Jack Black, Kevin Hart game to film Jumanji in Hawaii

In his mind, he knows how to be a "hot babe".

"It is in my toolbox," said US actor Jack Black, 48.

On a night shoot on the Hawaii set of his new movie Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle, hedescribed his character Professor Sheldon "Shelly" Oberon as an overweight middle-aged cartographer, cryptographer, archaeologist and paleontologist, who is the avatar of the pretty and popular high school cheerleader named Bethany.

He joked that watching episodes of MTV series Teen Wolf and listening to US singer-songwriter John Mayer helped him "feel it".

Opening here tomorrow, Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle is a sequel to 1995's Jumanji, a fantasy adventure in which children play a magical board game and accidentally release a player (Robin Williams) trapped in the game and have to finish playing it to save him.

This time round, four teenagers in detention are sucked into the world of Jumanji through a video game, and into the bodies of the four avatars.

They have to win the game or be stuck in it forever.

Co-star and fellow US comedian Kevin Hart also took a break from filming to chat during our set visit.

His character is zoologist Franklin "Moose" Finbar, a small man with a big brain who is the avatar of the high school football jock Fridge.

Hart, 38, said: "Fridge is a bully who becomes the complete opposite of what he is in the real world. He is almost an assistant of some sort (in the game), and this doesn't sit well with Fridge because he is not used to taking orders.

"When you come from a world where you are 1.98m and 110kg, and you get shrunk down to 1.6m, and your weaknesses are speed, strength and cake, you are no longer the tough guy that you were."

Rounding up the cast is Dwayne Johnson as Dr Smolder Bravestone, the action hero explorer avatar of the neurotic and needy Spencer, and Karen Gillan as martial arts fighter Ruby Roundhouse, the avatar of shy wallflower Martha.

NATURE RESERVE

The movie was shot on Kualoa Ranch, a private nature reserve known as Hawaii's Jurassic Valley. It has also been used as a location shoot for movies like Jurassic World, Kong: Skull Island and drama series Lost.

Black liked shooting in Hawaii, which he compared to a camping trip.

"It is not like going into the deep jungles in Africa. There is no malaria here," he joked.

"But there are centipedes. But that is what you want. You want to be on location that really feels like you are in Jumanji. It makes it easier to act. It takes one less thing to imagine."

You still have to use your imagination to act on set, according to Hart.

"Because they can only show you so much on the script. This world is created, and it is so amazing. But when you get out here, there is a green tennis ball at the top and there is a purple X here and there is an orange X over there. That is your rhino and that is your panther and that is your giant elephant that is coming down to get you.

"It is not like you have these live animals out here to really react off of, you are going off the trust of your director and also your instinct."

There was also time to enjoy the island paradise.

"We are not working six-day weeks," said Black.

"We have weekends to have some fun in the sun. My family came out for a week, and we swam with the dolphins and had lots of beach time, and there was some good snorkelling."

Hart was less enamoured of the location.

He said: "Last night was tough because it was the elephant scene. Naturally we don't have an elephant, but I am always game for anything.

"So they built this really big golf cart with layers. And there is a smoke barrel underneath it that they ended up putting a seat on top of with not too much cushion. That was my elephant. I was riding on that for five hours yesterday, you are just sitting on a hard piece of metal.

"But you don't complain. It is what we need to do for the shot, and you have got several takes that you have got to do."

Black watched the original movie only once "as research", and said it was "incredible".

He said: "I loved Robin Williams' performance in it, and it is one of my favourite Robin Williams performances."

Black met the late US actor - who committed suicide in 2014 at the age of 63 - in New York City when he saw a play Williams was in.

"He was really sweet and funny, and we hung out a little bit. He was an amazing guy."

Williams' career is one that Hart would like to emulate.

He said: "If you look at his body of work, you go, 'I forgot he was in Mrs Doubtfire. Oh, Night At The Museum, remember he played this. There are so many things you can point to.

"At the end of the day, you should have a catalogue. You should have something that goes with your name.

"I don't think you relax because there are so many people who are breaking their neck to get one bit of what I have. I make sure that I go full steam and seize the moment."