Based on the book by author/artist Chris Van Allsburg,
Zathura: A Space Adventure is an enjoyable trip into the deepest, richest
imaginary outer space fantasies of our collective youth. Ten year old Walter
(Josh Hutcherson) and his little brother Danny (Jonah Bobo) are spending the
week over at the spacious home of their divorced father (played by Tim Robbins),
where they are driving each other--as well as dad--straight up the wall. When
Dad has to leave for ten minutes to pay a visit to the local office supply store,
he leaves the boys in the care of their older sister Lisa (Kristen Steward), who
would just as soon as sleep in.
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Catching Danny hiding on the dumbwaiter, Walter decides to teach his little
brother a lesson by sending him down to the cellar, where Danny has an adventure
just escaping the creepy place--but not before he comes across an old board game
called Zathura. It’s a wind up game with little spaceships that travel around a
star map, and with every turn, a player receives a card telling them what will
happen. Danny eagerly begins playing, and when the card spits out, he gives it
to his older brother to read. The card says, "Meteor shower, take evasive
action." And right at that moment, both boys flee for their lives as the entire
living room is turned into Swiss cheese by thousands of meteors shooting through
the walls and ceiling. 
But that’s just the beginning of their problems, for it appears their house has
been ripped intact from the very land it stood on and tossed into outer space,
where it drifts aimlessly through the black void. The only way the boys can get
home is by finishing the game, yet before that can happen, there are a lot worse
dangers coming down the pike, such as a berserk robot and man-eating aliens
known as the Zorgons. Ably directed by actor Jon Favreau, Zathuros: A Space
Adventure is an incredibly fun ride. Hutcherson and Bobo are great as the
bickering brothers, as is Steward, who’s clueless to their plight for the better
part of the film’s running time. While this film may seem very derivative of Van
Allsburg’s earlier work, Jumanji, Zathuros is actually a far better film because
of its warm humor and imaginative production design, which harkens back to the
1950s SF spaceships and robots. The DVD has a commentary by Favreau and producer
Peter Billingsley (who played little Ralphie in the modern day holiday classic,
"A Christmas Story), as well as several superb ’making of’ documentaries which
look at the production in different stages. There’s also a look at the
imaginative work of Chris Van Allsburg.
--SF