THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
Steven Spielberg made mega hits when adapting both Jurassic Park novels by Michael Crichton. Although there were only two originally written, audiences wanted to see more dinosaurs onscreen. Since that meant more money would be made, Universal Studios did not hesitate making it a reality.
PLOT
Jurassic Park III shows 12 year old Eric Kirby go parasailing with family friend Ben Hilderbrand (Mark Harelik) near Isla Sorna, the second island of cloned dinosaurs that originate from the failed theme park that was Jurassic Park. Their fun is cut short when their boat crew get killed by unknown dinosaurs offscreen. To avoid crashing into a rock, Ben unscrews the glider from the boat and they parasail into the island. When 8 weeks go by of them being missing, Eric's divorced parents Paul and Amanda approach paleontologist Alan Grant and trick him to coming with them to the island because they believe his experience on Isla Nublar will be useful. They lie and say it is only an aerial tour, when it's actually a rescue mission. Grant only agrees to be the alleged tour guide when they claim to fund for his research. While he invites his protege Billy Brennan, the Kirbys bring mercenary associates, Udesky, Nash (Bruce A Young) and Cooper (John Diehl). Upon arrival, Nash lands the plane which confuses Grant. When he tries to convince him to do the opposite, Cooper knocks him from behind. When he wakes up, they've already landed on a landing strip and begin their search. The search gets halted when they encounter the predator Spinosaurus. Cooper gets eaten and when they attempt to fly over it, they hit the beast and crash into the forest. The Spinosaurus follows them and attempts to devour them all. All but Nash are lucky to temporarily escape. Once they avoid its conflict against a Tyrannosaurus Rex, the Kirbys explain the truth that they're looking for their son. Grant explains that he's never been on Site B before, which means that his knowledge won't be useful. Although the Kirbys want to find their son, Grant is more concerned of reaching the coast of the island to figure out how to leave. As they move forward, they do find the parasail with Ben's rotting corpse. This terrifies Amanda because this means that Eric is on his own. Once they pass through a velociraptor nest, they get chased by a male of the said species inside an iNGen compound. They do try to lose it by passing through a herbivore herd, but this results in Udesky and Grant getting separated from the others. While Udesky gets killed by the raptors, Grant finds Eric. When they hide for the night, the paleontologist shares with the boy that his parents are looking for him. By morning, both groups plan to reach the coast. As Eric moves forward with Grant, he hears his dad's satellite phone ringtone from a far. He reunites with his parents near a fence and explains that he heard the jingle, but Paul doesn't have his phone on him. He recalls lending it to Nash last. The Spinosaurus finds them again, but the ringtone is going off aloud, meaning that the phone is inside the predator. It chases them all the way down to an abandoned observatory. Grant does discover that Billy stole two raptor eggs to secure funding. He does prefer leaving them but for their sake, he keeps them rather than throwing them away. They go down the observatory, only to discover it to be an aviary for Pteranadons. One adult takes Eric as a meal for its babies. Billy rides a parasail to rescue him while Grant and the Kirbys get blocked by another adult. Based on their combined weight, they fall into the water while the Pteranadon drowns. When Eric falls in, Billy gets the parasail stuck on the cliff face. When he lands into the water as well, he gets attacked by two of them. As Paul and Alan make it to the boat, Amanda closes a fence that ends up opening without being closed all the way. The remaining group pass by a herd of herbivores at day but at night, they find the satellite phone from the feces of the Spinosaurus. They briefly encounter a Ceratosaurus, but it leaves them alone due to them being deterred in the feces. At night, Alan tries to contact his ex girlfriend Ellie Satler for help, but her son Charlie answers instead. The group gets attacked by the Spinosaurus for the last time, determined to kill them all. When Ellie calls them back, she grows worry of her friend's safety when he shares their location. They try to avoid it by staying in the boat's cage, but it tumbles the cage and puts them into the water. Paul gets out first and distracts the beast near a crane. As the others take advantage to escape as well, Grant uses a flare gun to scare it, which only worked when igniting it with the boat's fuel on the water. Paul does fall off the crane, but survives without any massive injury. When it's morning again, they get close to the beach but are surrounded by the raptors who still demand for the eggs back. When Amanda surrenders them to the only female raptor that appears to be their queen, they appear irritated when Alan uses a raptor larnyx to communicate with them. They would finally leave when the Marine Corps and Navy make it to the beach, thanks to a call by Ellie. As they board, they reunite with a surviving Billy. Once they leave the island, the film ends with everyone seeing the Pteranodons leave the island.
THOUGHTS
I’ve been seeing this movie since 2002 due to my fascination of dinosaurs and it goes without saying that I really enjoyed this one more than I expected. Joe Johnston had big shoes to fill as the director and while he’s not better than Spielberg, he held his own in giving us an entertaining adventure film. The one thing he does better than him is create a faster pace and keeps the adrenaline going. The message of how nature shouldn’t be controlled doesn’t have a strong presence and that’s fine because this is the chance to avoid repetition. This time, survival is more important than nature. Based on his contribution for The Matrix, Don Davis was actually a good choice to compose music for this sequel, almost sounding identical to what John Williams had made. While there is a stronger use of impressive visual effects, you’ll still feel the presence of Stan Winston’s practical effects. The biggest delivery of this combination is seeing new dinosaurs. Since we got to see a male T Rex during The Lost World, it was a matter of time that the same would apply for the raptors. Whenever they showed up, they seemed to live up to being the smartest creatures to ever roam this planet. I was completely off guard when the first male we see hid behind the encased formaldehyde to get the jump on Amanda. And the second it calls for backup, you knew things were gonna get worse for the humans. The Pteranodons lived up to being the most frightening winged creature of all, unless there’s proof that dragons were real. Whenever one would fly over to catch their prey, you’ll just want to accept that fate has been sealed for the prey. The one dinosaur that was the film’s scene stealer was the Spinosaurus. Seeing this predator’s determination to kill the humans makes you relieved that it doesn’t exist anymore. While it’s not scientifically possible for it to kill a T Rex, it’s hard to deny that it was a badass moment to witness. Another good aspect about this film is that we get another cast of characters we create investment for. Sam Neill returns as Alan Grant and delivers in portraying him as one who was traumatized of what he experienced before. Despite being lied to, he was willing to lead the others to their best chance at survival. The one moment I appreciate was how during the fake tour, he was in joy again seeing the creatures he adored when he was a kid. It was hard to appreciate Laura Dern’s return because Ellie Satler serves as the Deus ex machina for the main characters, which is the only reason she and Alan broke up. Nevertheless, her calling Marine Corps and Navy proves how much she still loves him. Going into the new characters, William H Macy and Tea Leoni were highly convincing as a dynamic couple that Paul & Amanda are supposed to be. Whatever differences they had offscreen, their respect goes off the roof for how they put that aside to rescue their child like any loving parent would. Trevor Noah showed off Eric to be the bravest kid in this franchise for surviving on a dinosaur island, by depending on his intelligence and being as resourceful as long as he can. Knowing that he pulled it off for 8 weeks make you want to tell Kevin from Home Alone to eat his heart out. Knowing that his parents seemed to be on the same page once they get reduced, I do hope that they continue to be a happy family they deserve to be. Billy Brennan comes off as the most conflicted of this film because we know he means no harm, yet makes a terrible mistake. Alessandro Nivola portrays him as one who has a good heart, but chose not to think over the biggest decision of his life. Through Grant’s pep talk, he truly realized that he messed up stealing the raptor eggs. When he parasailed to rescue Eric, he didn’t care what would happen to himself because he felt that he didn’t deserve a second chance. While I respect his selflessness, I gotta admit that he’s pretty lucky to be alive because those Pteranodons drained a lot of from him when they attacked. Last but not least, the late Michael Jeter gave us another likable character performance as Udesky. Despite losing his best guys, he remained to self assured that the rescue mission would succeed. That makes it a shame that he live long enough to see it. And his death is arguably the most brutal in the series as his demise was used to lure the others. Just because I have a soft spot does not mean there are no issues throughout this film. First off, why does Grant still have financial troubles when Hammond offered to pay for his expeditions? If iNGen cut him off, that’d be interesting to talk about. I want to be scared of Alan’s plane nightmare when he thinks he’s seen a raptor, but why does he see a male? The only dinosaurs he ever saw were female and he has not encountered males until later into the film. If there was gonna be consistency, it should’ve been a dream of him seeing a female that would resemble the Queen he’d encounter. Sadly, this isn’t the only failure of consistency to notice because I’m livid on how Eric hears the ringtone and his parents don’t. How do Paul & Amanda hear their son and not the jingle? They show to not be far from each other, so it just doesn’t make sense. It is surprising that the Kirbys aren’t exactly a wealthy enterprise, but why didn’t Grant look up their business beforehand? If he did, he’d demand the truth before takeoff. The vending machine scene is dumb for two reasons: Billy breaks the glass and makes a loud noise, while Paul tries to find enough change to pay for something that is obviously not powered on. Just because you put money inside does not mean it’ll work. You have me hooked when the raptors are allegedly smarter than primates, but why didn’t they stay near the trees if they know the humans stole the eggs? I honestly think it’d be intense to see the eggs be returned before Alan could ever find out. I want to freak out that Amanda gets scratched by the Spinosaurus but despite showing blood, there isn’t a single slash on her body or her shirt when she’s out of water. Just when I thought consistency, it does not. The last thing to deeply bother me will always be the ending. The Pteranodons leaving the island comes off as a callback to the pelicans from the first film. I would only appreciate it if they had acknowledged it anytime during Jurassic World, but they don’t because they refuse to have any kind of lazy answer. It’s even weirder to the fact that that’s the time they choose to leave when they were free roaming in The Lost World. If you’re somehow able to ignore these issues like I have, I feel certain you can still find enjoyment. In short, Jurassic Park III ain’t an amazing sequel but as long as it finds a way to be entertaining, it doesn’t have to be. If you’re a dinosaur lover that enjoyed the first two films, I hope you enjoy this as well.
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