Hi to your all!
Love my books, love my movies and I look forward to writing more reviews on them!
Hi to your all!
Love my books, love my movies and I look forward to writing more reviews on them!
Member since:11.07.2000
Reviews:11
On a recent visit to the cinema, I noticed a poster for 'Jurassic Park III' which will be released in the UK this summer. I thought now was as good a time as any to voice my opinions on its predecessors 'Jurassic Park' and 'The Lost World', especially as my assessment of the two films is different to virtually every other reviewer!
The summer of 1993 - I remember it well. The hype machine was in overdrive. Word of mouth was ecstatic. The nation was swept with a fascination for all thing dinosaur. 'Jurassic Park', the biggest movie ever was here. After the critical mauling of 'Hook', Spielberg was back to his best. The special effects were going to take your breath away. 'Don't miss it' spoke the majority of reviews.
This ecstasy certainly seemed to be shared by the majority of punters. As I left the cinema, I overheard lots of people talking about what a wonderful cinematic experience they had just had. I wished I could have agreed with them. I wanted to get excited about the film. I really did. But I found the movie something of a disappointment, and I couldn’t understand why it had the phenomenal amount of rave reviews.
I'm sure the world and his wife knows the premise by now. And what a premise! John Hammond (Richard
Attenborough), an eccentric billionaire, has created a theme park on an island 120 miles off the coast of Costa Rica. The park's main attraction? A 'zoo' full of living breathing dinosaurs. Hammond's genetic engineers have 'created' these beasts using DNA found in the blood of prehistoric mosquitoes (who fed off dinosaur), insects that have been preserved in amber for 65 million years.
After a mess up in the transportation of a dinosaur results in the death of one of the Park's workers, Hammond is faced with the prospect of the having the Park shut down for safety reasons. Those wishing to do so send lawyer Donald Gennaro (Martin Ferrero) to the island, who is accompanied by chaos mathematician Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum). To defend his cause Hammond invites palaeontologists Alan Grant and Ellie Sattler (Sam Neil and Laura Dern).
Whilst said group are on a tour of the park's facilities, a turncoat amongst Hammond's staff, shuts down the park's power supply to cover his tracks whilst he steals some dinosaur embryos. The result is that the electric fences surrounding the dinosaur compounds are disabled, and our heroes are suddenly at the mercy of these hungry prehistoric creatures.
So what's my problem with the film? My general moan is that is never particularly clear for what sort of audience the film is designed. I think that if it had been made as a straightforward 'adult' thriller it would have been a lot better. But the movie is spoiled by Spielberg's decision to try and pander to a younger as well as an adult audience. The result is that we get some scenes (the sneezing dinosaur, the electrocution) that are, quite frankly, silly. In between we get some quite frightening set pieces (the T-Rex attacks the children) that are more than likely to scare watching kids to death!
Furthermore, I concede that the dinosaurs are the real 'stars' of the film rather than any of the human personnel involved, but none of the performances are especially memorable. Sam Neil and Laura Dern are rather bland in the 'leading' roles. And Richard Attenborough, the one guy you would expect to add a bit of class to the proceedings, seems to spend the entire film deciding or not whether to speak in a Scottish accent.
The screenplay is rather weak and at times rather unbalanced, leaving the impression that some scenes have been cut. The 'emotional' chat between Dern and Attenborough about the 'only thing that matters is the people we love' for example seems rather disjointed given the scenes that precede and follow it.
And the plot - well where is it? What astonished me when I read reviews at the time was that a large number of them did acknowledge the movie was thin on storyline, but given the amazing spectacle, this didn’t matter. Of course it matters! The best films have good acting, a good script and a good story. 'Jurassic Park' has none of these!
In an interview about the film, Spielberg said that his aim was to build up the tension in the first half of the movie, and then give the audience the ride of their lives for the rest of it. If this was his intention, then it doesn’t quite work. The best bits of the film are indeed when the dinosaurs are onscreen, but it happens too late in the day really. And it would have been nice to have seen more species of dinosaur. There are some exciting sequences in the last half hour of the film, but it is practically solely the 'T-Rex and velociraptor' show!
And I would have loved to have seen more stuff about the DNA and the genetic engineering, potentially fascinating stuff. And yet all I got was a rather silly five-minute cartoon about the discovery of the prehistoric mosquito (if the film had been more adult-orientated this presumably would have been explored further).
I'm not suggesting the film was a total disaster. Those onscreen dinosaurs are a real triumph and marvellous to behold. Just take a look at 'The Land that time forgot' next time it turns up on TV and you'll see how far special effect technology has come!
Enjoyable for the most part? Yes. Mightily impressive special effects? Without a doubt. couple of exciting set pieces? Definitely. Genuinely suspenseful? Not really. Spielberg back to his Jaws-like best? Not at all - 'Jurassic Park' is not half the film 'Jaws' was. An unmissable five star movie? Nah. Sorry folks, it's only average!
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
Production Year: 1964 - Action/Adventure - Director: Cyril Endfield - Original Language: English - Classification: Parental Guidance - Starring:Stanley Baker, Jack Hawkins, Ulla Jacobsson, James Booth, Michael Caine, Nigel Green
Production Year: 2002 - Action/Adventure - Director: Vincenzo Natali - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring:Lucy Liu, David Hewlett, Anne Marie Scheffler, Joseph Scoren, Matthew Sharp, Jeremy Northam
Action/Adventure - Original Language: English - Classification: 12 years and over - Starring:Jack Ging, Marla Heasley, Lance Legault, Melinda Culea, Mr T, Dwight Schultz, Dirk Benedict, George Peppard, Carl Franklin
Production Year: 1977 - Action/Adventure - Director: Clint Eastwood - Original Language: English - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring:Clint Eastwood, Sondra Locke, Pat Hingle, William Prince, Bill McKinney
I always thought the film was brilliant when I watched it as a kid, and I guess I still do, but I think the film is really made with a young audience in mind which is why I liked it. But I disagree that the story is that bad...and anyway, the film is not one that needs much of a story because it has enough impressive set pieces to keep the viewer interested. Great, detailed op though, even if I disagree with what you say. Jonny
Collingwood21 16.04.2001 14:32
I agree that this film never lived up the hype, but then I dont think anything could have done. The reason that this film tried to pander to the children watching it was because it meant there would be a lot more scope for merchandising, which is how films like this make most of their money, after all. Have you tried the book? It is far better than the film! Good review :-) sharon
Dizz 16.04.2001 13:49
sorry - that should be "any" - not "and" - bad typing!
Multimillionaire John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) has a plan for a spectacular new ... more
theme park: a secluded island where visitors can observe actual dinosaurs. With the latest development in DNA technology scientists can clone brachiosaurs triceroto...
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![Jurassic Park [DVD] [1993]](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/78511563.jpg "Jurassic Park [DVD] [1993]")
![Jurassic Park [DVD] [1993]](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/78489603.jpg "Jurassic Park [DVD] [1993]")
Apr 16th, 2001
very helpful by (100%):
