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Zathura: A Space Adventure

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Zathura
File:Zathura dvd.jpg
Zathura DVD cover
Directed byJon Favreau
Written byChris Van Allsburg (book)
David Koepp
John Kamps
Barry Lyndon
Zach Braff
Produced byMichael De Luca
Scott Kroopf
William Teitler
Peter Billingsley
StarringJonah Bobo
Josh Hutcherson
Dax Shepard
Kristen Stewart
Tim Robbins
Frank Oz
John Alexander
Derek Mears
Douglas Tate
Joe Bucaro
Jeff Wolfe
Adam Wills
Distributed byColumbia Pictures
TriStar Pictures
Release dates
November 11, 2005
February 3, 2006 (UK)
Running time
114 minutes
LanguageEnglish
Budget$65,000,000

Zathura: A Space Adventure is a film directed by Jon Favreau, released in November 2005, based on an illustrated book by Chris Van Allsburg. It starred Jonah Bobo as Danny and Josh Hutcherson as Walter. Tim Robbins also had a small role as the divorced father of Walter and Danny. The film also gave a sister to the boys, introduced a derelict astronaut to the plot, and multiplied the number of the Zorgons and Zorgon ships. This movie is considered as the first of a series, being a prequel to Jumanji despite being released ten years hence.[1]

Plot summary

Two boys, Walter (Josh Hutcherson) and Danny (Jonah Bobo), discover a space themed board game, where everything inside it becomes real. The boys are eventually drawn into an adventure when their house is magically hurtled through space. The story is similar to Jumanji, another illustrated book by Van Allsburg (in the book, the Zathura game is contained inside the Jumanji one, although paradoxically the astronaut is revealed to be the creator of Jumanji).

During the course of the story, the boys must overcome their personal ill-feeling held toward one another in order to survive. They are aided in this by an astronaut (Dax Shepard) who appears as a result of the game. This astronaut is eventually revealed to be an older version of Walter, who had been trapped as a character in the game's world as a result of causing the disappearance of Danny, without whom he was no longer a player. Thus, the game could not advance without Danny taking his turn. This backstory becomes the basis, although the viewer only sees its role as such in retrospect, of parallels drawn between the two versions of Walter, including a revelation of the backstory without mention of his name or that of his brother. He is finally released when Walter summons his brother back to him. Both he and his brother seem to merge with Danny and Walter (after the astronaut turns back into another version of Walter) now that the future caused by Walter wishing Danny away has been erased.

Accompanying Danny, Walter, and the astronaut is their cantankerous elder sister, Lisa (Kristen Stewart), who while not a player is as vulnerable to the dangers present in the game. She is placed in cryogenic freeze for five turns. She develops a crush on the astronaut, and is thus horrified when she finds out that she fell for an older version of her brother Walter.

The main villains in the movie are the Zorgons; reptilian, biped tool-users who are fond of heat and are attracted to a heat source much like bees are attracted to nectar, because they are cold-blooded. The Zorgons, having burned their own planet to obtain more heat, are nomads who travel through space seeking more to burn and who keep a flock of four-eyed goats on their ship.

Another character, a robot (Frank Oz), first appears as a wind-up tin toy that quickly becomes life-size. It is supposed to defend the players, but as it is malfunctioning it mis-identifies Walter as an alien life form and begins rampaging through the house. Walter uses a "Reprogram" card on the robot, and it instead sets its sights on the Zorgons. A single Zorgon survives the robot's kamikaze attack and sneaks up behind Walter and Danny as they are wondering where Lisa is. Just as it's about to kill them, it is crushed and killed by Lisa with Danny's piano. Unfortunately, a massive Zorgon fleet arrives and attacks after Walter frees the astronaut and his brother.

Danny eventually completes the object of the game, whereupon the house is drawn into a roaring black hole, which Danny realizes is Zathura. The Zorgon fleet is pulled into the black hole, as are Lisa and Walter. Moments later, they have returned to Earth. All the "pieces" of the game (the house, its furnishing, and the players) have been replaced as they were before the game began. The brothers are thereafter much more cooperative with one another. The boys, and Lisa, retain their memories of the game's events in which they all agree never to speak of Zathura again.

As the kids get in the car with their mother and drive away, one of their bicycles which drifted off into space falls back to the lawn.

Production

Favreau preferred to use practical effects instead of CGI in the film. "...it’s so fun to actually shoot real spaceships or have a real robot running around on the set, or real Zorgons built by Stan Winston. It gives the actors, especially young actors, so much to work off of," he said.[2] Dax Shepard, who plays the astronaut in the film, said that he would not have been interested in doing the film if the effects had been "CGI based".[3] Actress Kristen Stewart enjoyed the on-set effects, saying that, "When we harpooned walls and ripped them out, we were really doing it. When there was a fire on set, there was really fire," and that, "The only green screen I was ever involved with was for getting sucked out into the black hole."[4] Miniature models were used to create the spaceships, and Favreau enjoyed going back to techniques used in many earlier films such as the original Star Wars trilogy.[5] However, in some shots the Zorgon ships were computer-generated, and digital effects were used in many other shots, such as to create meteors and planets, to add computer-generated legs and arms to the robot suit built by Stan Winston Studios, to digitally augment the Zorgon suits (which were constructed so that the head came out of the front of the suit where the actor's chest was and the actor wore a blue screen hood over his own head), and to create an entirely computer-generated Zorgon for one shot.[6] According to Pete Travers, Visual Effects Supervisor on the film for Sony Pictures Imageworks, retaining the stylized "1950s sci-fi look" from Van Allsburg's book "was a very important aspect of the effects".[7]

Jon Favreau discouraged the notion that the film is a sequel to the earlier film "Jumanji," having not particularly liked that film. Both he and Chris Van Allsburg(who also wrote the book of the same name upon which Jumanji is based) stated that Zathura is very different from Jumanji.[8]

Release

The studio hyped the film's release in an attempt to generator word of mouth, with tie-ins including an episode of The Apprentice showcasing its family appeal, and received positive buzz from critics (75% on Rotten Tomatoes) and screenings, Zathura was considered a box office bomb. It grossed $29,258,869, less than half of its $65 million budget. The international box office total was $35,062,632, for a total of $64,321,501 worldwide. Ironically, the plot's similarities with Jumanji proved to be its undoing, with one observer referring to it as "Jumanji in space without Robin Williams".


Released

Cast

Merchandising

Merchandising from the film was minor.[weasel words] As well a board-game version of the Zathura game, there was also a tin-version of the Robot and a tin, friction-drive Zorgon spaceship. None of these were made available outside of the United States.[citation needed]

See also

References

  1. ^ Van Allsburg, Chris (2002). Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 978-0618253968. {{cite book}}: Missing or empty |title= (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  2. ^ Murray, Rebecca. "Interview with "Zathura" Director Jon Favreau: Jon Favreau on the Practical Effects in "Zathura" and His Young Stars". About.com. Retrieved 2008-07-19. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  3. ^ Murray, Rebecca. "Dax Shepard Discusses "Zathura": Interview with Dax Shepard at the LA Premiere of "Zathura"". About.com. Retrieved 2008-07-19. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  4. ^ Barker, Lynn (2005-11-08). "Kristen Stewart: Zathura". TeenHollywood. TeenHollywood.com II Inc. Retrieved 2008-07-20. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  5. ^ Szymanski, Mike. "Interview: Jon Favreau and company get board with space exploration in Chris Van Allsburg's Zathura". Science Fiction Weekly. Retrieved 2008-07-19. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  6. ^ Robertson, Barbara (2005). "The Game's Afoot: Digital effects help shift time and space in the movie Zathura". Computer Graphics World. 25: 18–23. {{cite journal}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  7. ^ Wolff, Ellen (2005-11-11). "Imageworks Goes Retro Sci-Fi With Zathura". VFXWorld. AWN, Inc. Retrieved 2008-07-20. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  8. ^ Whipp, Glenn (2005-11-12). "'Zathura' creators shun sequel 'Jumanji' label". The San Diego Union-Tribune. Union-Tribune Publishing Co. Retrieved 2008-07-21. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)


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