Mowgli: Legend Of The Jungle Review - 5 Ups & 4 Downs

3. The Terrific Voice Cast

Easily the best thing about the movie overall is the strength of the voice cast, who at least sit on par with the performers from the 2016 movie and in some cases even surpass them.

The clear standout performances come from Christian Bale as Bagheera, Benedict Cumberbatch as a perfectly-cast, delightfully vicious Shere Khan, Peter Mullan as stately wolf Akela and Cate Blanchett as slimy python Kaa (the latter proving especially more convincing than Scarlett Johansson's portrayal in the previous film).

While Serkis' own, weirdly cockney-ish portrayal of Baloo will likely prove more divisive with fans, everyone gives a richly well-rounded turn here, and thanks to the impressive performance capture tech, the actors lend plenty of themselves to these characters beyond the mere voice work.