I wanted to love this, I really did. I give many props for the representativeness of the cast, especially with the theme of empowering women and people of color in engineering, science and math.
Visually, this is a really good looking film. A few (not all) of the original songs are catchy, and much of the dancing is off the hook. And then, that's it.
Many of the negative reviews on here mention how the film is derivative of many other holiday films that have come before it. True, but not a deal breaker - after all, there are only so many ways to be original when compared to the 1000s of other holiday movies out there. My problems are plot, pacing, characterizations and motivations - the writing seems to be last on the list in Jingle Jangle.
Forest Whitaker is a Academy Award winner and a national treasure. He has nothing to work with here. Mr. Jangle moves from resenting his granddaughter to screaming "I love you" in the course of minutes - I felt like I had fallen asleep and missed important plot points, but nope. The rest of the cast fares little better - what are their motivations? Why are the evil characters so "evil"?
POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD (but c'mon, it's pretty formulaic...)
We are told through the frame story that the Jangles "didn't have any proof" about the evil deeds of Gustafson and I guess we should just accept that? Lazy writing. There is no development of Lisa Davina Phillips' character other than her odd obsession with Jangle...the obsessed fluffy girl trope - lazy characterization. The conflict comes almost solely from the vague threat that the bank(?) is going to foreclose(?) on him, despite the fact that his "friend" (we know this because he calls him "old friend" a couple of times) will save him, if only he can complete his astonishing invention. Lazy plotting. I wonder if THAT will happen. Speaking of, the astonishing invention only interacts with the characters for like 5 minutes and suddenly he's their best friend and the most important thing in their world? Or, he's just there to sell toys (look out Baby Yoda!) Everything that happens is a huge MacGuffin - it's never explained how Jangle rediscovers his power to believe. The magical math that Journey can do extends to "the square root of possible." Um. I'm not looking for "A Beautiful Mind" here, but this is so trite and meaningless that it almost undercuts the important work the film does to show that black girls and women can succeed in science and math. And the big ending reveal that our narrator, Phylicia Rashad is...gasp...well, rather than spoiling it, how would these kids NOT have known about Jangle's toy factory - the factory of the greatest toy inventor who ever was - that happens to be across town and visible from grandma's window? It feels like this is a big budget film that spent all its money on visuals, music, dancing, and then there was no money left to polish a script/story. It's not even particularly holiday-oriented other than the glurgy good feeling. Hey, I love glurge, and I'm all in favor of good feeling, especially around the holidays, but glurge has to be backed up with clear character development, or a real experience of something miraculous happening. Both of these are missing from Jingle Jangle. Someone once said that the only thing more disappointing than a bad movie is a movie that could have been good.
POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD (but c'mon, it's pretty formulaic...)
We are told through the frame story that the Jangles "didn't have any proof" about the evil deeds of Gustafson and I guess we should just accept that? Lazy writing. There is no development of Lisa Davina Phillips' character other than her odd obsession with Jangle...the obsessed fluffy girl trope - lazy characterization. The conflict comes almost solely from the vague threat that the bank(?) is going to foreclose(?) on him, despite the fact that his "friend" (we know this because he calls him "old friend" a couple of times) will save him, if only he can complete his astonishing invention. Lazy plotting. I wonder if THAT will happen. Speaking of, the astonishing invention only interacts with the characters for like 5 minutes and suddenly he's their best friend and the most important thing in their world? Or, he's just there to sell toys (look out Baby Yoda!) Everything that happens is a huge MacGuffin - it's never explained how Jangle rediscovers his power to believe. The magical math that Journey can do extends to "the square root of possible." Um. I'm not looking for "A Beautiful Mind" here, but this is so trite and meaningless that it almost undercuts the important work the film does to show that black girls and women can succeed in science and math. And the big ending reveal that our narrator, Phylicia Rashad is...gasp...well, rather than spoiling it, how would these kids NOT have known about Jangle's toy factory - the factory of the greatest toy inventor who ever was - that happens to be across town and visible from grandma's window? It feels like this is a big budget film that spent all its money on visuals, music, dancing, and then there was no money left to polish a script/story. It's not even particularly holiday-oriented other than the glurgy good feeling. Hey, I love glurge, and I'm all in favor of good feeling, especially around the holidays, but glurge has to be backed up with clear character development, or a real experience of something miraculous happening. Both of these are missing from Jingle Jangle. Someone once said that the only thing more disappointing than a bad movie is a movie that could have been good.