Jumper (2008 film)

Jumper
Promotional movie poster for the film
Directed by	Doug Liman
Written by	David S. Goyer Jim Uhls Simon Kinberg (screenplay) Steven Gould (novel)
Produced by	Simon Kinberg Lucas Foster Jay Sanders Stacy Maes
Starring	Hayden Christensen Jamie Bell Rachel Bilson Samuel L. Jackson Diane Lane Max Thieriot AnnaSophia Robb
Cinematography	Barry Peterson
Edited by	Saar Klein
Music by	John Powell
Distributed by	20th Century Fox New Regency Productions
Release dates	February 14, 2008
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	USD$85 million

Jumper is a 2008 science fiction film based on the 1992 science fiction novel Jumper by Steven Gould. The film is directed by Doug Liman and stars Hayden Christensen, Jamie Bell, Rachel Bilson, Max Thieriot, AnnaSophia Robb with Diane Lane and Samuel L. Jackson. Jumper was released on February 14, 2008.

Plot

As a teenager, David Rice (Max Thieriot, young David) lives with his father William (Michael Rooker), after his mother, Mary (Diane Lane), left when David was only five. He has no friends in school except for Millie (AnnaSophia Robb, young Millie), whom he has a crush on, and Mark (Jesse James) in their home town of Ann Arbor, Michigan. When Mark throws a snow globe that he gave to Millie onto a frozen river and David falls through while trying to retrive it, he discovers he can “Jump” – teleport to anywhere on the planet which he's previously visited or visualized from a photograph. His first jump ends him up in Ann Arbor's local library. Using his ability he leaves his childhood home behind and sets himself up in New York City, and steals money from a local bank after seeing the inside of the vault and using it as a Jump point. Over the course of the next 8 years, David (Hayden Christensen) lives life to excess, Jumping all across the world and living a consequence free life.

This all changes when he meets Roland Cox (Samuel L. Jackson), part of a shadowy organization that has been trying to track David down. Roland uses a variety of advanced technologies to inhibit David’s ability to Jump while trying to kill him, but David manages to escape. He inadvertently Jumps home and has a brief encounter with his father, before tracking down Millie (Rachel Bilson) where she works, at a local bar. He encounters his childhood bully (who nearly caused him to drown in an ice lake many years ago, where he first learned to jump) and they spark a fight after Mark (Teddy Dunn),who is drunk, makes a sexual remark to Millie. During the fight, David Jumps with Mark into the bank vault he robbed 8 years before and leaves Mark inside. After this, David Jumps back to Millie, and uses his considerable wealth to fly her to Rome for a holiday.

While the two are exploring the Colosseum, David meets a young man named Griffin (Jamie Bell) who also has the ability to Jump. The two are attacked by Paladins: members of the same organization as Roland, they are dedicated to hunting down Jumpers – “abominations” in their eyes – and killing them, believing that only God should have the power to "Be everywhere at once". David and Griffin fight the Paladins and kill them, and David follows Griffin back to his hideout through Griffin's "Jump Scar" (a residual trace that a Jumper can pass through and appear in the same location as the previous Jumper). Once there, David learns about a centuries-old war between Jumpers and Paladins, and about how Griffin is trying to track down and kill as many of the Paladins as he can, stating that "Paladins kill Jumpers, I kill Paladins, it's a vicious circle". While Mark is in custody, Roland pays a visit to the innocent captive Mark, who was captured while he was trapped in the bank vault. After a few questions, Roland sets out to find David.

Fearing for Millie’s safety, David returns to Rome to see her safely on a homebound plane, but he is arrested by the local police for trespassing in the Colosseum. While in custody he is secretly visited by his mother, Mary, and warned that the Paladins are on their way. David escapes, puts Millie on a plane to Detroit, and then Jumps to his father’s house to check on him. Unfortunately, William is dead, killed by Roland for refusing to sell out his son.

David tries to get Griffin’s help in protecting Millie and stopping Roland. David arrives at Millie’s home and Jumps her to the hideout before Roland and the Paladins arrive. When Griffin arrives, he panics: the Paladins have technology that allows them to travel through Jump Scars. Roland arrives minutes later with a team of Paladins and attacks the group when David recognizes the photos of one of the people Griffin is tracking: his mother, Mary. Griffin kills the team with a flamethrower and forces Roland back through the Jump Scar, but not before Roland manages to drag Millie back with him.

Griffin prepares a bomb to use against Roland, but David won’t let him since using the bomb would kill Millie as well. David steals the bomb’s detonator and Griffin chases him: the two Jump across the world, through each other’s Jump Scars, until David manages to trap Griffin in a tangle of electrical wires (which effectively stops him from Jumping). Then he Jumps to Millie’s apartment to try and rescue her, only to be caught by Roland and the Paladins. With great effort David manages to Jump a large portion of Millie’s apartment into a lake (the lake where he almost drowned in the beginning of the movie), shorting out the Paladins’ equipment. From there, he jumps a portion of the apartment, Millie, Roland, and himself into the library he jumped to after saving himself from drowning the first time. David recognizes he jumped Roland and when Roland attempts to continue the fight, David jumps him onto a crevice in the middle of the Grand Canyon. David states that he could have "easily jumped him to a shark pit" and Roland was wrong about him; not all Jumpers end up being evil.

Cast

• Hayden Christensen as David "Rice Ball" Rice (adult): a young man who discovers the ability to "jump", or teleport.
• Samuel L. Jackson as Roland Cox: the leader of the Paladin organization, whose goal is to kill jumpers, who are deemed too powerful to exist.
• Jamie Bell as Griffin: A fellow Jumper.
• Rachel Bilson as Millie Harris (adult): David's childhood friend and crush, who later becomes his girlfriend.
• Diane Lane as Mary Rice: David's mother who separated from her son when he was five years old.
• Michael Rooker as William Rice: David's father.
• Teddy Dunn as Mark Kobold (adult); David's childhood bully.
• AnnaSophia Robb as Millie Harris (kid)
• Max Thieriot as David "Rice Ball" Rice (kid)
• Jesse James as Mark Kobold (kid)

Production

In November 2005, New Regency Productions hired director Doug Liman to helm the film adaptation of the science fiction novel Jumper by Steven Gould. Screenwriter Jim Uhls was hired to rewrite an adapted screenplay by David S. Goyer. The studio announced plans to develop a trilogy based on the novel's premise. In April 2006, actors Tom Sturridge, Teresa Palmer, and Jamie Bell were cast for Jumper with Sturridge in the lead role. The following July, actor Samuel L. Jackson was cast into Jumper as an NSA agent, with producer Simon Kinberg rewriting the original screenplay draft by Goyer. Principal photography was scheduled to take place in Tokyo, Rome, Toronto, and New York. In August, actor Hayden Christensen replaced Sturridge in the lead role as David just two weeks before the beginning of shooting, as the studio "became concerned about not having a more prominent actor in their trio of young stars."

In September 2006, Jumper was filmed at various locations in Peterborough, Ontario. The next October, actress Rachel Bilson replaced Palmer in the role opposite Christensen, with principal photography already underway in Toronto. In December 2006, Liman negotiated with the Rome Film Commission for rare access to film for three days in the Colosseum. The scene in the Colosseum was originally written for the Pantheon, at which exterior shots were also filmed. The crew was required to keep equipment off the ground by using harnesses and to rely on natural light for filming the Colosseum's scenes.

After filming in Rome, scenes were filmed in Toronto during December 2006 to January 2007 and wrapped at the Canadian location on January 19. Cast and crew traveled to Tokyo to film scenes. On January 26 in Toronto, 56-year-old David Ritchie, a set dresser, was fatally struck by frozen debris while dismantling an outdoor set in wintry conditions. Another worker was injured and was sent to a hospital with serious head and shoulder injuries. As a result of director Liman insisting Christensen perform his own stunts while filming various scenes, the actor injured his hand, split open his ear, and developed a hyperdilated pupil that required hospital care.

In February 2007, the next filming site was set up at Gallup Park in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Sixty students from the nearby Huron High School were cast as extras for the film. Since additional filming was required of the area, twenty other students were used for a day of filming in September.

While other films tend to use only one storyboard artist, Jumper required six artists who each worked on an individual action sequence. The artists were given specific instruction on the rules of the teleportation used in the film, to ensure accuracy in the storyboarding. One artist reflected on the instructions: "I was just thinking, 'How would a guy that can teleport fight?' So you were really pushing yourself to try to think of inventive, cool, spectacular ways that you could use this jumping talent that these characters have."

Marketing

The first teaser trailer for the film premiered on October 10, 2007.

The film has been involved in viral marketing using the site WhatWeird.com, and numerous YouTube videos semi-integrated into the lonelygirl15 storyline.

Samuel L. Jackson appeared on the FOX pregame show before Super Bowl XLII on February 3, 2008 to promote the film. A trailer for the film also appeared during the Super Bowl broadcast.

On Facebook's gift shop, 250 thousand snow globes with the Jumper's logo were made available. While normally Facebook gifts cost a dollar, 20th Century Fox paid so that they could be given out for free.

An episode of American Idol began with Hayden Christensen as David taking Ryan Seacrest to the Sphinx in Egypt, and then "jumping" back to the show, where Seacrest introduced the episode.

During Winter X-Games 12, Hayden Christensen helped narrarate various events. There was also a "Jumper Cam" throughout the Games, a camera that looked at high-flying images such as the "Big Air" event and others.

Critical reception

The film received generally negative reviews from critics. As of February 15, 2008, the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 15% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 92 reviews — with the consensus being "An erratic action pic with little coherence and lackluster special effects." One critic described Hayden Christensen as "half-man/half-tree." Metacritic reported the film had an average score of 36 out of 100, based on 28 reviews.

Box office performance

The film was released Thursday February 14, 2008 in the United States and Canada, in the hopes of pulling in business on Valentine's Day, and grossed an estimated $27.2 million in 3,428 theaters from Friday to Sunday, ranking #1 at the box office. From Thursday to Sunday, it grossed an estimated $33.8 million.

Graphic novel

Oni Press released a graphic novel that portrays several back stories related to the film titled Jumper: Jumpscars. The novel was released on February 13, 2008, one day before the film's wide release. A publisher for Oni Press commented on the tie-in to the film, stating: "The world that was being built around these characters was so well-realized and the mythology so interesting that other stories about this conflict would be plentiful and add to what the filmmakers were building." The novel was written by Nunzio DeFilippis and Christina Weir and illustrated by Brian Hurtt.

Video game

A video game for the film will be made for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, and Wii consoles. The storyline will focus on the characters Griffin and David as he attempts to avenge the death of his parents. Nicholas Longano of the video game publisher Brash Entertainment stated, "From the very first script read, we knew this had to be made into a game. The teleportation elements make for some very compelling gameplay." The game was released on February 12, 2008, two days before the film's wide release.

External links

• Official site and trailer
• Teaser site
• Jumper at IMDb
• Jumper at Rotten Tomatoes
• Jumper at Metacritic
• Jumper at Box Office Mojo
• Jumper at AllMovie