Tag Archives: Ingen

Why Jurassic Park III Still Roars (for Me, Anyway)

by in Dinosaurs and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Alright, cruising right along into our second week of #JurassicJune. Last week we looked at The Lost World Jurassic Park, so it only makes sense that this week we would continue the Jurassic franchise and take a look at Jurassic Park III.

To my knowledge, there was no book guiding the story here, which many fans claim is the reason it is the ‘weakest’ of the original three movies. I’ve done exactly nothing to verify this, but I read that Crichton was brought in during the earliest days of the script’s development, but after three days of brainstorming, he had nothing, and left to let the movie make itself without his guidance.

Woah.

Whatever the film’s critical reception — many also point to the 14 year gap between titles as proof of the movie’s poor quality — I still think there is a lot to love about this film, and greatly enjoyed my most recent rewatch which was actually somewhat revelatory for me.

Let’s start with my initial impressions. I honestly can’t remember the last time I watched this film (presumably sometime in 2022 in the lead up to Jurassic World Dominion but maybe farther back), so I feel like I can genuinely call these impressions ‘initial’ though there will always be some faint rose-colored echoes of childhood experience tainting a completely objective view of the film.

In any case, my initial thoughts — unfortunately — while watching were that it looked a bit cheap compared to the previous films. In the bonus commentary, a lot of time is spent talking about how this movie was a huge step forward for CGI, and that they used much more of it in this film than any of the previous films, taking painstaking effort to make the skin and musculature of the dinosaurs sag and droop as it might in real life. Unfortunately, it seems to almost be a rule of thumb that CGI just looks worse and worse the older it gets. Ostensibly, there will be some point at which the CGI from ten years ago will not look noticeably worse than the CGI of today, however, I think we’re still a ways away from that (also this movie is now over TWENTY years old).

I wish I could say that it was just the CGI that cheapened the experience for me, but I also thought the practical effects suffered as well. The scene in which the Spinosaurus attacks Dr. Grant and crew in the airplane was essentially all practical effects, and I have to admit, the Spino just seems to move like a robot. The whole sequence feels more like you’re on a ride at Universal more than actually being attacked by a dinosaur.

Finally, I’ve never thought of this movie as a 3D experience, I don’t ever remember watching it with 3D goggles on, whether in theaters or at home. However, I notice MANY shots in the film which seemed to exist for no other reason than that the dinosaur would loom out over the audience members. I haven’t yet watched a movie in 3D and been happier for it so this also was a small strike against the film for me.

But there is still a whole lot I found myself loving about the film. First and foremost: Spinosaurus Aegyptiacus! Obviously what we know about this weird looking dinosaur has changed quite a bit since 2001; however, this version of the dinosaur is still completely captivating. Famed paleontologist, and inspiration for Alan Grant’s character, Jack Horner consulted on the film and explains (in yet another special feature video) that Spino’s skull was 8ft long and (in 2001) was considered the largest predator known. Essentially a whale that could walk around on land and swim. He mentions that they essentially equated size with ferociousness, and bam the classic “Spino vs T-Rex cliche (of which this film is the trope codifier) was born.

I see a lot of flack for this move because these two dinosaurs did not live in the same time period and would never have faced off in this way . . . To which I say, it’s still awesome, and doesn’t break the logic of the movie which is essentially that the folks at InGen didn’t care how an ecosystem would have actually worked, they just wanted to build as many cool dinosaurs as they could. In any case, Spinosaurus Aegyptiacus (whatever it happens to look like at the moment) has played a huge role in my fiction, and likely never would have been on my radar if not for this movie. So I’ll always be indebted to JPIII on that account.

Some other cool dino things I appreciated about the movie: 1) Ankylosaurus sighted! They are also becoming a fav of mine so I was happy to see them included; 2) They at least tried to put feathers on the Velociraptor. Later we’ll see MUCH more where that came from (check out Prehistoric Planet Episode 3 Freshwater for a better representation); 3) Tyrannosaurus Rex shown more as a scavenger than a hunter (interesting!).

I think this post is starting to run on a bit, so I’ll begin to wrap it up with the revelatory bit I mentioned in the beginning of the post. Since I started working in makerspaces back in 2018 (wow 7 years already!), I have half-assedly kept a sort of running list in the back of my mind of all the fiction I’ve consumed which contains a 3D printer, or some type of digital fabrication device. I had completely forgot that this movie uses one to make the velociraptor resonating chamber despite having seen tons of 3D printed resonators on Tik Tok and other places . . . I just never put it together that they actually had one in the movie.

I don’t remember watching that scene when this movie came out and thinking: “Oh I want to do stuff like that when I grow up” . . . and yet here we are . . . with JPIII having influenced my choice of career more than any of the previous two “better” movies. I guess you never can tell.

Give Jurassic Park III a Watch?

Of course! Despite its aging graphics and some other flaws in the film, Jurassic Park III still has quite a bit of wonder for any dinosaur enthusiasts, or even anyone looking for a halfway decent monster movie. I enjoyed rediscovering Spinosaurus, seeing some Ankylosaurs and of course the dreaded Velociraptors.

On a more personal note, I couldn’t believe how the ‘worst’ film of the trilogy was still clearly influential enough on my eleven year old mind to plant the 3D printing seed in my brain, which grew unconsciously over the next 17 years to result in me working with 3D printers nearly every damn day.

That’s all I have for this week. What are your thoughts on Jurassic Park III. Are you a fan? Or did it flop? Did it connect to your life in any unexpected ways? And as always, which dinosaurs did you enjoy seeing in this film? Which are your favorite? Can’t wait to talk some more about this movie! Leave your thoughts in the comments.

(Hopefully) we’ll be looking at Jurassic World next time on the blog! Happy #JurassicJune!

It’s #JurassicJune! Let’s Rewatch The Lost World Jurassic Park!

by in Dinosaurs and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

It’s June again! Which means I’ll be taking a bit of a break from my sort of scattered and chaotic approach of posting about random books, movies or games on this blog, and try to niche down a bit and focus on media which includes dinosaurs in some way shape or form. Call it a #JurassicJune if you will (it’s what I’ve been calling it the last five years).

I kicked things off last Sunday with a review of Riley Black’s The Shortest History of the Dinosaurs for #DinosaurDay and while I like to try to open the month with something non-fictional, the rest of the month need not be such a serious, or even factual endeavor. Looking down the pike, I see we have a new Jurassic World movie set to release on July 2nd. For any who have been reading this blog since Jurassic World: Dominion‘s release back in 2022, you’ll remember that I was highly skeptical that the movie closed out or ended anything, despite that being its purported purpose. Looks like I was right! Though somehow it feels about as prescient as predicting it will indeed be a horse that wins the Kentucky Derby (I’m now imagining velociraptors racing in the Kentucky Derby and I’m unsure if they would actually try to run the race, or just eat the horses). It will be interesting to see how this new film connects to previous entries, if it does at all.

In any case, since Dominion I’ve been dolling out reviews of Jurassic Franchise books and movies as feels appropriate. I managed to line up posts for the 30th anniversary of the 1st Jurassic Park film back in June of 2023 and a post for the 29th anniversary of the Lost World Jurassic Park novel back in September of 2024.

The Lost World Jurassic Park film appears to be the last movie based on an actual book by Michael Crichton, and so I should be able to move pretty quickly through the rest of the films, of which there are conveniently enough to provide a post per film during the rest of June (ending with Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom since I already covered Dominion).

So, without further ado, let’s review The Lost World Jurassic Park (the film). Hold on to your butts!

I can’t say that The Lost World has had quite the same influence on me (or the culture at large) as the original JP film. There aren’t nearly as many quotable lines (somehow I’ve experienced few occasions to shout “don’t go in the tall grass!”), and the change in orientation from theme park to a kind of safari does seem to take a bit of the wonder out of things somehow.

However, that does not mean there aren’t ANY great lines, and that there’s NO sense of wonder. And it certainly doesn’t mean that I haven’t seen this movie about a thousand times . . . that I still don’t get immense pleasure from each new watch. That this movie isn’t still just awesome.

During this most recent rewatch, hunter Roland (played by Pete Postlethwaite) stood out to me as the unassuming star of the show. He’s introduced leading Ingen’s systematic capture of various dinosaurs on the island, bouncing up and down in a Jeep struggling to pronounce the dinosaur’s names, eventually resorting to just describing them and giving them nick names of his own like “Friar Tuck” for Pachycephalosaurus and “Elvis” for the Parasaurolophus. I don’t know how this never stood out to me before. It’s hysterical.

With Ian Malcom as the film’s main character, it probably should not be surprising that the film has quite a bit more humor in general than I remember in the first film (and certainly more humor than the book), and given Malcom’s experience from that first film, a great deal more cynical when it comes to dinosaurs.

If I’m remembering correctly, compared with other movies in the franchise, The Lost World is positively subtle in its call-backs to the original film. There is obviously the Tyrannosaurus Rex footprint with trembling water, to foreshadow that favorite beastie’s appearance on screen. Dieter’s comeuppance ala Compsognathus (compy) horde seems to call back to Denis Nedry’s death from the original, but isn’t actually all that similar a scene. And Roland and Ajay’s leap from the hunting blind as a flaming jeep falls towards them is only briefly reminiscent of Tim and Grant’s car/tree scene in the original. Oh and I guess I did love the part when the T. Rex is chasing Malcom and Harding and she asks him to slow down. A nice twist from the original when Malcom is almost eaten in the jeep (“must go faster”).

These call-backs, as well as Nick’s admiration of a wall painting depicting the old park, are interesting to me in the way they set up this kind of reverence of the original movie. Hammond becomes a kind of visionary — almost hero-like — despite it being his hubris and overreach which caused so much pain and suffering. It’s a nuance I haven’t considered in previous viewings, and I’m looking forward to how it progresses through the remaining films. Jurassic Park attempting to reconcile with its own legacy.

Crichton’s novel was much more present in my mind during this viewing as well (having just read it last September). I won’t spend a ton of time analyzing the changes from book to film, but will note that they were pretty sweeping.

The obvious changes are InGen’s giant hunting operation, as well as the entire San Diego portion of the film. I guess with these massive additions to the plot it was necessary to CUT some things from the novel like an entire character, Dr. Richard Levine, as well as one of the more bizarre dinosaur scenes from the book in which two Carnotaurus are so good at camouflage as to become effectively invisible (if this sounds hilarious, go watch Invisible Raptor hahah!). We have only to wait until Jurassic World to see this idea return with the Indominus Rex.

These changes feel so foundational to each adaptation that it’s hard to really judge whether they are better or worse, they’re just different. However, I do think the movie took steps in the right direction with Sarah Harding’s character, toning back the sort of “action girl” badassery — though she can clearly still handle herself — present in the book in favor of some more nuanced characterization. It’s Malcom who ends up looking somewhat toxically old-fashioned for thinking Sarah some damsel in distress, and riding in like a “white knight” to save her when she does want or need him there.

Of course this thread gets somewhat murky when everything goes to hell and both characters require saving from various carnivorous dinos, however the whole thing feels firmly less problematic than some of Crichton’s other writing.

So Give ‘The Lost World Jurassic Park‘ a Watch?

Absolutely. If for no other reason than to get warmed up for the new movie coming out July 2nd. But if a reason IS required, I’d say that even 28 years after its original release, The Lost World Jurassic Park still has plenty to unpack and enjoy, whether it be Roland’s understated humor when describing these incredible creatures, or the thrill of another run in with Velociraptor.

This movie still has plenty left to enjoy!

That’s all I have for this week! Have you seen this one before? What’s your favorite part? What’s your least favorite? And of course, always, what’s your favorite dinosaur? In the movie or just in general.

Happy #JurassicJune! See you next time!