"Jump In!" With Your Whole Family
Move over “High School Musical” and “Cheetah Girls,” Disney Channel has found a new phenomenon—double dutch.
Last Friday, the premiere of the original movie, “Jump In!” became the channel’s most-watched telecast ever with 8.2 million viewers. That surpasses the premiere of “HSM,” which had 7.8 million viewers.
If you missed it, “Jump In!” stars Corbin Bleu (“High School Musical”) as Izzy, an up and coming boxer, who discovers he has a knack for double dutch. But this isn’t the traditional double dutch you did as a kid. These routines are extremely complicated as the jumpers dance, do handstands and turn flips—all while the ropes keep moving.
At first, Izzy has no interest in double dutch, but when he’s forced to take his little sister to a competition, he realizes just how cool it is. And when his neighbor, Mary (Keke Palmer, “Akeelah and the Bee”) is in need of a fourth person on her team, he jumps in. However, Izzy’s dad, (Bleu’s real life dad, David Reivers) has dreams of Izzy winning the Golden Gloves Tournament. Plus, Izzy is concerned about what his classmates—and the school bully—will think of him participating in such a “girl” thing. Eventually, Izzy must choose what he really wants to do.
“Jump In!” is no “High School Musical,” but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth watching—because it is. It gets a little overly sentimental in parts, and some of the dialogue can get a little annoying (How many times can you hear someone say that double dutch is their whole life?), but the ending is one of the sweetest I’ve seen in a long time. You know what’s coming, but the movie throws in a twist that makes it all the more special. And Bleu is so cute, you can’t help but fall in love with him.
The soundtrack is really good too, although it overpowers some of the movie, and the double dutch—which Bleu and Palmer do a lot of themselves—is amazing.
If you’re looking for a movie for your whole family—and you’re a little tired of hearing “Getcha Head in the Game” over and over—then “Jump In!”
“Jump In!” airs tonight (Thursday, January 18th) at 8 p.m. on Disney Channel…
