Subject: REVIEW: JURASSIC PARK

From: [email-masked] (Eric Walker)
Date: 15 Jun 93 14:30:31 GMT

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			       JURASSIC PARK
		       A film review by Eric Walker
			Copyright 1993 Eric Walker

     My ears are still ringing and my head is still swimming from the
experience I had last night: I saw Steven Spielberg's JURASSIC PARK.
The movie of the year, the ads call it, with dinosaurs so life-like you
won't believe they're real.  There hasn't been this much hype for a
movie since 1989's BATMAN, and expectations have been high that we
would finally see a return to the old Spielberg magic that's been
missing since the days of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK and E.T.  The
question to ask, therefore, is "does the movie live up to the hype?"

     Yes, it does.  The movie isn't perfect, but it delivers what the
audience wants to see, and more.  You want dinosaurs?  There has never
been anything on the screen quite like the dinosaurs we see in JURASSIC
PARK.  The movie is teeming with them, and they're every bit as scary
as we want to be, and then some.  The dinosaurs take us on a thrilling,
terrifying roller-coaster ride from the first frame to the last.  I
haven't felt this wrung-out by a movie since I saw ALIENS in 1986;
there's an intensity to this film that grabs us and holds us on the
edge of our seats, carrying over any weaknesses in plot and
characterization.  In fact, the dinosaurs outshine the human cast,
typifying a weakness inherent in all of Spielberg's movies.

     I could go on and on about those dinosaurs.  This movie has the
special effects Oscar in the bag, especially where the Tyrannosaurus
Rex is concerned.  The only time it seems as though we're looking at
animatronics and not at live lizards is when the dinosaurs aren't
moving (which isn't often).  The brachiosaurs tower over the tops of
hundred-foot-tall trees, and the fearsome velociraptors (which like to
hunt in packs) look like the came from our darkest nightmares.  You
absolutely will not believe your eyes.

     In fact, the dinosaurs are so realistic that parents with young
children may want to seriously consider the movie's PG-13 rating before
taking their kids to the theatre.  Spielberg knows how to frighten an
audience without blood; in fact, there's less blood and gore in this
movie than there was in JAWS.  There are scares aplenty, though, and
they all come from suspense and the sheer presence of the T-rex as it
thunders across the screen, crushing everything in sight in pursuit of
his meals - both dinosaurs and humans.  His assault on a party of
Jurassic Park sightseers may be the most intensely frightening scene
Spielberg has ever filmed.  It's a far cry from Barney.  The film pulls
out all stops to wring suspense out of the dinosaurs, and at this it
succeeds grandly.

     The human actors and actresses struggle to compete with these
awesome titans, but let's be honest: Spielberg could have cast anyone
in these roles and gotten the same results.  After the troubles with
HOOK, in which casting problems and demands (as well as outrageous
salaries) struck a heavy blow to its success, Spielberg has apparently
gone back to using actors and actresses less in demand, thus
guaranteeing that he would have the final say in every stage of
production.  (Laura Dern has commented that when it comes to control of
his movies, Spielberg is more obsessive than David Lynch.)  This means
the dinosaurs take the center stage, and no attempt is made to outshine
them.

    The story is essentially an update of the classic monster movies
of the 1950s, those films that state that There Are Things Man Was Not
Meant To Know.  In the case of this movie, it's the power of creation,
as Man (specifically, a billionaire named John Hammond, played by
Richard Attenborough) has taken dinosaur DNA from the blood of
mosquitoes encased in amber for millions of years and used it to grow
brand-new, living reptiles.  Hammond wants to put these dinosaurs in
a theme park on an island off the coast of Costa Rica and display them
for the world to see, but he finds that living beings can't be
controlled as easily as the robotic creations of Disneyland.

     That tells us all we need to know about the story.  In terms of
thrills and excitement, it lives up to its expectations and more - but
there are serious flaws in terms of characterization and plot
development.  The humans are there simply to be gobbled up and to run
away from dinosaurs.  Most of the people seeing this movie aren't even
going to remember their names by the time the final credits roll;
there's no Chief Brody or Lacombe or Elliot here.  Sam Neill and Laura
Dern put in passable performances as the pair of archaeologists who
squabble about whether or not to raise a family.  He doesn't want kids,
and she does - but of course there's a heart of gold underneath his
supposedly gruff exterior, and when the chips are down he plays the
father figure, risking his life to protect the kids tagging along with
them.

     Richard Attenborough is John Hammond, the billionaire who's
brought back the dinosaurs, cloning them from dinosaur DNA taken from
fossilized mosquitoes.  Unlike his obsessed opportunist character in
the novel, he's a kindly grandfather figure who wants nothing more
than to impress the world with his creation, making his dinosaurs
available for all to see.  This is why he built Jurassic Park - he's a
modern-day Walt Disney, more interested in the care and enjoyment of
his guests than he is with making money.

     Then there's Malcolm, a modern-day update of the scientist
warning against tampering with nature.  He quotes the Chaos Theory (a
new branch of mathematics that governs probability and predicting the
unpredictable), and of course we know he's right when he says that
"life can't be controlled" - because in this type of movie, it never
is.  Things go wrong, and before anyone knows what's happening
Jurassic Park is out of control and dinosaurs are moving this way and
that, munching on the unfortunate souls who get in their way.

     The cause of these problems can be traced back to human greed as
much as the unpredictability of Nature.  There's an interesting theme
of greed and its consequences here that's especially appropriate when
one sees how much of a theme park the movie itself is.  We've all
heard the JURASSIC PARK hype campaign; the merchandise is flooding the
markets; the books, T-shirts, tie-ins, and other companies jumping in
on the money-making bandwagon here in real life are ironically
parodied in the film, as we have corporate executives discussing how
much they should charge for park admission.  In one scene, John
Hammond realizes that his theme park is not going to get off the
ground, and we see several of the JURASSIC PARK products that are
actually being sold here in real life.  The merchandising campaign for
this film was planned before it ever reached the filming stage, and
Spielberg is trying to satirize it by taking us behind the scenes and
realizing how difficult it actually is to sell a theme park to the
public.  While it fails as satire, it still retains a level of irony.

     (Spielberg may be lamenting the cost of success: because this
movie cost so much to make [as did his last film, HOOK], merchandising
is an important tool for the studio to make its money back.  This
means that the theme park aspect is built right into the movie itself.
Spielberg considered saving the pirate ship from HOOK for use in a
possible theme park, but that idea was abandoned.  In addition, he had
wanted to build life-size robotic dinosaurs for this film so that they
could be used in a theme park afterwards, but that idea didn't pan out
either.  Nevertheless, we all know that a JURASSIC PARK ride is going
to show up at Universal Studios.  The movie is plugging its
merchandise as heavily as the dinosaurs themselves, but Spielberg
found a way to make fun of merchandising at the same time.)

     But the problems in the story make the film less of an
achievement than CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND or JAWS, both of
which are paid homage in this film.  When the characters see dinosaurs
for the first time, Spielberg is trying to get the "sense of wonder"
that he achieved so magnificently in his UFO film, but at he fails at
this.  In CLOSE ENCOUNTERS, our enjoyment came from both the UFOS and
the reactions of the humans to beings from outer space, but that's not
the case here.  The dinosaurs *are* amazing and we gasp in awe when we
see them, but our excitement comes entirely from the special effects
and not from the characters, because they're so poorly developed.

     A subplot involving sick dinosaurs is also worth mentioning.  I
was hoping that this aspect would be further developed, but it seems
little more than a red herring.  This ties into the ending of the
film, which is too abrupt to be truly satisfying.  One extended
sequence of the characters talking about the sick dinosaurs and their
possible life expectancy would have helped; I think that it could have
been a tribute to WAR OF THE WORLDS, and it would have been a more
satisfying conclusion.

     But as serious as these flaws are, they don't subtract from the
excitement we feel when the film kicks into high gear.  It bogs down
in a couple of places during the first hour, but once the machines
begin to fail and the dinosaurs are on the loose, the film turns into
one of the most exciting, terrifying monster movies ever filmed.
Spielberg even tops his own JAWS for excitement here, as we find
ourselves gripping the seats and forgetting to breathe.  My eyes were
locked to the screen for the entire second half of the film, and I was
putty in Spielberg's hands as he delivered one amazing scene after
another.  I especially love the fact that there is almost no blood in
this film.  In an age when even big-budget science fiction movies like
TOTAL RECALL rely on splatter and gore for audience entertainment,
JURASSIC PARK scares its audience without making them sick to their
stomach.

     The Tyrannosaurus Rex is a wonder to behold.  The special effects
belie themselves even in a mega-budget production like this, and if we
look hard enough we can see where the computer animation and mattes
are being used.  That's minor nit-picking, however, and anyone who
complains about the special effects is a spoiled brat who doesn't
believe in "suspension of disbelief."  But the T-rex will shut the
mouths of the most fanatical critics.  It's an awesome creation,
definitely the most realistic movie monster *ever* created.  It does
not look like the product of computers and models - it looks *real*!
You absolutely will not believe your eyes when you see it, and you'll
have an uncontrollable urge to duck when it lunges right at you.  Best
of all, T-rex is a homage to the movie monsters of old: there's one
scene where it eats a helpless victim that reminds me of the classic
THE BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS (and the great Ray Harryhausen).

     This brings up an important question for parents.  Since the film
is such a terrifying monster movie, should young children be allowed
to see it?  The answer, I think, lies with the parents themselves.
I'm not going to make a blanket statement here, because you know your
children better than I do.  There are eight-year-olds in the audience
who will eat this movie up and ask for more, but there are also
children who will consider the movie too frightening to finish.
Personally, I belong to the "give it a try" school: since there's very
little gore in the film and its terror comes from suspense rather than
actual violence, the experience of seeing a scary movie may actually
be a good one for kids.  It's similar to taking a four-year-old to see
PINOCCHIO; he'll be frightened by the experience, but he certainly
won't be traumatized for life, and years from now he'll look back on
the experience and remember it.  In the end, it's up to you.  If you
think JURASSIC PARK is too frightening for kids, don't take them.  If
you do, then let them see it.  The movie is rated PG-13 for good
reason.

     JURASSIC PARK is an unforgettable summer experience, a movie that
delivers exactly what we expect from it.  It's got a flawed story and
forgettable characters, but it also has some of the most amazing
monsters of all time.  The dinosaurs of JURASSIC PARK are a new
high-water mark in the long history of Hollywood movie monsters,
standing tall with King Kong, the Martians of WAR OF THE WORLDS, and
other fondly-remembered creatures of the past.  It's an movie well
worth paying full admission price for, as long as you realize that
you're not going to get Academy Award-winning performances or a complex
plot.  It's a far more satisfying film than the other summer
blockbusters of recent years: TERMINATOR 2, BATMAN, TOTAL RECALL, and
other flawed adventure movies.  I can't see any movie coming out in the
near future that will deliver a more satisfying good time at the
movies.  Arnold Swchwarzenegger?  Who cares?  1993 is going to be
remembered as the year we first heard the thundering footsteps of
JURASSIC PARK.

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 ~ OLX 2.1 TD ~ ** Edited For Television **