Jumanji (film)/Plot

The plot to the 1995 "Jumanji" film.

Plot

1869

In an effort to remove traces of something that has previously haunted them, the brothers Benjamin and Caleb Sproul try to get rid of a chest in a forest a mile near the town of Brantford, New Hampshire. Terrified of the foreboding contents of the chest, the two boys ride back to town after finishing burying it deep, and hope that no-one ever finds it.

1969

Digging out the past.

A century later in Brantford, 12-year-old Alan Parrish is out riding his bike, but is forced to flee from the local gang of bullies led by Billy Jessup to a the Parrish Shoe Company factory owned by his father, Sam Parrish, where he meets his oldest friend Carl Bentley, one of Sam's employees. Carl shows off his prototype sneaker to Alan, hoping Sam will approve production and lead to great financial success. Sam catches Alan hiding from Billy Jessup and sends him outside to stand and face his fears like a man, leaving Alan disappointed in his dad's faith in him. When Alan accidentally damages a machine with the prototype sneaker Carl hoped to present, Carl takes the blame and loses his job. Outside the factory, an irritated Alan tries to resolve the issue Billy has with him hanging out with his girlfriend, but it doesn't last after the bullies beat Alan up and steal his bicycle.

Alan is then enticed by the luring sounds of tribal drumbeats and follows the noises to a construction site building executive offices near the factory, without the sounds attracting the attention of anyone else. Inside a wall of mud, Alan digs out and finds the same chest buried 100 years ago, containing an elaborate jungle adventure board game called ""JUMANJI"". Before Alan can examine the box, construction workers starting to get back to work notice him, and he then runs off to take the game home to the Parrish Mansion. Back home, Alan is very interested in the exotic looking game, but forgets about it after his mom Carol finds him beaten up from his run in with Billy's gang. Later that night, Sam and Carol are about to leave Alan at home to attend a party where Sam will make a speech as guest of honor, but stop to try and let Sam make amends for leaving him to deal with the bullies on his own. Revealing that they intend to have Alan attend the esteemed Cliffside School for Boys, an argument erupts between him and Sam, an unhappy Alan decides to try and run away from home at bed & breakfast hotel.

First Move

Sarah is attacked by swarming Bats.

However, his friend Sarah Whittle appears at the front door to give his bike back, and explains she told Billy to stop picking on him for having out with her. Before Alan can run away from home, the two are interrupted by the sounds of drums, they then head back inside to take a look at "JUMANJI". After reading the instructions, Alan invites Sarah to play the game, but she is uninterested and throws the dice back at the game: causing the Rhinoceros token to automatically accept it as a roll and strangely move itself across the board and a message appears on the crystal ball, triggering a summoning of shrieking Bats into fireplace. When Sarah becomes scared and pleads to give up playing, Alan starts putting the game away but accidentally makes his first move when the grandfather clock chimes and he drops the dice, making the Elephant token move along its own path. The crystal ball message states that he must wait in a jungle until a five or an eight is rolled, and to their horror, he is then gradually sucked into the game's central ball with Alan begging Sarah to roll the dice again. Attracted by the sounds of their screaming, the swarm of Bats released by the game flock out of the fireplace and then attack Sarah and chase her out of the house, leaving the game and Alan behind.

1995

Monkey mayhem.

Twenty-six years later in 1995, after recently losing their parents in a car crash when on a skiing vacation in Canada, Judy Shepherd and Peter Shepherd move into the long emptied Psychic & Parrish Mansion with their Aunt Nora Shepherd, planning to open the house as a bed & breakfast hotel. Exploring the emptiness of the Mansion, the three are disturbed by the Bats, and call pest control to investigate. The exterminator finds nothing and reveals to the kids the story of Alan's disappearance and an unpleasant rumor that he was apparently murdered, which he believes to have been done by Sam. Due to their parent's sudden deaths, the relationships and attitudes between the kids and Nora are strained, as Judy has taken up telling lies and Peter has adopted a shyness and never speaks to anyone except Judy, getting them into trouble at school. Like Alan and Sarah before them, Judy and Peter also start to hear the sounds of drumbeats coming from the attic, something that Nora doesn't seem to notice.

A few days later, before they can go to school, Judy and Peter are drawn to the sounds of the drumming and head upstairs to the attic, where underneath less interesting board games they discover "JUMANJI". Deciding to play the game in the attic, Judy reads the rules while Peter takes out the remaining tokens when the Rhino and Elephant won't move and as a result, the Crocodile and Monkey tokens are mystically drawn separate pathways on the board game also. When Judy rolls the dice first, the Croc token slides along its path and stops to send a message on the crystal ball about an oncoming consequence, triggering the appearance of three giant Mosquitoes to attack them. Spurred on by the excitement, Peter then rolls against Judy's judgement and his Monkey token triggers a party of Monkeys to wreck kitchen in fun. Monkey has a fire in stove. As Judy reads the other instructions, the Monkey gang leave the house and head off in different directions. Realizing that the consequences released by the game releases will disappear and everything will be restored when the game ends, they decide to continue the game despite the danger. Since he rolled doubles, Peter rolls another turn and lands a five, releasing an intimidating Lion, who pursues and corners them downstairs. Fortunately, Peter also set an adult Alan free from "JUMANJI" at last, who manages to lock the Lion in the master bedroom.

A new world

A new world.

Overcome with joy at his freedom and back in Brantford, Alan's victory is cut short when he learns from Judy about the absence of his parents and his disappearance leading to the belief that he was dead. On the way outside to try and find his parents, Alan runs into Officer Carl Bentley, now working as a police officer and unaware who he is, and calculates that he has been in "JUMANJI" for 26 years after Judy reveals the current year is 1995. Carl is forced to leave them after some Monkeys steal his police cruiser, which lets Alan follow his instincts and head to the now closed shoe factory, finding Brantford plunged into poverty. Inside the abandoned factory, a homeless man reveals that Sam abandoned the business after the search for his son was unsuccessful, leading to Sam giving up on everything until his death in 1991 along with his wife Carol. After visiting his parents graves and finally learning about what happened to his parents and the shoe factory, Judy tries to convince Alan to come back to the Mansion and help them finish the game, but they observe a car crash and overhear from medics about an outbreak of seizures from unknown bites. Alan then jumps to conclusions and they get into the empty car in time to avoid a Mosquito, but the persistent insect forces them to make the improvised drive back home. Back at the old Parrish Place, Judy and Peter try to persuade Alan to help them finish the game but he is having none of it. Using reverse phycology he picked up from his dad, Peter at least convinces Alan to watch their progress.

Sarah's turn

Only after "JUMANJI" stops taking Judy's roll does Alan realise they are continuing the same game that he started in 1969, so he too will need to play in order to end the consequences released from the game, but since his turn isn't due yet, he remembers they need Sarah's dice rolls also. Finding Sarah at the same house since her childhood, they find her now a psychic who had gone into isolation and a name change after the trauma of Alan's disappearance. After the three bring Sarah back to the Parrish Mansion, she becomes frighted by seeing "JUMANJI" again, and is unwilling to join in because of how her life was ruined last time she played. Alan tricks her into dropping the dice from her hand, using her turn to move her token and the consequence effects release fast growing "JUMANJI" vegetation like Vines all over the living room, including Purple Flowers that shoot lethal bards dipped with poison, and vine trapping Pods, one of whom manages to snare Peter and try and drag him into its colorful jaws, but Alan hacks the vine with the heirloom sabre of his war hero ancestor.

The Hunter

In the library, the four players make a promising bond to finish playing "JUMANJI" and undo the damages it has brought to Brantford and their lives. Alan's next turn brings out someone that makes him uneasy with dread, a big-game hunter named Van Pelt who is intent on hunting and killing Alan, for reasons that he cannot understand as he is a product of the game itself and apparently continuing their alleged rivalry, ever since Alan was sucked into the game. Van Pelt pursues Alan outside and open fires on Carl after he tries to intervene, causing the great white hunter to run out of ammunition and grudgingly leaves the hunt to find replacement firepower. Back in the library, Sarah and Alan later get into a heated argument with each other after she explains how much of her life and reputation was soured by the trauma of being the only witness of the real reason for Alan's disappearance and the town refusing to believe her story. Judy makes her next roll to pass the time of the adults talking and an overwhelming, large animal stampede of Rhinoceroses, Elephants, Zebras and Pelicans tear up the house in their rampage, while a lone Pelican takes "JUMANJI" after mistaking it for a fish and flies away with it. Tracking the Pelican to the river, it is unwilling to give the game up, until Alan bribes the bird with a real fish, and it casts the game aside. Before the game is lost over a waterfall, Peter catches the game, much to the surprise of Sarah and Judy, but Alan feels differently and they run into Carl again, this time taking Alan in for questioning. Sensing Van Pelt nearby, Alan goes along with Carl's arrest and leaves the three behind so Van Pelt will follow him and leave them as three realize that they are unable to finish the game without Alan. Meanwhile, Peter tires landing a fixed roll to try and win but is transformed by "JUMANJI" into a Monkey for cheating.

Sir-Sav-Alot

While Alan is taken away by Carl, the cop is suspicious about the unexplained madness going on in town having something to do with Alan, and he tries explaining after he learns that Sam fired Carl for what happened at the shoe factory 26 years ago. It is only after Alan tried to make an apology for Carl losing his job, that Carl finally realises that he is Alan. In Brantford town, the mass hysteria unleashed from the consequences of "JUMANJI" is reaching overwhelming chaos as Peter, Sarah and Judy lose the game to Van Pelt in the midst of the stampede. The three follow the hunter to a local discount department store to retrieve the game, but are caught by Van Pelt, who scares the witnesses off with his gunfire, knowing the police will be called and Carl would turn up along with Alan. The three manage to retrieve the game and evade the hunter and his gun long enough through quick evasion and an improvised trap Peter set up until he corners them with a collapse of stacked up tyres. Good as Van Pelt's intuitive plan is, Alan and Carl arrive at the store to try and stop him, but since the brakes of Carl's cruiser are faulty, they crash through the store and bury Van Pelt under an avalanche of fallen paint pots.

On the way home, Alan is unimpressed by Peter trying to cheat and tells him off for crying, but feels like he adopted too much of Sam's stern parenting and makes amends with Peter, promising they will win the game have have him turned back into a real boy. Meanwhile, Nora drives home and loses her car after a scare from the stampede and a surprise run in with a Monkey. As Carl is passing by, she stops him and asks for a ride home, but he too loses his cruiser to a Pod, forcing them to continue on foot.

"JUMANJI"

Alan swims through the rapids.

Back at the Mansion; now becoming overrun by vegetation from "JUMANJI", Sarah makes her next turn, and a Monsoon erupts from inside the Mansion, starting to flood the house and triggers the appearance of two Crocodiles that attack the group; only ending when Carl and Nora finally arrive at the front door and try to enter the house, unwittingly draining the flood outside and taking the two Crocs with it. Upstairs in the attic, Alan makes his next turn and is sucked into the floor by Quicksand which is created from the floor itself. Sarah leans herself into the Quicksand to stop Alan from sinking, but they are both trapped with Judy rolls her turn and the Quicksand becomes frozen. As Peter makes his next turn, a gathering of large Spiders come out from the back of the attic and advance on Alan and Sarah, since they are stuck, requiring the kids to stand and fight the Spiders off with Peter rushing to go get an axe, but Judy is shot by a poisonous barb from a Purple Flower and gradually collapses. Nora arrives at the house to find Judy and Peter and becomes terrified of the lion in the master bedroom, Alan's legs on top of the ceiling and Peter's transformed self with Nora not recognizing her nephew, but Peter locks her in a closet as he rushes to save the two trapped adults and Judy. Before the Spiders can make an easy meal out of the two trapped adults and Peter comforting a paralysed and dying Judy (who wishes that their parents were here), Sarah's last roll releases an Earthquake that scares the arachnids away and splits the whole house in two. Finally free from the floor, Alan swings through the divided house and misses the recently awakened Lion again while he catches the fallen game. Landing in the living room where the game all started, Van Pelt reappears and demands Alan to drop the dice, seemingly losing one into the ravine and rendering him unable to finish the game and Sarah shows up to see Alan not running away. Tired of running, Alan refuses the hunter's demands to run, remembering his father's meaningful lesson about standing to facing ones fears. Van Pelt becomes impressed of Alan finally acting like a man as he aims his gun at him and questions Alan's last words. Surprisingly, Alan's last dice roll lets his token reach the goal and he effectively wins the game just in time to answer Van Pelt's question about last words with: "JUMANJI". Before Van Pelt's last shot can hit Alan and Sarah, it starts to evaporate into a growing Tornado, causing all consequential elements (including Van Pelt) to be sucked back into the board in a form of a whirlwind.

The Spiders close in on Alan and Sarah.

Alan and Sarah suddenly find themselves back in 1969 again, as the same children from before, but with full knowledge of their lives after they started playing. What felt like an eternity to them was a mere 5 minutes in the restored reality, as Alan immediately reconciles Sam with apologies from their fallout, and a surprised Sam allows his son to attend a local school if he wishes to do so, and admits to his father that he was the one who damaged the machine, so that Carl would get his job back and his prototype sneakers were presumably approved by Sam. After his father leaves for the party as the guest of honor, Alan then suddenly remembers that Judy and Peter are still in the attic, but Sarah reminds him that because it's 1969, Judy and Peter have not even been born yet. Sarah hands their game tokens to Alan as a way of showing they would never have finished the game without them. Later, Alan and Sarah chain up "JUMANJI" and throw it into the river. Sarah starts to share her first kiss with Alan as the two leave to start dating.

Alan and Sam reconcile after he won.

1995

In a much better adulthood, Alan and Sarah are married and expecting for their first child. Alan has taken over the shoe business after Sam retired and living with Carol in Florida, Carl still working in the factory as the plant supervisor, and Jim and Martha Shepherd still living and he is working as the advertising of Parrish Shoes. At their Christmas party in the Parrish Mansion, Alan and Sarah reunite with Judy and Peter, with Alan and Sarah remembering them just as they once were in the other timeline, momentarily forgetting the kids don't remember their other lives. Alan and Sarah also discourage the Shepherds from going on the Canadian ski trip that would have killed them and thus preventing their deaths in the previous timeline with Alan convincing Judy and Peter's father to start work at the shoe factory as he accepts Alan's offer. Alan and Sarah then invite the Shepherds into their home and promising they are welcome anytime, a way of repaying the kids for playing the game and saving them from being trapped forever, also gifting them with Christmas presents.

Meanwhile, on the French seaside, two young girls hear drumbeats as they walk along a beach, and are due to see the "JUMANJI" board game half-buried in the sand.

• As the film credits draw to a close, drumbeats can be heard during the reprisal of the opening titles and menacing child's play scores, indicating that "JUMANJI" will return to be played again.