Dora is a teenage girl who spent her youth growing up in the South American jungle. When her professor/explorer parents finally discover the location of the lost city of gold, they decide to send Dora off to high school in America instead of letting her tag along on the dangerous adventure. But others are looking for the city of gold, and they're willing to kidnap Dora and her new high school friends in exchange for the location of the city.
This film starts out exactly like a live-action Dora episode. A 6-year old Dora and her best friend Diego are off on a wild jeep adventure in the jungle, with a talking backpack and map, and Swiper the Fox trying to steal from them. Then it cuts to "reality" and we see the kids playing in a cardboard box outside Dora's jungle home. Diego and his family are moving to "the city" and the kids say their goodbyes to each other.
Then the movie takes a turn from the cartoon show and jumps ahead to Dora's teen years, where she's still "adventuring" in the jungle. She finds out that her parents have finally found the lost city of gold, but they're reluctant to bring her along because she's still too young. They send her to "the city" in America, to live with Diego's family. And so begins her awkward attempt to "study the indigenous people" of high school.
The trailer for this movie made Dora seem eccentric and out-of-place in normal society, but a confident explorer and always in control. The movie, on the other hand, shows Dora as an odd child, even by her parents' standards. She lacks social skills and is inappropriately personal with everyone she sees.
She does this thing from the old cartoon where she'll explain a fact, then stare at the camera and say, "Can YOU say (thing she described)?" All while her parents are looking around the room awkwardly and whispering to each other, "It's just a phase; she'll grow out of it."
Her optimism is through the roof and her lack of social grace makes for some really painful scenes to sit through. Teenage Diego channels the audience, as he's constantly trying to reel her in. He explains to her that he's just struggling to survive high school and her presence is ruining his "street cred". But he fails to get through to her, as she cares more about being positive with everyone than trying to find common ground to relate to anyone.
Then Dora gets kidnapped by some treasure hunters who plan to use her to find the lost city of gold, and Dora, Diego, and two of their classmates end up shipped back to the jungle in a crate. They escape thanks to the help of a friend of Dora's parents, and go on their own jungle quest to track down her folks.
The rest of the movie is spent exploring the jungle while the classmates whine about not going home. There was a bizarre scene where Dora and Diego get drugged by an exotic plant's spores and start hallucinating that they're cartoon characters, which brings on a literal Dora cartoon scene in the middle of this live-action movie.
Oh! And Swiper the fox is apparently a real thing! No explanation whatsoever for his presence. Some of the kids even comment on the fact that there's a random talking fox wearing a mask. He's apparently working with the treasure hunters. And there was little effort put into his appearance as well; he reminded me of the stop-motion foxes from the film Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009).
If you grew up with Dora cartoons (I didn't), you might enjoy this rendition of a teenage Dora. But for the most part, there were a lot of cringey scenes that dragged on way too long, including one where an adult ugly cries because he almost died, while the kids whisper about how awkward it is when adults cry.
I'd recommend giving this a one-time view, but good luck sitting through it twice! If you want a fun live-action Dora movie, I'd recommend watching the fake trailer made by College Humor instead, which is likely what sparked interest in making this movie in the first place.
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