Animal invasion, 3.5-hour makeup, artificial waves: How was the movie "Jumanji" filmed?

Animal attacks, 3.5 hours of makeup, artificial waves: How the movie "Jumanji" was filmed

The movie "Jumanji" tells the story of an extraordinary board game capable of bringing the dangers of the jungle into the real world. In 1969, teenager Alan Parrish finds the game and begins playing it with his friend Sarah, but soon disappears inside the game. 26 years later, Alan returns thanks to children named Judy and Peter, who find "Jumanji" in the old house. Now the characters must finish the game that started many years ago, as well as survive wild animal attacks, natural disasters, and the mad hunter Van Pelt.

Robin Williams refused to star in the film after seeing the initial draft of the screenplay. The actor agreed to the role only after director Joe Johnston and screenwriters Greg Taylor, Jim Strain, and Chris Van Allsburg reworked the story. At the same time, TriStar Pictures was ready to finance the project only if Williams played the lead role.

Johnston was worried about the actor's improvisation. In the end, they reached a compromise: Williams would first perform the scenes according to the script, and then additional takes would be recorded in which he could improvise, including playing alongside Bonnie Hunt.

When the film was being shot in 1995, the special effects team used several technologies simultaneously.

Amalgamated Dynamics prepared mechanical and animatronic models of the animals, while Industrial Light & Magic created the digital characters. For the film, ILM specialists developed two new software programs: iSculpt helped create the facial expressions of the computer animals, while another technology made it possible to display fur realistically.

This approach allowed physical objects on the set to be combined with digital herds of rhinos, elephants, monkeys, and other creatures of Jumanji.

The Parrish mansion existed in several forms at the same time. Separate rooms, facades, and large parts of the house were created for filming, and part of the interiors was built in pavilions around Vancouver.

The scene of the house's destruction was particularly complex. For this episode, ILM built a large model of the mansion, which was filmed against a blue screen. As a result, the audience sees the building literally collapsing under the influence of the events in the game.

The tropical downpour in the game had to turn into a real flood. Therefore, special pavilions were built for this episode, where a large volume of water could be controlled.

The rain and waves were created artificially, and then the material was supplemented with visual effects. This method allowed the actors to interact directly with the water instead of depicting it in front of a green screen.

One of the film's largest-scale scenes — the stampede of animals through the town — was also assembled from several components. Sets and special structures were used on the filming location, and the animals themselves were added later using computer graphics.

For example, for the episode involving the herd and a car, the special effects team prepared a real car that could be crushed, and then digital animators synchronized this destruction with the movement of a computer-generated elephant.

Principal photography began on November 14, 1994, and was completed on April 7, 1995. Work was carried out simultaneously in several regions of the USA and Canada.

The main filming location was the city of Keene in New Hampshire. Its streets portrayed the fictional town of Brantford — many scenes related to the town, including the massive invasion of animals, were filmed here.

Another important location was North Berwick in Maine. The old Olde Woolen Mill factory there was used as the Parrish family shoe factory. Additional filming also took place in British Columbia: house sets were built in Vancouver and its surroundings, and some city episodes were filmed in Tsawwassen.

Approximately 65 million dollars was spent on the film. For a mid-1990s family adventure film, this was a large budget, which can be explained by the scale of the special effects and many complex scenes.

The film's worldwide box office gross was approximately 262.8 million dollars, and the movie ranked among the top ten highest-grossing films of 1995.

The complexity of "Jumanji" was not only in creating fantastic animals. The team had to work simultaneously with children, complex makeup, water, large-scale sets, and weather.

The makeup for Bradley Pierce, who played Peter, took the most time. For the scenes of the character's gradual transformation into a monkey, the actor had complex prosthetic makeup applied every day. This process took about three and a half hours and went on for two and a half months.

Another challenge was the need to combine different filming locations into a single world. The natural landscapes of New England were harmonized with pavilion scenes and sets in Canada, so every element, from the street to the interior of the house, had to look like part of the same town.

For the scenes where animals stampede, the streets of Keene had to be prepared with crowd filming and destruction sets. At the same time, the animals themselves in these episodes were added during the visual effects stage.

The main character, Alan Parrish, was played by Robin Williams. His character disappears inside the game as a child and returns to the real world 26 years later as an adult.

Alan's friend, Sarah Whittle, was played by Bonnie Hunt. The childhood version of her character was portrayed by Laura Bell Bundy.

Judy Shepherd was played by Kirsten Dunst, and her younger brother Peter was played by Bradley Pierce. For Dunst, "Jumanji" was one of her first major roles after the film "Interview with the Vampire," while Pierce was mainly known for his voice acting work before this film.

Jonathan Hyde portrayed two characters at the same time — Alan's father, Samuel Parrish, and the hunter Van Pelt. This decision by the creators not only connects the two characters visually: Van Pelt becomes a unique symbol of his past and family history for the adult Alan.

The film also stars David Alan Grier as police officer Carl Bentley, Bebe Neuwirth as Aunt Nora, and Patricia Clarkson as Alan's mother.

"Jumanji" began as a much more compact story. The author of the book, Chris Van Allsburg, said that he initially envisioned the adaptation as something similar to an extended episode of "The Twilight Zone." However, Joe Johnston wanted to create a larger adventure film, after which the script was rewritten several times.

New digital technologies had to be used for the film. ILM created special tools for the facial expressions and fur of the animals, as depicting digital fur realistically remained a serious technical challenge at the time.

Not only computer-generated animals were used on the set. Full-size mechanical models of animals and other physical elements were created for the film, which were then combined with digital graphics. That is why many scenes in "Jumanji" still look convincing today: in them, digital effects do not work in a vacuum, but interact with real objects.

The name of the fictional town has been preserved in the real city of Keene. After filming was completed, a Parrish Shoes sign, created specially for the film, remained on one of the city walls. Today, it reminds local residents and tourists of the filming of the movie.

Not only a sequel, but an entire franchise of the film emerged. The original film was followed by an animated series, and then movies such as "Zathura," "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle," and "Jumanji: The Next Level" appeared. At the same time, the films starring Dwayne Johnson significantly reimagined the concept of the game itself.