The film’s saving grace, the one aspect that almost-but-not-quite elevates it above an enjoyably passable popcorn flick, is the kinda-sorta meta nature of the story. Only later did I realize how bland the characters actually were, how run-of-the-mill and ubiquitous the CGI was (only one animatronic dinosaur? Really?!), and how bloodless the film really was (in more than one sense). Thanks to all this nostalgia-pandering, I left the theater on a high, proclaiming that it was the second-best film in the series. rex back in action (even though in most shots she looked less real in 2015 than she did in 1993). I teared up upon hearing the old theme music again, upon seeing the ruins of the original park, upon seeing the original T. But the parts that got to me the most upon that first watch were the deliberate, pointed callbacks to the first film. And it is sort of neat to see the park actually open, however briefly. It’s a competently-made adventure/monster movie with mostly likable (albeit rather bland) characters, fun (and in one or two cases surprisingly violent) dino-action set-pieces, and an interesting idea or two. See how they got me?ĭon’t get me wrong, Jurassic World is…fine. But the kid in me was just so damn excited to see dinosaurs on the big screen again and not just any dinosaurs, but specifically the ones I’d grown up loving. Jurassic World came amid a meteor shower of remakes, reboots, and sequels acting like reboots, so I should’ve recognized it earlier as the cynical nostalgia-fueled cash-grab it turned out to be. As a kid I ate up Jurassic Park III like a pack of Procompsognathus on an injured John Hammond, and even today I can’t bring myself to hate it, but there’s a reason it’s the black sheep of the trilogy. I have similar fond memories of The Lost World, and though I revisit it far less often I do think it’s a pretty good sequel. Watching it as an adult for the 65 millionth time, I can still feel remnants of the true awe and terror it inspired in my childhood. It’s one of those rare action-heavy science fiction films in which the writing, the performances, and the special effects are all near-perfect. I think it’s pretty much accepted by most that Jurassic Park is loads better than the franchise it hatched. And, for the first time in my life, I’m not all that excited to return to the world of InGen and Isla Nublar. Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom just hit theaters. And since, I guess, my Hereditary post set a bit of a precedent for talking/writing about movies here, I’ll address the Triceratops in the room.
It was largely a waste of time and energy, interesting only to a small niche audience who were quick to correct any factual errors (for which I was grateful, don’t get me wrong, but it only made the whole endeavor seem more pointless even if the world does need a new encyclopedia of dinosaur-related films, literature, video games, etc., I don’t currently have the credentials, the resources, or the patience to write it).īut, even though the blog is defunct, I still want to talk/write about dinosaurs and dinosaur pop culture. I’d read what others had written about dinosaur films and was basically just regurgitating it online with some personal anecdotes and opinions thrown in here and there. Ian Malcolm, that I was standing on the shoulders of those who’d come before and not really saying anything new. I only stopped updating it because I realized, to paraphrase Dr. Last year I even maintained a short-lived blog under that name (from which, I’ll admit, I’m cannibalizing a bit for this post). Neither of us is sure what that other movie might have been, but I’ll always be grateful we didn’t see it.įrom then on, I was The Dinosaur Kid. She claims she hadn’t seen the trailer and had originally intended to take me to another, more age-appropriate movie that had sold out. In the summer of 1993, some six months before my second birthday, my mom took me to see it in the theater. Jurassic Park was my first exposure to dinosaurs, and remains my all-time favorite film.
“The park is gone.” Truer words were never spoken.