Review by Tres
I just finished watching Jurassic World with my oldest daughter. As in all of my reviews, I will truly try to not give anything major away about the movie.
We begin with an egg cracking to the birth of a Velociraptor.
We are then introduced to an entire new cast. I love the idea that we don’t have former characters coming back throughout this new introduction to the Jurassic Realm. I read the original 3 books and truly enjoyed the first film. I was disappointed that they then strayed so much from the books in the second and eventually a third movie. (More disappointed in the second of all the original trilogy.) This new film does a nice job bringing in sorely missed aspects of the “Lost World” book that the second and third movie sorely missed.
Jurassic World takes us to the island that Jurassic Park originated on and 22 years after yhe tragic InGen disaster that killed so many workers on the island. After a few years the island was revamped and the new owner Masrani (Irrfan Khan) has pushed for “Bigger. Louder. More teeth.” since the reopening.
Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) is the marketing director that is focused on getting these bigger and better attractions to raise revenue for a slowly depleting attraction attendance problem: “No one’s impressed by a dinosaur anymore.”
In a pretty cool scene, we are introduced to a crowd-pleaser, the Mosasaurus. This is a gigantic dino-shark type creature that uses a Great White the size of Jaws as a snack. A cool aspect was where the crowd goes after the snack is grabbed. (I leave that for viewers.)
Then we have the focus star, Owen (Chris Pratt), an ex-Navy man and now recruited raptor tamer. I was impressed with the scenes and feel with Pratt and the Raptors.
In the original 3 films the eyes of some actors didn’t quite track with the dinos. However, Jurassic World does a nice job with line-of-sight for the different dinosaurs.
Even the 2 children that the film focuses around, Gray (Ty Simpkins) and Zach (Nick Robinson), do a nice job acting and interacting with things that would have been added after the original shoots. I enjoyed these two and their roles as brothers. I couldn’t help but see similarities between them and my own two sons.
Then we get to meet the trouble maker of the film, the big baddy, Indominus Rex. This is a genetically created dinosaur from Dr. Henry Wu (BD Wong), whom as far as I can tell is the only recurring character and actor from the previous films. This my my favorite part of the story, because this dinosaur comes from the Lost World book and what I had longed to see in the 2nd and 3rd movies. It has some very unique characteristics and talents which were great top see brought to the big screen.
Our second baddy of the film is Hoskins from InGen played by Vincent D’Onofrio. I usually like his work, and he plays the InGen man with a mission well.
I did not take my youngest son to this movie in fear of the violence and loud noises and it all bothering him. I liked how the director intentionally took the soft road on the deaths. Deaths are inevitable in this type of film, let’s face it… people are going to get eaten. But the gore was left out and this made me more comfortable about my son now seeing it, but also for all of the children that were in the audience today.
The Down-Side
My small complaint, though I liked Howard and Greer back together (The Village),….
The Village
I do not buy the forced chemistry between Pratt and Howard.
A big complaint is the Mosasaurus. First, from the science teacher viewpoint, all DNA has been retrieved from amber with mosquitoes stuck in them. You can still see the prehistoric amber with mosquitoes throughout the filming in labs and on the property. How then, does a mosquito get to suck on a gigantic aquatic animal? On top of that, it was the most CGI looking creature in the film.
My biggest complaint is watching this film makes me often feel like I just watched it, like 2 weeks ago…. when I watched the first movie. The originality of the story line was my biggest disappointment of all.
2 children come to visit a relative.
A dinosaur becomes smarter than they ever thought it could and breaks out.
A worker is sneaking around and playing against the park.
The children end up getting lost among the dinosaurs and almost eaten.
A reluctant hero decides to save them.
The hero knows raptors.
The hero finds a sick/injured dinosaur and interacts with it.
The originality is missing. We are repeating the first movie in plot line.
The big picture in this film (as well as the original Jurassic Park and the Crichton books), …
Gen 1:1
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
When we start playing God in the realm of creating, we take a lot of chances on outcomes. God created his world and it was good. He didn’t make man to create different aspects of hi world or to try to improve on it.
God actually gives us insight as to man’s logic and what it can become. Rom 1
20 For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse: 21 because that, knowing God, they glorified him not as God, neither gave thanks; but became vain in their reasonings, and their senseless heart was darkened. 22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, 23 and changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things.
With it’s flaws and shortcomings, this is still an enjoyable film to watch. I didn’t feel like the scenes were all CGI or robotics, even though they had to be. (Right?)
Pratt had a great performance.
The 2 young actors did a much better job with their characters than in the original film.
However, overall I still have to give it a 4. It’s a solid movie with nice special effects.
Pratt does a nice job in his roll with his usual funny moments, but many times in this role he’s intense.
The boys do a great job in their characters and portrayal of brothers.
Howard does a nice job being a work-aholic that is focused on making her theme park a success.
If you like the original Jurassic Park, you will be pleased with this film.
If you, like my wife, thinks seeing dinosaurs on film is stupid, this would be a waste of money for you.
Interesting views on this bigger, grander version of the “dinosaur as monster” film with more teeth for the money. I just caught the original “Jurassic Park” with it’s beautifully atmospheric score by John Williams and must admit up front (having not seen the current release), how truly amazing the special effects were for that era in film circa 1993 (or there abouts). Particularly terrifying was the encounter of the kids trapped in the suv while the 9000 lb. amniatronic prop tried to overturn it so as to have it’s midnight snack. That scene was so vividly presented as to make one a bit, shall we say, spoiled, for just about anything that has since come after it. Maybe it’s because we take CGI magic for granted even though it still has the ability to wow us beyond what we’ve come to expect.
The brute strength of this aforementioned CGI, becomes a crutch for the “storytelling” aspect of a film such as this. Instead of using some of those “plot points” and specific scenes illustrated in this review as a jumping off point for a “twist” on the original material, the screenwriter looks to be a tad lazy, figuring that anybody new to the film (not having seen JP #’s 1-3), will just go along with this one without bothering to check out what came before. That first film was pretty rich in terms of the tale being told, the visuals and irony, considering that in this day and age scientists are still trying to “Play God” with genetic engineering and shady promoters are still trying to get rich despite the possibility of collateral damage where none was intended. Such is mankind where some things never seem to change.
Thanks for an intriguing read.
I appreciate your insight. If I can walk away as a watcher and not a reviewer, it’s a great film and very well done. I did appreciate the fact that NOT EVERYTHING was CGI; they did use some robotics as well.
I really did not mind many of the duplicated views, as they were monumental to the original JP. I just really did not expect to see so many of the set-ups duplicated.
As you said, maybe a little more laziness than should have been in the script preparation. However, definitely worth the movie ticket.
Thank you again for your input.
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