Reviewed by Johnny McNair 

Fox Home Entertainment – 88 minutes – 2008 – Unrated – 1080p Widescreen 2.35:1 – DTS HD 5.1 Lossless Audio – Digital Copy

Let’s just get right to the point and say that Jumper could have been a very cool film, but instead turns out to be a cinematic mess that plays off more like an episode of Smallville, but in no way as good. A movie like Jumper is proof that reviews don’t matter, because when it was released earlier this year in theaters the movie received dismal reviews, but went on to earn over $220 million worldwide. So this review may be a waste of time, because now that Jumper is available on Blu-ray from Fox Home Entertainment, it will sell like crazy to make a zillion more dollars. Well at least it’s pretty to look at.

THE MOVIE

Jumper is based on the sci-fi novel by author Steven Gould, centering around a young man named David Rice played Hayden (“You were the chosen one”) Christensen from the last two Star Wars prequels who discovers that he has the power to teleport himself to anywhere in the world he desires instantly. Now instead of being like Spider-Man and doing good deeds, David uses his abilities to teleport into bank vaults and steals money so that he can live an elaborate lifestyle around the world. His fun and games comes to a halt when he is discovered by a man named Roland played by Samuel L. Jackson (sporting a blonde fro), who works for a secret society that hunts down jumpers. Roland possesses a special gizmo that traps jumpers, diffusing their powers so they can be killed.

David escapes a certain death and becomes a man on the run, but this does not keep him from seeking out the girl of his dreams, Millie, played by Rachel Bilson (The O.C.), who wonders where he has disappeared to and how come he can afford a life of luxury. David then meets a guy named Griffin played by Jamie Bell (the kid from Billy Elliot), who is also a jumper. Griffin fills him in on how jumpers have been around for centuries, but are still being hunted down by their enemies, the Paladins. David realizes that Roland was one of them. From this point on the movie becomes an over the top cat and mouse chase between the Jumpers and the Paladins with so many special effects that you’ll wish you just played a video game instead.

The sad apart about Jumper is that the film was directed by Doug Liman, a solid director whose past credits include The Bourne Identity, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, and Swingers. He’s definitely familiar with action packed big budget movies, but with Jumper it seems like something went really wrong. Hayden Christensen once again proves that he doesn’t have the leading man charisma to hold a film, and Samuel L. Jackson is again stuck in a shitty movie. Jackson is one of the best actors out there, but he needs to think about what he’s getting into before he falls into the hack box. Surprisingly it’s Jamie Bell who is the only interesting character in the film, because he’s just having fun with it.

Jumper could have been the Back to the Future of this generation if only the script was better fleshed out, because it’s a good concept that’s badly executed. When this film is over, you won’t even remember watching it, because there’s no magic on the screen. Jumper would probably work better as a TV show, where you can keep the chase going on a weekly basis in locations around the globe, but damn, it couldn’t even keep your attention for it’s 88 minutes running time. But if you’re watching the film and it’s getting to painful, you can perform your own jump out of the film by hitting the stop button.

VIDEO

What Jumper lacks in story it makes up for big time with image quality, offering 2.35:1 image quality and 1080p resolution, the film practically jumps off the screen. Flesh tones are perfect and blacks stand up strong, with small hints of grain, but overall near perfect. Being that this film involves various locations around the world, there’s a lot of eye candy to take in such as Tokyo, England and Rome, all of which have been shot beautifully. The CG jumping effects also shine, especially when you get to see the actual jump from the character’s point of view. This is a great looking transfer.

AUDIO

Again the movie is a strike out, but the sound is a homerun. Jumper features a DTS-HD Lossless 5.1 surround audio track that will make your room sound like a movie theater. Whenever characters perform a jump, the sound design that highlights it will make you feel like you’re going along for the ride with them. Also, make note of the background sounds in the various locations that have been weaved nicely to give you the feel of the environment. The dialogue (though awful) is crisp, and all you sound enthusiast should be pleased with what jumper has to offer.

EXTRAS

Being that the film barely runs 90 minutes, there is plenty of room for extras on this 50 gig Blu-ray, and fortunately a decent batch of stuff is offered. As a bonus a second disc is also featuring access to a digital copy of the film that you can download on your portable media device or laptop.

First up is an audio commentary featuring Director Doug Liman and the films producers Lucas Foster and Simon Kinberg, who offer some interesting tidbits about the production, but even there enthusiasm won’t make you sit through this twice.

“Jumping Around the World” is a 10 minute look at all of the locations featured in the film. This is nothing fancy, but it does demonstrate that this film was intending to go for a grand scale epic feel. For those of you who have Blu-ray players that allow you to access Profile 1.1, Jumping Around the World can also be viewed via Picture-in-Picture, popping up during various scenes to highlight the locations.

“Making an Actor Jump” runs about 8 minutes and gives a peek at how the jumping effect was done layering the actor’s movements and the CGI effects.

“Doug Liman’s Jumper: Uncensored” is a 35 minute behind the scenes look at the making of Jumper, highlighting the uphill battle it took to get it done. Because this is not your standard “brown-noser” feaurette that you normally are stuck with, it is definitely the best extra on the disc, showing how hard it is to make a film in Hollywood.

“Jumping From Novel to Film” is an 8 minute look at author Steven Gould’s original Jumper novels and how the concept was transferred to the big screen. They also hint on forthcoming Jumper movie sequels…Hmmm, we’ll see about that.

Six deleted scenes running 10 minutes attempts to flesh out more character development, but its very obvious why they were omitted.

“Jumpstart: David’s Story” goes into David Rice’s backstory via an animated graphic novel. It won’t blow you away, but it’s cool that it was added.

“Previz: Future Concepts” is a 5 minute piece showing some animated storyboards for several of the films action sequences.

A second included DVD can be used to redeem a digital copy (standard definition) of Jumper that can be viewed on a laptop, ipod, or iphone.

BOTTOM LINE

As a film Jumper falls flat, but as a Blu-ray disc offering superior image and audio quality and a good variety of extras, you may want to give it a rent at least to see if it’s worth forking over your hard earned cash for. At least the film is short and will not make you feel like you’ve lost too much of your life; but you may be very disappointed to see a great concept that has gone really bad.

SCORES (Out of 5):

The Movie: 2.0

Video: 4.0

Sound: 4.0

Extras: 3.0

Bottom Line: 2.5