| Journey to the Center of the Earth | |
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Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Eric Brevig |
| Produced by | Beau Flynn Charlotte Huggins |
| Screenplay by | Michael D. Weiss Tom Stoppard Mark Levin Jennifer Flackett |
| Based on | Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne |
| Starring | Brendan Fraser Josh Hutcherson Anita Briem Seth Meyers |
| Music by | Andrew Lockington |
| Cinematography | Chuck Shuman |
| Editing by | Paul Martin Smith Dirk Westervelt Steven Rosenblum |
| Studio | Walden Media |
| Distributed by | New Line Cinema |
| Release date(s) | July 11, 2008 |
| Running time | 93 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $60 million[1] |
| Box office | $241,998,151[1] |
Journey to the Center of the Earth (also promoted as Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D or Journey 3-D) is an American 2008 3D adventure film starring Brendan Fraser, Josh Hutcherson, and Anita Briem. It refers to and may be considered a 21st-century sequel to the 19th-century novel of the same name by Jules Verne.
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The film starts off with a man running from a Giganotosaurus, the man who is possibly Max Anderson. As the dinosaur pursues him, he comes to a fissure. He tries to jump over, but fails, and falls.
Trevor Anderson (Brendan Fraser) is a Bostonian volcanologist whose 13-year-old nephew, Sean (Josh Hutcherson), is supposed to spend ten days with him. When Sean's mother drops him off, she leaves Trevor with a box of items that belonged to Max, Trevor's brother and Sean's father, who disappeared 10 years before. Sean suddenly takes interest in what Trevor has to say after he tells him about his father, whom he never really had a chance to know. Among the items in the box is the novel A Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne. Inside the book, Trevor finds notes written by his late brother. At Trevor's laboratory, the two learn there is a new dot on his radar device on Snæfell, an extinct volcano in Iceland. Trevor goes to Iceland to investigate, and Sean goes with him.
They start by looking for another volcanologist named Sigurbjörn Ásgeirsson and instead find his daughter Hannah Ásgeirsson, the scientist having died years earlier. It turns out that he and Trevor's brother Max were Vernians, a small group who believe the works of Jules Verne to be fact. Hannah offers to help them climb up to the radar device.
While hiking the mountain, a lightning storm forces the three into a cave that collapses, leaving them trapped. They find it is an abandoned mine. They venture further into the mine, eventually reaching the bottom of a volcanic tube which is full of precious gems. As they are admiring the gems they realize the floor they're standing on is actually muscovite, a very thin layer of rock formation. The muscovite breaks, and the group falls through the volcanic tube towards the center of the earth, surviving only because the volcanic tube eventually turns into something like a "water slide" which drops them into a lake. There, they find that the center of the Earth is actually another world contained within the Earth.
The group continues seeking a way back to the surface. Along the way, they find evidence that someone was there 100 years previously. Trevor remarks that the instruments found are Lindenbrook's (a character from the book), hinting that his views of the events of the book being real are changing. They find some of Max's things as well, such as his water bottle and his journal. While Trevor and Sean are going through what they've found, Hannah wanders off and unfortunately discovers Max's body.
They bury him on the beach of the underground ocean and Trevor reads a letter to Sean found in Max's journal about how it was Sean's birthday that day and how Max thought he would never be there to give his son his first baseball glove. They then say their goodbyes and hug each other. Trevor also discovers that his brother died due to dehydration because of the Magma surrounding the center of the Earth.
Using Max's advice from his journal, Trevor figures that they must find a geyser that can send them to the surface, which is located on the other side of the underground ocean, or else the temperature will rise up to 200 °F, making it impossible to survive. They must reach the geyser in 48 hours or all of the water to create the geyser will have evaporated. They build a raft and begin crossing the underground ocean, but soon encounter prehistoric piranha fish (resembling Xiphactinus), so they use makeshift baseball bats to bat them away, until the arrival of a shoal of Elasmosaurus. After the fish attack, the raft's sail becomes loose, and Sean tries to hold on, but is blown away and becomes separated from the two adults.
Sean's guide is now a little bird who has been present since the trio entered the center, and it takes him towards the river. He then goes walking, but trips and finds out he is in a magnetic field. Next he goes through a path of floating magnetic rocks; he almost falls down, but is able to hang on. Meanwhile, Trevor and Hannah decide to split up to find him. Sean wanders on to find a dry bone-filled land. He hears roars and hides behind a rock. Drool falls next to him, and Sean looks up, to encounter a Giganotosaurus which drools on top of him and his face, and comes after him. Sean runs, but the dinosaur is faster. It finds him, and he yells and cries for help. Trevor – who has desperately been searching for him – finds him. The beast pursues them until they discover that the ground beneath them is muscovite, the same type as earlier. The dinosaur falls through the muscovite, creating a massive hole, and dies in the process. They get to a river and find Hannah, using another Giganotosaurus skull as a boat. They sail until they end up at a volcano with magma rising. They feel cold water on the other side of a magnesium wall.
Trevor uses a flare to ignite the magnesium in the wall and causes a geyser to shoot them through Mount Vesuvius in Italy, where they destroy the vineyard of an Italian man; Sean gives him a diamond that he found earlier to say sorry. Trevor sees that he has many more in his backpack, and he uses them to fund his brother's laboratory. Throughout the adventure, Hannah and Trevor gradually become close and even share a kiss. Sean visits Trevor and Hannah in their new home, which was purchased with some of the diamonds Sean took from the cave. Trevor hands Sean a copy of the book Atlantis: The Antediluvian World by Ignatius L. Donnelly, suggesting they could maybe hang out during Sean's Christmas break, alluding to a possible sequel. Sean then reveals that he has brought the little bird back from the center of the Earth to keep as a pet. Despite Sean's entreaties, the bird flies away into the screen, ending the movie.
The film transposes the novel into the present day and is mostly live action, with only the landscape and creatures supplied by computer-generated graphics.[2] The film is projected using Real D Cinema and Dolby 3D.[3]
The first trailer was shown before screenings of Meet the Robinsons, the re-release of The Nightmare Before Christmas and the release of Beowulf, with the Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert, and during the 2008 Kids' Choice Awards.
Warner Bros. marketed the film like a theme park attraction.[4] However, the studio had to slightly tweak the campaign (including dropping "3D" from the title) when it became clear that the film would be shown in 3-D in far fewer theaters than anticipated.[5]
The film received mixed to positive reviews. It received a 61% "Fresh" rating by Rotten Tomatoes, based on 151 reviews, with 92 "Fresh" reviews and 59 "Rotten." Top critics gave the film 56%, based on the reviews of 9.[6] Metacritic gave the film a 57, indicating "Mixed or Average reviews."[7]
Journey to the Center of the Earth opened #3 behind Hellboy II: The Golden Army and Hancock in North America. The film grossed $21,018,141 in 2,811 theaters with an average of $7,477. 57 percent of the opening gross was taken from theaters which showed the film in 3-D. It has since made just over $100 million domestically.[4]
As of October 2009, the film has grossed $101,704,370 in the US and $139,157,146 foreign sales, with a total of $241,995,151 worldwide. The film has also enjoyed strong DVD sales.[8]
It was released on Blu-ray Disc and DVD on October 28, 2008, in standard 2-D format as well as a magenta/green anaglyph. The film opened at #2 at the DVD sales chart, selling 843,224 units in the first week which translates to $13,238,617 in revenue.[9] As per the latest figures, 1,642,994 DVD units have been sold, bringing in $25,346,260 in revenue. This does not include Blu-ray Disc sales/DVD rentals.[9]
The 2008 two-disc BD edition of the film does not conform to the – only later established – Blu-ray 3D specifications, which means that this version does not take advantage of any dedicated 3D HDTVs, although it can be watched on them as well as on any other TV in anaglyph 3D by using red-cyan paper glasses (four pairs are included). A 3D blu-ray version will be released on January 17, 2012
In May 2009, the film premiered as "Journey to the Center of the Earth 4-D" at Stone Mountain Park in Georgia.[10] It also opened in the motion simulator at Dollywood under the same name on June 12, 2009.[11] It also features in the new 4D Cinema at the recently reopened Weston Super-Mare Grand Pier in the U.K
| Award | Year | Category | Result | Cast/Crew |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Teen Choice Awards | 2008 | Choice Summer Movie: Action Adventure | Nominated | |
| Young Artist Award | 2009 | Best Performance in a Feature Film – Leading Young Actor | Nominated | Josh Hutcherson |
| BMI Film & TV Awards | 2009 | Won | Andrew Lockington |
The film's closing scene suggests a potential sequel with seeking Atlantis as its goal. In a July 2008 Q&A with Fraser and Brevig with Rocky Mountain News's Mike Pearson, director Eric Brevig indicated a sequel to Journey depended largely on the reception of the film. Said Brevig, "If people embrace the movie and want to see these characters on another adventure, we might come up with something."[12] A month prior Brevig had been less cagey, when asked by Paul Fischer if he'd like to return for another installment, saying, "I would love to. If the movie is successful, I hope to get on that right away. Because I certainly like watching the three characters."[13] Due to cost and competing projects, an Atlantis-based sequel was ruled out.
In March 2009, Walden Media and New Line Cinema purchased Richard Outten's spec script, Mysterious Travels, to serve as the basis for the sequel. Outten has rewritten his original screenplay, transforming it into a second adventure in the franchise. In the story, the characters embark on a journey to a mysterious uncharted island thought to have informed the writing of three literary classics: Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island, Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels and Jules Verne's Mysterious Island.[14]
In May 2010, New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. announced that Journey to the Center of the Earth 2 also known as Journey 2: The Mysterious Island, will be released September 23, 2011. Eventually, it was changed to be released sometime in 2012.
Fraser and Briem will not return due to scheduling issues, but Hutcherson will reprise his role. Dwayne Johnson will play the boyfriend of Sean's mother and is forced to come along on a trip with Sean to find his missing grandfather, played by Michael Caine, on a mythical and monstrous island. In October 2010, it was announced that Vanessa Hudgens will play Hutcherson's love interest.[15] Like the first film, this one will be shot in 3D, and the script will be loosely based on a Verne novel – this time "The Mysterious Island".
Brad Peyton is on board to direct while Beau Flynn, Charlotte Huggins and Tripp Vinson producing with Michael Bostick and Evan Turner serving as executive producers. Filming kicked off in October 2010, in North Carolina and Hawaii.
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