Journey 2: The Mysterious Island | Hollywood 3D Film | Movie Reviews

Some writers were much ahead of their time. The fantasy tales they wrote were having the science quotient also. Such creations are better known as Sci-Fi (or Science Fiction). Some of the remarkable Sci-Fi writers include Jules Verne, H. G. Wells and others. Jules Verne was a French writer and his original writings were in French only. He was arguably one of the most translated author. His famous creations were, well, almost all the books he wrote.

Journey 2: The Mysterious Island (or Journey to The Mysterious Island) is a 3D Hollywood movie based on the fantasy tales. Though the name was taken from the famous Jules Verne book (and a lot of content too), reference to the other books including Jonathan Swift’s famous work “Gulliver’s Travels” and Robert Louis Stevenson’s famous work “Treasure Island”.

The movie starts when Sean Anderson was followed by the police for trace passing the prohibited area. There was a brief chase happened but ultimately he was caught by the police. His step father Hank Parsons comes to take him to the home. We see that Sean was not fond of Hank, despite Hank’s genuine feelings towards him (and helping him whenever in need). Liz tries her best so Sean understand the true feelings of Hank, be he was not ready to listen the stuff. However Hank didn’t loose hope and calms Liz down. Later he tried to know the truth about the incident Sean was caught for. He got to know that he was there in order to boost the satellite signals for the code he have received. He suspected that the code was sent to him by Alexander Anderson, Sean’s grand father, who was missing since a couple of years. Suspected the truthfulness of the stuff, Hank however decided to help Sean, as he was keen to have a father-son bond between them. While helping Sean, Hank used his experience and expertise (he was in U. S. Marine) and interactively tried decipher the message. He comes to the conclusion that the three books The Mysterious Island (by Jules Verne), Gulliver’s Travels (by Jonathan Swift) and The Treasure Island (by Robert Louis Stevenson) are actually about the same place (same island). He then tried combining the maps of the island found in each book in order to know if there is a resemblance (or link) there between all them and it’s current whereabouts. And He got succeed in the same. The place as per the result of analysis is the island somewhere near to the place named Palau (based on the co-ordinates).

However Sean was not happy with the interference of his stepfather, but he was quite happy with the help he have provided in solving the message. Hank was excited only because it was the first thing he and Sean did as a team. So despite of strong objections of Liz, Hank decided to help him and go with him on the mission to find the mysterious island (if it actually exist). They land to Palau. Sean tried finding out a chopper to hire, to go the place but failed. Hank however tried to convince and finally found an eager (to earn) Gabato who works with his daughter Kailani. She was however not ready to go to that dangerous area of the ocean but Hank offered them 1000 USD which was quite enough to make Gabato take the risk (we later got to know that he was running in poor economic condition and was needed money so he can send his daughter to the college for advance studies). The deal was final in 3000 USD at last. Sean developed an immediate crush on Kailani but she knew her limits.

On they way to the place they are encountered with a wind storm, everyone including Hank decided to return, however Sean insisted to continue the flight, referring the descriptions from The Mysterious island book. They caught into the storm and the chopper cracked into small piece, though they were all wake up after some time, alive, strange! They were all on an island, and it has to be nothing else but, the mysterious island!

The actual movie starts from here we can. It is all on the imagination of the director now, that how to create the virtual world of The Mysterious Island. He does it well and when you watch the movie in 3D, it is more evident. See the team crossing the bridge and you will remember similar scenes of the famous movie Avatar. See the giant Lizard and you will remember Gulliver’s Travels. See the lizard chasing them and you will remember… well, we leave them up to you. No doubt, the research team have done their stuff remarkably well and the set designers implemented them. For example see the tridents on the top of the city or see the notes written in Hindi in Nautilus. (Nautilus was the fictional submarine imagined by Jules Verne in his book, it was when there were no actual submarines. Actually the first submarine prepared was inspired a lot by Jules Verne’s description and actually Nautilus is the name given to the submarine! A remarkable sci-fi writer, indeed!) Because the creator and owner of Nautilus, Captain Nemo was an Indian prince. We will not go into the story details to keep your interest. An ultimate, wise truth comes to know that we should get only the stuff which we can actually use. The gold stones or rocks cannot be brought by Gabato, to the real world, despite its availability! The feelings of the teenagers are shown very properly in the movie, it is age when you are not kid and you are not an adult too. In this age, kids tried proving their abilities and sometimes got rebel. A middle class father’s feelings are expressed genuinely and so does the efforts of a genuine stepfather for his stepson. So, the movie has the emotional quotient too, and you will feel at more than one places in the movie. The special effects are remarkable and so do the acting of the lead actors. The casting team chose the right actors for the right characters and the actors did justice to their work.

It is the movie mainly created for children but adults will also love it. Sometimes though you may feel that director tried to make it interesting and he moved ahead the level of children and below the level of adults, making it hoisting in air. Nonetheless the movie is clean and can be watched together by the family, as the plus point. We also got the hint at the last scene of the movie that there will be a third installment of the movie will also be available which focus the voyage to the moon (based on the other book of Jules Verne).