Jurassic World review

Steven Spielberg’s “Jurassic Park” is a monument in populist filmmaking, executed by a guy who’s made a few of those in his career. Released in 1993, it was one of the first landmarks of computer animation and one of the last in robotic puppetry, and on both accounts it still looks more convincing than almost anything before or after it's release. It might not be the most thematically heavy or ‘important’ movie that Spielberg ever made—it’s easy to forget that “Schindler’s List” came out the same year, winning best picture—but it may very well be the most satisfying and tightly constructed effects movie within his catalog.

The damn thing came out 22 years ago and it still holds up! In fact, it’s so good that no amount of mediocre or unnecessary sequels has seemed to damage its reputation, which is a relief since “Jurassic World” is the worst and certainly most expensive offender.

While “Jurassic Park” was adapted from a slab of airport fiction by writer Michael Crichton, “Jurassic World” just seems to be an adaption of “Jurassic Park.” In the first film Sam Neil was forced to deal with his fear of raising children by having to save the lives of the park owner’s grandchildren. Here, Bryce Dallas Howard plays Claire, an aloof, child-phobic careerist, working for a now rebooted and revamped park that’s totally open to the public. She’s then forced to deal with her priorities when one of the genetically-enhanced super-dinos escapes from its enclosure with her neglected nephews (Nick Robertson, Ty Simpkin) lost in the park. Chris Pratt plays Owen, a big-hearted, hard-headed Velociraptor trainer who volunteers to help Claire find the kids before they’re turned into lunch. Pratt’s doing his best to choke down some exceedingly bad dialogue, with his tongue firmly pressed against his cheek, but it’s hard to ignore that his paper-thin character is essentially a combination of Jeff Goldblum’s flirty, rock-star scientist character Ian Malcolm and the somewhat underwritten Australian raptor specialist from the first film.

These similarities and call-backs are played all throughout the movie in way that feels less like loving homage and more like a shrewdly devised appeal to nostalgia, and it's a serious problem when a movie spends more time on fan service than it does telling its own story. Jake Johnson playing  a handsome but useless nerd wearing the old logo on his T-Shirt in the park’s control room is a reasonable wink, but the complete restaging of the first's film's rainy Jeep scene, with the new kids now attacked in a Plexiglas, motorized ball, comes off as desperate and irritating. these echos go on and on. Instead of slowing down the plot to inspect a sick triceratops we now have an injured (fake looking) longneck of some sort; Vincent D'onofrio plays the new greedy industrialist who’s looking to exploit the dinosaurs, and we’re even given another chaos-theory speech.

Making matters worse, the film is constantly alluding to its own themes by employing the most on-the-nose references, where characters actually ask out-loud why kids these days can’t be entertained by regular, cataloged dinosaurs. Part of the plot deals with corporations that engineer their own breeds of designer dinosaurs so that they can own a piece of park though sponsorship, and the film has the gall to portray this as soulless cynicism while bombarding us with vulgar product placement--never mind the fact that the movie itself was made by a studio owned by a massive media corporation (NBC/Universal).

It could be argued that the film’s subtext was supposed to be read as cleverly-coded commentary on the studio system by an indie filmmaker (“Safety Not Guaranteed” director Colin Trevorrow),  giving the middle finger to the ‘man’ from within, if it weren’t so bloody obvious, hypocritical and trite in it's execution.

The best moments of “Jurassic World” are the ones that require no attachment to the characters--as they barely exist—and instead lean on the campy joy of mid-level monster animation. When pterodactyls are released from their aviary and start to swarm on crowds of tourists, the movie almost resembles the no-plot-no-consequence joy of Syfy Channel mock-busters like “Birdemic” and “Sharknado.” At its worst, it’s lazily written, blandly acted, tonally confused, and achingly mercenary.

Grade - D+

Originally Published in the idaho State Journal/May-2015