It is that time of year once again when we all gather around the TV to watch our favorite Christmas movies. It is also that time of year when we get online and argue over exactly what constitutes a Christmas movie. This often means a particular spotlight on the seemingly endless question of whether Die Hard is a Christmas movie, but here’s one you maybe never considered. What about Jumanji?
Fun fact: all three Jumanji movies were actually mid-December releases. Certainly few, if any, would argue that the recent Dwayne Johnson-led Jumanji films would qualify as Christmas movies. However, the original film with Robin Williams does include a scene near the end that takes place at Christmas, which led one fan on Instagram to suggest it counts as a Christmas movie, and reboot co-star Karen Gillan has officially endorsed this position.
As the original post states, the final scene of the original Jumanji is set at Christmas with Robin Williams and Bonnie Hunt’s characters, now married, inviting the family of Judy and Peter, the children they experienced the game with, to their Christmas party. Williams even goes full Santa.
The Christmas scene does ask some particularly interesting questions. Was the scene at the end always a Christmas party? Was it made that way because of the decision to release in December? Or was the December release specifically decided upon in order to match the way the film ended? Is Jumanji a December franchise specifically because of this scene? Does that make all the Jumanji films Christmas movies?
The currently-filming Jumanji 4, is also set for a December release. There's no expectation that the movie will include any Christmas elements, but it could certainly surprise us. We've seen the franchise make references to the original Jumanji before, so any callback to this final scene certainly wouldn't be out of place.
Does this scene alone make Jumanji a “Christmas movie?” That’s certainly a somewhat difficult argument for some to make. For many fans, simply being set at Christmas doesn’t make a Christmas movie, and even if you do think that’s enough, most of the movies that fall into that category. Like the previously mentioned Die Hard, at least have the whole movie set during that period.
Here we’re only talking about a single scene. If you saw Juamanji in theaters back in December 1995, it perhaps made it all feel like a Christmas movie, but 30 years later, separated from that, I’m not sure anybody watching it for the first time would feel that way about it.
Of course, at the end of the day, the only real way to determine what counts as a Christmas movie is your own feeling. If you think Jumanji is a Christmas movie, then it is. If other people don’t feel that way, who cares? You have Karen Gillan on your side.
