A Trilogy 65 Million Years in the Making

Jurassic Park
(Steven Spielberg, 1994)

5 Stars

Telephone transcript between Steven Spielberg and Michael Crichton, circa 1993:

SS: Hey Mike, fancy making the greatest film EVER?

MC: Yeah, alright.

SS: Awesome.

End transcript.


So why do I love Jurassic Park so much? Well, it just everything you need in a movie, isn’t it? In its following and quotability, few films can match Spielberg’s epic monsterpiece, and its groundbreaking effects still stand strong, if not atop, in today’s cinema.

From the moment Doctors Grant and Satler (Sam Neill and Laura Dern in their most career-defining roles) first see the magnificently rendered brachiosaurus, both actors and audience are equally transfixed, making this one of cinema’s most magical moments of all time. The dinosaurs are flawless throughout; the sick triceratops moves and moans as a real animal would, and the carnivores are so perfectly created that you really do believe that a T-Rex could attack your car or raptors terrorise your kitchen. Also, interestingly, despite their cult status, we don’t actually see the raptors until fifteen minutes before the end of the film; their presence and foreboding is simply created by the knowledge of their omnipresence; a perfect example of Crichton’s masterful writing.

But it’s not simply the prehistoric creatures that perform with aplomb; every member of the perfectly picked cast delivers with the utmost conviction, from Richard Attenborough’s fatherly John Hammond to Jeff Goldblum’s beautifully sardonic Chaos Theorist Ian Malcolm. Wayne Knight as the hopeless antagonist Dennis Nedry is brilliantly inept, whilst Samuel L. Jackson is intoxicating as the chain–smoking tech-whiz Ray Arnold, with his dismembered arm putting in a stellar show. Even child actors Joseph Mazzello and Ariana Richards do a fine job as Hammond’s grandchildren.

The award, however, has to go to the late Bob Peck, who is simply marvellous as cynical park ranger Robert Muldoon, delivering each and every line with a well-timed perfection that few actors can ever dream of achieving.

With tension and humour abounding, all set to John Williams’ grandiose yet tender score, Jurassic Park is truly a masterpiece of cinema, and looking at it almost twenty year on, I can still see why both I and so very many others fell in love with this seminal film. Every scene is a classic, and every line memorable. Just remember if ever you’re on the toilet when a T-rex attacks, he can’t see you if you don’t move.


The Lost World: Jurassic Park
(Steven Spielberg, 1997)

3.5 Stars

The Lost World has had a lot of bad press over the years. Okay, it’s not as good as its predecessor, but let’s face it, it was never going to be. What it is, however, is a ruddy good sequel, and, in its own right, a jolly fun adventure romp.

The Lost World does exactly what ever good sequel should do; it adds to the mythology of the original film in a logical and believable way, and then throws in double the action and double the adventure. Sure, the story isn’t as good as the first, or for that matter, as good as the book. But it’s fun, and there’s two T-rexes.

The dinosaurs are as believable as the first time round (although, I must say, the raptors are a little shoddily animated in one or two shots during the climax), and the cast are strong, most notably Jeff Goldblum reprising his role as Dr Ian Malcolm, and the ever-delightful Pete Postelthwaite (Romeo & Juliet) as big game hunter Roland Tembo. Even Vince Vaughan (Dodgeball) is pretty good as wildlife photographer/activist Nick Van Owen. Alas Julianne Moore (Hannibal) is quite annoying. But perhaps that’s just because I don’t like her.

Sure, there are flaws; the ridiculous gymnastics display used by Malcolm’s daughter to escape a raptor attack is plain daft, and the T-rex in San Diego during the epilogue is, well… It was raptors in the book, and that was scary. A T-rex just recreates Godzilla. On the whole, however, I’m still a big fan of The Lost World, and have vivid recollections of my Panini sticker album. Them were the days.


Jurassic Park III
(Chris Columbus, 2001)

1 Star

And this is where the plot, along with the original director, gets lost. I’ve ranted for hours in the past about why JP3 sucks big time, so I’ve decided here to simply give some comprehensive bullet-points.

Enjoy.

· Let’s start with the obvious one: Good ol’ Mister Spinosaur. The team in The Lost World travelled all over Isla Sorna, and not once did they come across this rather pants looking beast, and yet it seems to crop up EVERYWHERE in this movie. Nonsense.

· The effects SUCK. The raptors look like weird birds, and the spinosaur looks like something that was made on Blue Peter. I couldv’e done better in the time it took to write Speed 2.

· The raptors: In both previous movies, the raptors were all the more terrifying simply because we never saw them. In JP3, they’re there right from the start, and are these pansy little things that get defeated by a whistle. What a load of bollocks.

· The “who gets killed” checklist: Of the cast of ten or so, we have Dr Grant, who can’t be killed, mum, dad and son, who can’t be killed, and then half a dozen nameless peons. I wonder who dies? Even the “death” of Grant’s assistant turns out to have a happy ending. This is meant to be a thriller, not happy bloody families.

· The family concept: Is just crap.

· Exactly what happens at the beginning of the movie is unexplained; are we to assume there are sea monsters too, or did Mr Omnipresent Spinosaur pop out for a swim in the open water?

· Alan’s return to the island: He simply wouldn’t go. Contrived trite.

· There’s no magic moment; JP had the brachiosaurus, whilst Lost World had the stegs… JP3 meanwhile decides to abandon what makes the films so wonderful and instead just throw us straight in with the sticky-back-plastic carnivores.

· The cop-out ending: Because the studio ran out of cash. And the one that was proposed was shite anyway.

· Chris Columbus is a douche.

· I hate Chris Columbus.

The one redeeming feature, and the only thing that earns Jurassic Park 3 its one star is the excellent pteranodon sequence, though even that was an out-take from the first movie. I hate you Chris Columbus, just in case you missed it the first few times.