StoryTelling

Movie Tralier: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJKHQLM8AbM
First Scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFssGAgZo6U

I chose the movie Jumanji. It debuted in December of 1995. Jumanji is a 1995 American family fantasy adventure film directed by Joe Johnston. It is an adaptation of the 1981 children's book of the same name by Chris Van Allsburg. The story centers on young Alan Parrish, who becomes trapped in a board game while playing with his best friend Sarah Whittle in 1969. Twenty-six years later in 1995, siblings Judy and Peter Shepherd find the game, begin playing and then unwittingly release the now-adult Alan. After tracking down Sarah, the quartet resolve to finish the game in order to reverse all of the destruction it has caused. The movie begins in 1981 with two brothers named Caleb and Benjamin. They are seen burying a chest, hoping that no one will ever find it. One hundred years later in 1969, Alan Parrish visits a shoe factory owned by his father, Samuel. He visits his friend Carl Bentley, an employee, who reveals a new shoe prototype he made by himself. Alan misplaces the shoe and damages an important machine, but Carl takes responsibility and loses his job. After being attacked by a group of delinquents, who also steal his bicycle, Alan follows the sound of tribal drumbeats to a construction site. He finds the chest containing a board game called Jumanji, and brings it home. At home, after an argument with Samuel about attending a boarding school, Alan plans to run away. Sarah Whittle, his friend, arrives to return his bicycle, and they begin playing Jumanji. With each roll of the dice, the player piece moves by itself and a cryptic message describing the roll's outcome appears in the crystal ball at the center of the board. Sarah rolls the dice but nothing happens. Alan rolls the dice; a message tells him to wait in a jungle until someone rolls 5 or 8, and he is sucked into the game. Afterwards, a swarm of bats appears and chases Sarah out of the mansion. Twenty-six years later, Judy and Peter Shepherd move into the vacant Parrish house with their aunt Nora, their parents having died in an accident on a ski trip in Canada. The next day Judy and Peter find Jumanji in the attic and begin playing it. Their rolls summon giant mosquitoes and a group of monkeys. The game rules state that everything will be restored when the game ends, so they continue playing. Many other exciting events take place in the rest of the movie, until finally Alan makes the winning roll, causing everything that happened as a result of the game to be reversed. The movie has a good hook because it opens with conflict. Weiland says in his article The Hook, “That most good beginnings start with conflict.” He says that it “demands the characters to be at odds with someone or something right from the get go.” The beginning of Jumanji does just that. It leaves the characters at odds with the box. The two brothers bury the box in 1981, hoping that no one finds it, for they know what happens when you open the box and start playing the game. This leaves the audience wondering what happens when you open the box that is buried at the beginning of the movie. In 1969, twenty years later, Alan finds the buried box. Alan brings the board game home and they all start to play. All events after they start playing are conflict. After each one the audience is left to wonder what happens next. Conflict keeps the pages turning and I believe that Jumanji does just that.

Weiland also says in The Hook, “the opening sets a tone for the audience.” The movie of course opens with two brothers burying a chest. When the chest and the board game is found by Alan, things start happening. From stampedes, to lions in the house, and monkeys crawling everywhere. The boys burying the chest opens the scene for the entire audience. They are burying the chest in hopes that no one finds the board game. The audience doesn’t know this, so they want to know what happens when the chest is opened, so it make them keep watching the movie.