Movie Review: Journey to the Center of the Earth

Put your brains on idle as we are swept away into a fully engaging adventure. Based loosely on the classic Jules Verne novel, tongue is put firmly in check as a nerdy scientist with a host of problems gets involved in the adventure of a lifetime.

Back home at a stuffy university college prof Trevor Anderson seems headed nowhere. Trouble on the job sees his department about to be downsized thanks to a snooty overseer out to create trouble for our sad sack scientist in training. Climatology is big on this man’s agenda, or more specifically the phenomena of volcanoes and some fluke of nature. Like his long lost brother, Trevor believes something fundamentally unique is happening in the atmosphere. How right he is!

While problems on the job persist, Trevor gets a doubly whammy when his young nephew Sean arrives on the scene. Apparently this is a stop gap layover for the lad and his mom wants him to “bond” with his uncle before departing for of all places Ottawa. Yes, Canadian jokes surface for mild amusement before the pair latch onto some plan to find out what happened to their dearly departed father/brother.

That thirst for knowledge is what drives Trevor and before you know it he’s off with Sean to Rekjavick, Iceland, in an effort to learn about abnormal climate change. Once on the ground in the frozen north the pair make contact with a local guide named Hannah Asgeirsson. Clues tell them she’s their best hope of learning what happened long, long ago.

Challenges confound this trio who set off in search of the truth. Certain false steps hurl the explorers way down, into the bowels of the earth.