It should tell you all something that I procrastinated writing this review. I just didn’t have strong enough feelings for it to dive right in.
The fifth entry in the series finds our former park manager Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) working for a nonprofit bent on saving the dinosaurs that are left on Isla Nublar, where a volcano is set to blow any time (did no one think of this during development?). She’s offered much-needed support for a dino rescue by Eli Mills (Rafe Spall), chief of staff for John Hammond’s retconned partner, Benjamin Lockwood (James Cameron). A condition of the funding is that Claire take her ex, Owen (Chris Pratt), back to the island with her so he can do his “dino whisperer” act especially on Blue, the superintelligent velociraptor he raised and has rapport with. Needless to say, things go drastically not according to plan, and chaos ensues.
SPOILERS AHOY
Once Claire and Owen get to the island—with the guys with the guns and the ships and the cages and the cattle prods—the truth comes out: Mills has hired a quasi-military unit to gain control of eleven species of dino, including Blue, and bring them back to California for Nefarious Purposes. Claire, Owen, a techie (Justice Smith), a dino vet (Daniella Pineda), and the also-ran dinos are left to die in the volcanic eruption. Naturally, the humans find a way to get on board the departing ships, just in time. We then have the very sad image of a brachiosaurus mournfully calling out as it becomes swallowed by smoke and fire. At this point, the film stops being a disaster movie—for the rest of the time, it’s a conspiracyish thriller, and not a very smart one, at that.
Turns out that Mills has arranged an immediate auction of the dinos to the highest bidders, so they can be used as weapons. We are treated to the sight of the auctioneer (Toby Jones) taking bids while each caged dino is rolled out on an assembly line track, being electroshocked and prodded so they are angry at all times(?). At the same time, Claire, Owen, and Lockwood’s granddaughter Maisie are working to, what, free the dinos? Kill all the bidders? I don’t even know what they had planned.
In the end, some of the bidders escape with their prizes, and Our Trio is left watching the remaining dinos start to be suffocated by cyanide gas (a rare fail-safe measure, presumably). Claire makes the difficult decision to NOT release them out into the general public (good job, Claire!), and roll credits. Oh, except that Maisie then overrules Claire and flips the release lever, for mysterious reasons having to do with a completely unnecessary twist subplot. The dinos escape into the night, neatly setting up the premise for Jurassic World 3, expected out in June 2021.
Director J.A. Bayona showed that he could do both impressive disaster and powerful human interest in The Impossible (2012). Unfortunately, the only time we get the awe-inspiring shots so plentiful in the first Jurassic Park is the aquatic scenes involving the mososaurus in the deep, and even these are passed over quickly. And we don’t get the personal peril so well depicted in the original film, either, except that as usual, many of the bad guys get eaten. It’s amazing how the dinos can distiguish them.
I will say that the main duo is much easier to watch this time. Claire is no longer a damsel in distress, and she has the sensible boots to match. (There’s a pointed shot of her footwear as she arrives on the island, which I appreciated.) And Owen is much less of a dudebro this time, which is refreshing. Claire also is the only character given a true arc, with her evolution from dino activist to realizing the necessity of killing the surviving dinos.
The current IMdB rankings for all five movies have the original JP in first place (at 8.1), followed by JW (7.0), JW:FK (6.6), The Lost World: JP 2 (6.5), and JP III (5.9). Given the likely premise of the next movie, with its Sharknado aspects, I don’t have high hopes for the series. We’ll see. And please don’t include Jeff Goldblum just to include Jeff Goldblum—either give him something to do that affects the story, or let him go. Thank you.
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