Jurassic World

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I saw the original Jurassic Park in the theater. It was a visceral experience where I was as terrified as those kids being chased by a T-Rex and velociraptors. I wanted to experience that with this movie and the trailer made me believe it could happen, but it failed in that aspect. It is still a pretty entertaining movie, but it retreads a good portion of the story from the first movie with a slight change in a subplot.

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The original had two kids going to visit their grandfather because their parents were going through a divorce. This version has two kids visiting their aunt because their parents are going through a divorce. Instead of a brother/sister pairing, it is two brothers this time around. The older brother mostly tries to flirt with any girl he sees in the park while his younger brother prattles on about random dinosaur facts and annoys him. Through their eyes, we do get to see the park, which is pretty cool even though some special effects can still use some work. The dinosaurs look the most real when it is dark and rainy. With too much sunshine, you know you are just staring at some CGI.

In the first movie, there is a subplot of Newman from Seinfeld (I forget his name in the movie), trying to steal dinosaur DNA to sell to an outside bidder. The subplot in this movie is Vincent D’Onofrio trying to use velociraptors as soldiers. I’m not sure how that is even close to a good idea, and he is told it is horrible, yet this is still a subplot in the movie.

I can’t help but compare the two movies since they are so similar, yet one does more with less fabulous CGI. Chris Pratt is entertaining, but Bryce Dallas Howard’s character is unrealistic. Mainly because I didn’t believe she would have been running around in high heels the entire movie. I know some woman can run around in high heels, but not through a jungle. Those heels are going to get stuck in some mud pit at some point. Beyond her high heel issue, the random pairing of her and Chris Pratt’s character as love interests made no sense besides they are two attractive people in close proximity to one another.

What I really wanted was something to entertain me, but also make me feel like the dinosaurs were going to get the people at any moment. I didn’t feel a connection with any of the people so I didn’t much care when random people were chasing after a hybrid dinosaur and being destroyed by it. The writing was corny and I got a little bored by the dinosaur fights. The director of this movie, Colin Trevorrow, needs to learn something from Spielberg.

Other random notes:

  • Since I recently rewatched Jurassic Park, I realized how much poor Timmy was terrorized in that movie by dinosaurs and also electrocuted by a fence. The kid in this movie walked out of that park with hardly a scratch on him.
  • My favorite part is when a raptor was briefly riding a t-rex (or the hybrid, can’t remember which now).
  • BD Wong does not seem to age since he looks the same in this movie as he did in Jurassic Park.
  • Maybe what this movie needed was Jeff Goldblum sitting around with his shirt open for no good reason.

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Rating: B-

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