Jurassic World: A Review

All right, let's just acknowledge the obvious right off the bat. It's impossible to judge Jurassic World without in some way comparing it to it's predecessor, Stephen Spielberg's original Jurassic Park from 1993. 20 years on, it's clear that Spielberg's film is a classic that's earned its place in our collective culture with its groundbreaking special effects, memorable lines and performances, intelligent underlying themes, and some of composer John Williams' best music. Bringing up the original film would be necessary enough if Jurassic World were just another sequel, of which there are two already, but it's unavoidable when the film reaches back to that first one for many of its own thematic and story ideas. Because they basically just made Jurassic Park, but without any of the subtlety that made it a classic.

We'll get into how that works, but first here's our set-up. It's 20 years on since John Hammond's disastrous first attempt at a dinosaur theme park, but since his death his scientists and company have made good on his dream and built a functioning resort called Jurassic World. Attendance has been dropping below what the company wants, so park supervisor Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard) has proposed an unorthodox plan. Instead of just resurrecting old dinosaurs, they'll combine the DNA of several to create a brand-new hybrid dinosaur. And because the predators like the T. Rex and the raptors draw the biggest crowd, that's the DNA they'll use. Animal keeper Owen (Chris Pratt), who trains the raptors among other things, understandably thinks this a bad idea, especially when he sees that the conditions this new dino, named Indominus Rex, will be living in are completely wrong for an animal like the Indominus. He's immediately proven right as the Indominus escapes its corral and shows itself to be far more intelligent and far more dangerous than anyone predicted, going on a rampage that sends the entire park into chaos. So with control being lost all over, it's up to Claire, Owen, and his raptors to hunt down the Indominus before it can reach the area filled with guests and all the other dinosaurs can escape as well.

Owen (Chris Pratt) calming down his raptor squad

I'll commend Jurassic World for attempting to do more with the ideas and themes of the original film than either of the sequels, but the execution is highly flawed. It brings up the same issues of ethical science, illusion of man's control over nature, and animal husbandry that informed so much of the original but instead of conveying them through subtle character interactions and good filmmaking it chooses to have the characters blurt them out at each other with dialogue. Granted it's still got more going on beneath the hood than many other sequel blockbusters of its like, but does it in a way that's so thuddingly obvious that it's like the film is worried the audience isn't going to get the point of its story. That being said, I'm glad it continued Jurassic Park's shifting of blame from hubristic scientists, as is common in sci-fi stories like this, onto the capitalists and profit-seekers who only want to make money from these amazing technologies and animals without accepting any of the responsibility that comes with them. It's crystal clear that the entire reason the Indominus is as deadly and dangerous as it is, is because the company in charge of the park wanted something  big and scary as fast and cheap as possible. In fact, there's a scene where the company head goes to ream out the park's lead scientist for creating the Indominus with your standard mad scientist argument and the scientist basically says, "I just did what you asked me to do. I knew this was a dangerous animal, I presumed you did as well." It's another symptom of the lack of subtlety, but it's still a scene I enjoyed for how it played with genre conventions.

The Indominus Rex, whose look was thankfully not
given away by the trailer.

Jurassic World's biggest flaw is it's story in fact. The plot is a little too messy for it's own good. While the main plot of the rampaging Indominus and Claire & Owen trying to stop it is strong and engaging enough to build a film around, there's something like a dozen little side-plots branching off of it that don't really pay off, go anywhere, or might just be helping set up a sequel. For instance, Claire is supposed to be chaperoning her nephews on a luxury vacation because their parents are getting divorced, so some scenes are devoted to both her passing them off onto her assistant because she's too busy and how that divorce is affecting the two boys. But neither of these really have any effect on the plot besides giving Claire a reason to be extra-concerned when the Indominus escapes into the general park area and her nephews are right in its path. Not helping in that regard is how much of a rush the film is in. Unlike the original film; which took its time, built things up to payoff later, gave the audience time to breathe and knew when to give them a hit of awe, once the Indominus Rex escapes the film steps on the gas and barely ever lets up. Not only does this make the barely sketched side-characters and subplots fight with each other for focus, it also kind of undermines the tension. Like when it falls into the trap of tell, don't show for the Indominus. Sure, telling the audience about how scary the dinosaur is can create expectation that it admittedly does show later. But it's lazy and it only works to a degree. It would been more effective if the filmmakers told us about how scary it was and showed it trying to escape. That way they could do a later scene where the Indominus tries to escape again, but succeeds because it learned from how its last attempt fails. This would show how intelligent and cunning the Indominus actually is without having to give a single line of dialogue and would create more tension with the audience because we would have seen the Indominus act firsthand.

A Mosasaur, metaphorically eating
blockbuster escalation.

Still, the film does do a few things right that elevate its quality. One thing I appreciated, and another element lifted from the original film, is how all the major characters have understandable motivations and when they inevitably clash none of their positions is presented as inherently superior. Even the company head is given enough shades of character to not be a stereotype and Vincent D'Onofrio, who is kind of a villain interested in Owen's raptors for their military applications, raises several reasonable points about the park's operations and while he is something of a stock villain does seem genuinely concerned about stopping the Indominus even though he does have an ulterior motive for doing so. And the central plot about Chris Pratt and his raptor squad hunting the Indominus and the subsequent dino rampage through a fully functioning theme park is enjoyably goofy in a monster-movie kind of way. The special effects bringing the dinosaurs to life is still on point, even if there is a heavy reliance on CGI over puppets, and thank the gods that there's a successful 21st Century blockbuster that uses sets and locations instead of just filling giant green-screen rooms. Those little bits of tangibility help so much in grounding the fantasy and making what we the audience see feel real.

And it must be said, for those of us who had Jurassic Park as a formative film it's hard not to get a little misty-eyed when that familiar John Williams music flares up over footage of dinosaurs. Thankfully, shout-outs like this to the original film are where the film does show some subtlety. It doesn't feel the need to shove them in your face or stop the film for bouts of nostalgic masturbation. It's mostly a few recreations of famous shots, returns to familiar locations, and more John Williams music. They're icing on the cake, something special for fans to pick up on but not essential to the overall product.

In the end, Jurassic World is a perfectly serviceable B-Movie that's awkwardly trying to be an A-Movie. It plays with bigger ideas and themes but can't seem to fit them in coherently with its goofy mutant dinosaur monster plot. Its characters are much the same way but at least have enough going on to rise to two-dimensional status. Definitely falls short of the original, but is still better than either of the other sequels.

Final Score: 3/5