Jurassic Park

No unauthorised breeding at Jurassic Park.

Director: Steven Spielberg
Writers: Michael Crichton (Novel & Screenplay)
               David Koepp (Screenplay)
Runtime: 2hrs 7minutes


Plot: Dinosaurs are real, protect your loved ones. Lawyers suck and Sam Jackson doesn't swear. I really don't know of anyone who doesn't know the plot to this but a guy builds a theme park centred around cloned, dangerous dinosaurs but needs outside opinions so he can continue to get funding for the place. As you can guess, shit goes down.

Shit man, how have I never watched this the whole way through? I mean I heard that the effects were amazing but I thought they probably look a bit crap considering this came out in '93 but what the hell do I know. These effects are still so amazing. I can't get over how good they are. I really think this film was worth the 2 hours it took from my life and I definitely respect the fact that it doesn't feel like it's taking 2 hours from you. I really can't wait to watch the rest of these if this is the high bar that's been set.

Let's get into the bad stuff first to get it out of the way. Hammond (Richard Attenborough). Hammond is such a piece of shit. How? He uses his grandchildren as some sort of test audience which I suppose is fine if he was 100% confident in this project which he seems to be but at the same time, his park is being investigated before it's even open. That should be a little bit of a red flag. As you know, shit happens and his grandchildren are put in danger. What does Hammond do? Sends a guy out in a jeep to get them back. The jeep goes out, gets Jeff Goldblum and comes back without the grandkids. This should make someone go out of their mind with worry and what does Hammond do? Have a solo candlelit dinner and have a conversation about his flea circus. Not go out and risk his life for his grandkids, have a discussion about a damn flea circus. This guy's a dick, why do people say that he's a nice guy? Is it because it was Richard Attenborough? I don't know, I didn't like this character.

The writing is a little bit...how do I put it? Stupid? Yeah, the writing can sometimes be a little bit stupid. By sometimes, I mean the occasional line, I think everyone gets a stupid line in this but I have a few favourite stand out stupid lines. The first comes from the King of whispering and mumbling and uhm-ing; Jeff Goldblum. He's in the electric car approaching the gates to the park, he's already been given all the information and clues he needs to know there are dinosaurs here and what does he say? Quote: "What have they got in there? King Kong?" I'm sure this was meant to be a funny line, probably meant to come out as sarcastic but it didn't come out that way. My initial reaction to that line was "fuck have you been doing this whole time?" Honestly half the time Goldblum was talking I just tuned out. I don't know why maybe it's because I just don't like his voice or his speech pattern or whatever but you could not pay me to pay attention to him in this film.

Another stupid line comes from Dr Grant (Sam Neill) after the first T-Rex incident (one of the coolest fucking things I've ever seen in my entire life). Tim (Joseph Mazzello) is stuck in the Jeep which was launched into a tree. Grant climbs the tree to get Tim out and asks Quote: "Are you ok?" Now I get why he's asking this, don't get me wrong on that. He's making sure there's no severe damage done to the child's body, the thing is, I just find it a bit stupid to ask someone who has gone through such a scarring near death experience to ask if they're ok. It's not like little Tim is gonna come back at him like "Yeah man I'm great, almost got eaten by an extinct creature that my grandfather brought back to life knowing that this was such a fucking dangerous predator, then I almost got flattened by a car but aye, I'm alright, wanna go grab a pint and wait for all this to blow over?" Like, it's just a bit stupid.

The last stupid line comes from Tim. Grant is telling the children that the (I think) Brachiosaurus is just like a big cow. Tim says Quote: "I like cows". Good for you kid. Glad you got that off your chest. What's even better about this line is that it sounds like it was edited in later while they were putting the scene together. It's just funny.

Finally, for negative points, Tim should be dead. He was electrocuted and flung off of this electric fence that should have a high enough voltage to keep extinct, smart predators from escaping and maybe even preventing them from wanting to escape. This child should be dead. End of. He got fucked so badly. I'm amazed this kid survived.

Ok, I'm done complaining, let's get to the good stuff. The CGI. This is where effects look good, it's used sparingly and even though you can tell in some places like when the T-Rex is spinning the upside-down Jeep, but the majority of the time I couldn't even tell when it was a computer effect. A lot of effort clearly went into making this look as real as possible and it pays off. Near enough every effect blends together to create something so believable that apparently, people in the filmmaking business don't seem to want to do anymore because just doing CGI is a lot cheaper and easier to do than craft animatronics and puppets which I understand but...maybe sometimes that would be nice? At least use a couple of practical effects somewhere rather than just CG over everything.

The dinosaurs are great, they look great, especially the raptors. Where the hell am I gonna get one of those things? They're so fucking cute, I mean yeah they're dangerous predators and incredible hunters but at the same time...they're so damn cute and I want to hold one. The T-Rex has her moments too. I say moments, she pretty much just steals the movie and makes everything at least 50x more awesome. She is the best thing in this film. Fuck the people, fuck the story arcs, fuck whatever argument Goldblum makes against the park, fuck everything. She. Is. This. Movie.

Another thing I loved is the reactions of the people when they first see these things. They're just in complete shock and awe. They're amazed at the sight before them, these extinct creatures that they've studied their entire lives. They love these things and honestly, what would you do if you saw these things alive and in front of your face? Damn. And the fact that you don't even see these things until about halfway through the movie which is pretty great considering that even the marketing for the film wouldn't show the creatures. Tension building at its finest.

I'm really trying to think of other things in this that aren't dinosaur related but...I really can't. They're the best thing and I won't hear a word against those babies. They're precious. Anyway, I think that's it for today, peace out guys.

This is just my opinion and if you disagree then that's great, I'm open to discussion and I'm always interested to hear how you feel about this film. This is also a critique which is considered "Fair Use" under the Copyright Act 1976. If you like this film then go and support its creators by buying the DVD or Bluray.