Jurassic World - Discussion and Grading

[JD]

Loved it; B+, nits and plot weirdness and all.

And while the action was of course tons of fun, I enjoyed the glimpses of the park working well almost as much; the petting zoo in particular was awesome. I know I don't speak for the common moviegoer here, but I'd definitely pay full price for a well-made Before Sunrise-style flick in which two strangers meet and fall in love over the course of a peaceful, normal weekend at the Park, giving us even more leisurely tours of the attractions as they banter along. Maybe towards the end such a movie could replay the JW disaster from their perspective, as in they survive the pterodactyl attack and then have to face fear and boredom in the overcrowded shelter with everyone else, but without keeping them in the thick of the action unnecessarily.

Because otherwise, I too don't really see where further sequels can go from here. Staying on Isla Nublar or Sorna would be too repetitive, but take dinos off the island and modern weaponry would make short work of them all. JW succeeds due to several great ideas - the Park is open and functional, hybrid dinos, and sheer nostalgia - but those factors really only work once.

'Course, Conan Arthur Doyle's The Lost World novel could definitely use another go...

I've been assuming they would go somewhere with the fact that the InGen soldiers got away with all of the material from the lab. Maybe they set up some kind of breeding facility or something and Owen and Claire somehow end up there.

 

[Turtletrekker]

Sequel set for 2018. Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard are both set to return.

 

[Gaith]

Corporations... find a way.​

 

[bigdaddy]

Sequel set for 2018. Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard are both set to return.

Chris Pratt is under contract for 38 Jurassic World movies.

It's clear that there are US Military dinosaurs being made. I thought they had a basic idea for three movies. I'm hoping one of them ends in a very Plant of the Apes ending.

 

[BeatleJWOL]

I'm hoping one of them ends in a very Plant of the Apes ending.

The radio said "No, Owen. You are the dinosaurs"
And then Owen was a bird.

 

[Dream]

Sequel set for 2018. Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard are both set to return.

Of course there would be a sequel. Let's hope they learned from the mistakes of TLW and JP3, and we get another worthy sequel like JW!

I don't hate TLW or JP3, but they could have been much better.

How would you guys rank the JP films?

My list:

JP
JW
JP3
TLW

 

[Mr Light]

JW > JP > LW > 3

JW just really jazzed me in all the nostalgia / crazy action spots. And it was a working populated theme park, which is one of my great loves.

I just rewatched them all again, and LW is a surprisingly good movie with many amazingly memorable dino sequences. 3 is the one that I just feel is completely pedestrian and unremarkable.

 

[Trekker4747]

Jurassic Park
Jurassic World
Jurassic Park 3
Jurassic Park: The Lost World

Watching all of them recently, JP3 just seemed to "click" a bit better. It still had stupid plot elements and stuff in it but, I dunno, it didn't have the absurd T-Rex in San Diego sequence.

 

[Dream]

I have big problems with TLW.

Malcom's girlfriend and Vince Vaughn are terrible and get people around them killed with their stupidity.

The daughter was pointless and didn't need to be there.

The T-Rex in San Diego finale still makes me faceplam.

TLW was just unnecessarily too long. JP3 was a breezy monster movie being 30 minutes shorter in comparison.

 

[bigdaddy]

JW > JP > LW > 3

JW just really jazzed me in all the nostalgia / crazy action spots. And it was a working populated theme park, which is one of my great loves.

I just rewatched them all again, and LW is a surprisingly good movie with many amazingly memorable dino sequences. 3 is the one that I just feel is completely pedestrian and unremarkable.

My rating would be...
Jurassic World
Jurassic Park

The other two are hard to say. LW is a horrible movie overall, it's just garbage. People are stupid, there is a random black teenager, people are stupid, dinosaur on the mainland is even a worse idea than making a park full of man eating monsters. But there are some beautiful dinosaur parts.

JP3 was just useless, and has a very odd arupt ending, but it moves right along at a decent clip. Just not enough people getting eaten and is useless. It's like it was TV or direct to DVD movie of Jurassic Park. But I think I like it better than 2 overall.

 

[Dream]

JP3 was just useless, and has a very odd arupt ending, but it moves right along at a decent clip. Just not enough people getting eaten and is useless. It's like it was TV or direct to DVD movie of Jurassic Park. But I think I like it better than 2 overall.

I think JP3 manages to keep away from being TV movie with its movie effects and Sam Neill being there. One thing it had going for it was that the raptors had bigger roles.

The raptors barely had more than a cameo in TLW. That moment when the gymnastic girl killed one after doing a fancy move was shark jumping bad.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

JP > JW = TLW > JPIII

You can't beat Jurassic Park. Jurassic World was really fun and besides a couple of dodgy effects, I really enjoyed myself. I also really enjoy The Lost World. I love they completely skip over the wonder and amazement of the first movie and just have people getting mauled, stomped on and eaten for two hours. I find myself listening to the Lost World score (especially The Lost World and Malcolm's Journey tracks) more than the original score (which I also love). Plus, ahhhhm.... it, uh, has uh uh, Jeff Goldblum. And Jeff Goldblum automatically brings any movie up one letter grade

Jurassic Park III I just have no desire to rewatch. Not even the great Dr. Alan Grant himself, Sam Neill, can save this gargantuan dung heap. The effects look like total shit, the Spinosaur vs. T-Rex fight still angers me to this day, and Tea Leoni's screaming makes me want to gouge my ear drums out.

That having been said, I'm really interested in seeing what they do with Jurassic World 2. Do they set it on Isla Nublar? Go back to Isla Sorna? Do we get to see a military movie with velociraptors? I'll be among the first in line to find out!

 

[Goji]

The original Jurassic Park is a classic and the best in the series by a wide margin. The three sequels are roughly interchangeable in quality in my view, each with things I like and things I dislike about them. I don't hold a negative view of any of them overall.

Since I was very young when the original came out (though I did manage to catch it in theaters. It was the first non-animated/kids movie I did see in theaters, at the age of 6) I have more nostalgia for The Lost World and Jurassic Park III since I was a bit older then and remember more of the experience seeing them in theaters with friends and family.

 

[Mr Light]

I think the next big story for them to do is dinosaurs amok on the mainland, the ending of Lost World writ large.

While Lost World suffers for only bringing back Malcolm as a main character, there are so many amazing edge of seat sequences in it. The InGen people capturing dinos. The T-Rexes attacking the trailer. The trailer hanging off the cliff. The raptors in the high grass. The raptors in the compound (yeah, the gymnast bars was incredibly stupid). The T-Rex in San Diego just made me completely geek out.

 

[Enterprise is Great]

I don't hate any of these movies they're all pretty good but some are better than others.

I'd rank them Park > World > The Lost World > JP3

 

[DWF]

The biggest problem I think with Lost World is that it's pretty fulled up with stereotypes instead of solid characters. and it took awhile but I have to wonder what happened to Vince Vaughn's character, after they're rescued from the island he just disappears from the movie with no explaination. Still JW is the best since the original.

 

[Trekker4747]

To be fair, JP had stock stereotype characters too.

Nerdy "hacker" girl.
Guy who doesn't want to have kids.
Grandfatherly Philanthropist
Weaselly Lawyer
Young woman trying to convince her SO to want kids.
Dino Ubergeek Kid.
Smarmy Intellectual Jackass.
Fat, Slovenly, Computer Expert.
Hard-Nosed Australian Hunter/Game Warden.

There's cliches all over the first movie.

 

[Grendelsbayne]

For me it's JP > JP3 > JW > LW, for reasons already stated farther upthread. Basically, JP3 is just a monster movie, but it's a fun monster movie which is fully upfront about not trying to be anything more. Plus, Sam Neill is great. JW, on the other hand, is a generic monster movie that keeps trying to pretend to be something more and has no really engaging characters. LW, of course, had the same problems times 10 (although Pete Postelthwaite, or however you spell his name, was fairly interesting), plus some of the laziest editing I've seen.

 

[DWF]

To be fair, JP had stock stereotype characters too.

Nerdy "hacker" girl.
Guy who doesn't want to have kids.
Grandfatherly Philanthropist
Weaselly Lawyer
Young woman trying to convince her SO to want kids.
Dino Ubergeek Kid.
Smarmy Intellectual Jackass.
Fat, Slovenly, Computer Expert.
Hard-Nosed Australian Hunter/Game Warden.

There's cliches all over the first movie.

But really except for Wayne Knight we cared about the characters and they all pretty knew the danger they were in. Hammond wasn't much of a philanthropist til the end of the movie. In The Lost World they pretty much threw thmeselves into the danger.

 

[fireproof78]

For me it's JP > JP3 > JW > LW, for reasons already stated farther upthread. Basically, JP3 is just a monster movie, but it's a fun monster movie which is fully upfront about not trying to be anything more. Plus, Sam Neill is great. JW, on the other hand, is a generic monster movie that keeps trying to pretend to be something more and has no really engaging characters. LW, of course, had the same problems times 10 (although Pete Postelthwaite, or however you spell his name, was fairly interesting), plus some of the laziest editing I've seen.

I really wish that Pete Postlethwaite had more of a coda and send off than retiring from the "company of death." His character was probably the most interesting in LW in terms of arc, and development.

Sam Neil, in my opinion, saves JPIII from being generic. That and the raptors