With: Jonah Bobo, Josh Hutcherson, Tim Robbins, Kristen Stewart, and Dax Shepard

Zathura is the story of two young brothers pulled into a strange game one of them finds hidden in the basement of an old house their father is renovating. As they play the game, their house is found to be hurtling through space. Chris Van Allsburg who helped with the script bases the story on his book Zathura.
I saw this one last Friday and actually had a pretty good time. While the film is sort of preachy at times, showing the dangers of sibling fights and rivalry, it also offers some truly fun points here and there, not to mention some amazing special effects.
Now, I have not seen Jumanji, so when people say this is just an outer space version of the film I can't agree or disagree. About all I can say is if Jumanji is half as good as Zathura it must be a pretty good film.
The two brothers, Jonah Bobo and Josh Hutcherson were very talented. I was amazed at how well they handled their parts. It did shock me to see two kids this young handle roles that some adults would have had trouble with.
As I said, the special effects were amazing. The rings of Saturn were beautiful, and the Zorgons were both fun and actually frightening looking. They surpassed the aliens in War of The Worlds by about thirty points. Perhaps Mr. Cruise and Mr. Spielberg could take a few notes from the folks here about what a scary alien is supposed to look like.
Also meeting the boys is a tiny toy robot that is 'a robot in disguise' that is malfunctioning and trying to kill the oldest boy, Walter. This little situation causes even more destruction of the house then before and I had fun watching the place get wrecked. I always had this desire to take a sledgehammer to a house somewhere.
I loved the ships the Zorgons used; they were right out of the 1950's and fit the game stage perfectly.
The scene where their older sister, Lisa (Stewart) gets frozen in the bathroom was funny as well as sort of scary to some of the viewers. And when her frozen body was being thrown around the house and down the stairs I think everyone was laughing.
The movie is aimed straight at 10 year-old boys with its robots, alien lizards, and brave astronauts. And from the audience I was with, it struck a strong cord.
Zathura is a complete children's adventure, a story that does have a moral but tries to not shove it down the throat of the viewer and still has scenes and images that will fire up the imagination of kids for a long time. It is a perfect film for the coming holidays, when families will have some extra time.
Now for the negative stuff. Yes, at first the two boys somewhat foul mouthed and acted very spoiled and massively selfish. It was fun to watch them grow beyond that.
The worst part of the film was Kristen Stewart running around half-dressed. Why did she have to strike a pose every few moments in her short panties and tight T-shirt? The scenes with her dressed like this were a pedophiles wet dream.
The girl is only 15 years old people. There was only one reason to show her off like this and that was to pull in older teen boys and adult males. That is offensive, to use a child like that and yes, she is still a child.
If someone had photos of a girl in an outfit like that, that young on their computer, they could be busted for all sorts of stuff.
What next? Dakota Fanning doing a pole dance in her next film? Maybe just appearing topless? Haley Ramm turning hard-core tricks? I'm sorry, but kids need to be allowed to be kids, not sex toys designed for middle aged men or horny teen-age boys.