I read Jumper years and years ago, but I remember the most interesting thing about the book was the part (which was at least much of the first half, maybe more) that showed the kid learning to use his power of teleportation, and the adventures he had. It is one of those powers that can lead to nearly endless possibilities, something that would spend hours imagining what I would do with if I had it. In the movie we see how David learns of his power, in an incident with a school bully that leads to him floating terrified down a river underneath the ice (I didn't know ice formed over moving water, but no matter), and then suddenly he finds himself instantly teleported to safety.

From there we make the jarring jump from one of the best young adult fiction novels to come along in quite some time (I imagine so, anyway), and into an almost completely uninteresting special effects-driven action flick. It's a notable, and disastrous, difference that the little kid from the book is now Hayden Christensen, who callously misuses his power until he discovers other jumpers that challenge his superhuman authority. What a role model.

Clearly, the idea for the movie is endlessly fascinating, as are the possibilities. Unfortunately, instead of really doing something interesting with the story, they opted to just show us this guy who uses it purely for material gain and does nothing with his life except sit around his fancy apartment until some bad jumpers and some jumper-hunters can turn up and turn the movie into your basic, run-of-the-mill special effects nonsense. As soon as David figures out his powers and starts to feel comfortable using them, the movie reverts into every other 90 minute special effects movie you've ever seen. What a waste.

Even worse, the movie is completely inconclusive. The ending requires at least one sequel for the stories to make sense, and it seems to me that Jumper is already fading into obscurity and so a sequel is not entirely likely. However, a quick glance at the IMDb will reveal that Liman has signed on for Jumper 2, which is announced for a release sometime in 2011. I can't wait.

On one hand I'm not surprised to see the movie ultimately turn into something of an advertisement for its own sequels rather than a complete film in itself, because it was directed by Doug Liman, who also directed The Bourne Identity, so it could very well be that he was hoping to kickstart another lucrative franchise. Good luck. I predict something along the lines of the precipitous Underworld franchise than the Bourne franchise. On the other hand, I'm surprised that so much of the movie was handled so poorly, because it was directed by Doug Liman, who directed The Bourne Identity and so should really know better.

I'm reminded of the hugely disappointing Hollow Man, which also began with endless possibilities and just blew it in favor of some snazzy special effects shots. I have been pretty unimpressed with Hayden Christensen ever since the new Star Wars films, and Samuel L. Jackson is just wasting his time completely here.

Then again, the movie is a cash cow. The premise is interesting, there are big names attached, and clearly the studios really believed in it, which you can tell just by glancing down the list of filming locations. For obvious reasons, they traveled all over the world to make this movie. Maybe that was part of the reason so many big names were attached? I may not have been able to resist the big paycheck and world travel myself, regardless of how dumb the script may have been…

The Bean-Meter

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