Film Review: ‘Jurassic World’ follows familiar formula
“Jurassic World”? Perhaps there was some fear that a mere park might not meet all your basic Jurassic needs. How else to justify the making of an entire world?
“Jurassic World” — a semi-reboot of Steven Spielberg’s 1993 “Jurassic Park” and its two sequels (1997, 2001) — implies a vast expansion of something: the size of the habitat or maybe the size of the creatures themselves. (The size of the budget, for sure.) As it turns out, the expansions barely have an effect on the film’s thrills.
Spoiler alert: The following review reveals several plot points.
In the world of “World,” it’s a decade or two since the unfortunate events of the original trilogy, which are occasionally referenced, usually in statements about old man Hammond (Richard Attenborough) and his hubris and how “differently” we’re handling it. Oh no, no hubris for us.
The island is now a full-fledged dinosaur theme park, with all kinds of up-to-date security devices and procedures that will, of course, break or be ignored or be sabotaged.
Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) is a high-level, all-business functionary at Jurassic World. Progressive role model? Or stereotype of tough, ambitious women as snippy and cold? (You decide.) Her sister’s two kids — Gray (Ty Simpkins) and Zach (Nick Robinson) — are visiting the park, but she can’t find the time to do anything with them, placing them instead under the somewhat distracted wing of a minion.
Claire has a tense mutual attraction with Owen (Chris Pratt), the park’s superduper ethical animal handler; he sees the creatures as individuals and souls, she sees them as cash cows. Owen is the one who’s always warning Claire and her bosses that their priorities will eventually lead to disaster.
They don’t have to wait long. The genetic engineering team led by Dr. Wu (B.D. Wong) has been splicing little bits of this and that into T. Rex DNA to create a dino that’s even bigger and scarier. But it turns out that this slapdash recipe also gives it several additional abilities, the greatest (meaning “worst”) of which is highly enhanced intelligence.
T. UberRex escapes and all hell breaks loose. There are a few thousand park guests now trapped on an island being overrun by stomping, chomping prehistoric beasts (including an enhanced stomping, chomping prehistoric beast).
What follows may differ in details from its predecessors, but it’s basically a retread of the same shtick — which means that the new film plays a whole lot better if you’ve never seen the originals. The filmmakers claim that this one’s different in many ways. For instance, these dinosaurs are genetically modified, as opposed to whatever the old dinosaurs were. This is a change with no meaning for the audience. It’s a bit like, say, remaking “Eastern Promises” scene by scene and then saying, “Oh, no. This is totally different: its bad guys were Russian mobsters, ours are Bulgarian mobsters. Whole different thing!”
Just because the beasts are bigger and the CGI may be better, there’s no real change for the viewer. And, truth be told, on all storytelling grounds, the first “Jurassic Park” was a much better film. This one has minimal humor — where’s Jeff Goldblum when you need him? — and the human emotions seem utterly by the book. The dialogue in the opening scenes (between Gray, Zach, and their parents) is hack to the point of cringeworthy.
The director here is Colin Trevorrow, whose only previous feature was the low-budget “Safety Not Guaranteed,” which I found totally charming. I’m always pleased to see a big studio take a chance on a young indie director like Trevorrow, but the requirements of a blockbuster production seem to have overwhelmed his best qualities.
If you’ve seen the original “Jurassic Park,” there’s not much to be gotten from this one. If you haven’t, this one may please you.
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ANDY KLEIN is the film critic for Marquee. He can also be heard on “FilmWeek” on KPCC-FM (89.3).