Jungle Book (1942)
Growing up one of my favorite Disney Films was The Jungle Book, probably going back to my love of animals as a child the classic 1967 animated film was a movie I could throw on anytime and have a great time with. When Disney announced that they were remaking the Jungle Book in 2016 I was immediately nervous, this is a movie that lends itself so much to animation and I just didn't see how it would transfer to live-action. They were able to get around this by making everything but the boy CGI and I actually ended up really enjoying that movie. But before CGI and before the pretty well known 1994 live-action film there was another version of The Jungle Book put on the big screen. In 1942 Zoltan Korda would bring the first feature-length cinematic telling of this story to life (not counting his earlier 1937 film Elephant Boy which only took bits and pieces from the story). Mowgli (Sabu) is just a child when he is left in the jungle and is raised by wolves becoming somewhat of a wild animal himself. Eventually, one day though he wanders into a human village and finds another life there. Most of the villagers are quick to judge him and dislike him which is especially true by a man named Buldeo (Joseph Calleia) but a woman named Messua (Rosemary DeCamp) takes him in and teaches him the way of man. Still, though his heart belongs to the jungle and he knows that eventually, he will have to face his sworn enemy, a dangerous tiger by the name of Shere Khan.
Speaking on the story of this film is a bit difficult considering that we have seen this story play out so many times before, there really is nothing overly new here that also stands out as that impressive. Due to the lack of interaction, Mowgli was able to have with the animals we do naturally spend more time with the village and compared to the other films based on this story we do dive much deeper into his relationships and dynamics with these people but I can't say that plot engaged me that much. Just changing the story doesn't make it more interesting and the rest of the movie does follow plenty of the same story beats that do come off as a bit bland considering we have seen it done before but it would be criminal to fault this movie for that as it was an early telling of this story and has no control over what was to come.
The main thing I was worried about in this film was the animals themselves considering there was no CGI or other visual effects they could use to bring the jungle to life. They had to shoot the actual animals and just make it work which sadly does not most of the time. Being real animals they mostly just have vague scenes of them walking around that they try to pass off as being bigger than they are which probably played off better in 1942 considering there were way fewer media out there featuring these animals which meant they were more captivating on presence alone, though now just seeing a tiger doesn't have a strong effect on the audience as we have all seen tigers and can easily find photos and videos of them right off our phone. Most of the time these visuals come off as cheesy but I will say that some do stand out as creative at least. Seeing how they shot the battle with Shere Khan, for example, was genuinely interesting despite the desired effect not being there. Also where the ethics probably wouldn't hold up in modern times they did use some creative techniques to try and get reactions out of animals like having a huge fake crocodile that genuinely scares the hell out of a bear. The production design however I do think overall still holds up, sure there are plenty of signs that this is a soundstage instead of a jungle but there is something to say about the physicality of this movie, you see this actor really swinging from vines and swimming through the water and it is all shot in really gorgeous technicolor. I absolutely think that back in 1942 if I were to see this movie without the knowledge of where cinema would go I would have felt like I was being transported to another world.
The main thing I was worried about in this film was the animals themselves considering there was no CGI or other visual effects they could use to bring the jungle to life. They had to shoot the actual animals and just make it work which sadly does not most of the time. Being real animals they mostly just have vague scenes of them walking around that they try to pass off as being bigger than they are which probably played off better in 1942 considering there were way fewer media out there featuring these animals which meant they were more captivating on presence alone, though now just seeing a tiger doesn't have a strong effect on the audience as we have all seen tigers and can easily find photos and videos of them right off our phone. Most of the time these visuals come off as cheesy but I will say that some do stand out as creative at least. Seeing how they shot the battle with Shere Khan, for example, was genuinely interesting despite the desired effect not being there. Also where the ethics probably wouldn't hold up in modern times they did use some creative techniques to try and get reactions out of animals like having a huge fake crocodile that genuinely scares the hell out of a bear. The production design however I do think overall still holds up, sure there are plenty of signs that this is a soundstage instead of a jungle but there is something to say about the physicality of this movie, you see this actor really swinging from vines and swimming through the water and it is all shot in really gorgeous technicolor. I absolutely think that back in 1942 if I were to see this movie without the knowledge of where cinema would go I would have felt like I was being transported to another world.
If there was one thing I had to really praise the movie for it would be the script. This movie decides to take the character of Mowgli and dig into some of the more comedic elements of his character especially as he is making the transition from the jungle to the village and most of these moments did pay off. I found him to be genuinely fun and Sabu brings really great charisma to his character that makes him extremely likable and entertaining. The film also has some shocking good messages in it that are nearly ahead of their time. This movie has things to say about hunting and how we treat animals and the environment that you don't often see from movies made in this time period and where sure none of these messages really rocked me to my core they did stand out and I can appreciate that this movie decided to be a bit bold and have some bigger things to say.
Overall though I can't say I really enjoyed the 1942 version of Jungle Book too much. This is a movie that probably would have really stuck out to me back in 1942 but being a film critic in 2019 the movie loses so much of its magic just simply due to the quality of effects and the freshness of the story. It is far from terrible but it doesn't age that well and even though I found the character of Mowgli to be fun and entertaining the plot he was stuck in felt stale and boring. If you want to see some creative early filmmaking then I would give this one a watch but if you are going in just to be entertained then I can't say this will do enough for you to warrant a viewing.
Overall though I can't say I really enjoyed the 1942 version of Jungle Book too much. This is a movie that probably would have really stuck out to me back in 1942 but being a film critic in 2019 the movie loses so much of its magic just simply due to the quality of effects and the freshness of the story. It is far from terrible but it doesn't age that well and even though I found the character of Mowgli to be fun and entertaining the plot he was stuck in felt stale and boring. If you want to see some creative early filmmaking then I would give this one a watch but if you are going in just to be entertained then I can't say this will do enough for you to warrant a viewing.