Review of Jurassic Park (1993) by Christian S — 26 Feb 2014

I know it's shameless of me to give all these five-star reviews but I can't help that I'm a sucker for things I like and to be fair this time I know I'm not alone here. Yes I was a wee tyke when I saw Jurassic Park and I would watch it over and over again and dinosaurs were my universe dear God they were my universe I love dinosaurs I loved them then and I love them now but I'll try to reserve that gushing and nostalgia.

So this 3-D re-release what did I think? I think it worked in every stinking way possible and that the movie from the beginning was made in a way that just begged for 3-D. The camera tricks with things like a close-up on the Amber with a fossilized mosquito to the big things like claws and teeth snapping at the people and at us by extension you got to admit there are so many opportunities it be more of a surprise if it didn't look good in 3-D.

Now that I'm an adult with an adult judgmental mind I am able to truly appreciate this movie in every way and really not just for special effects. Yes it is most famous for its special effects and that clearly is the thing that took the most effort and for better or for worse it has made a difference in Hollywood and changed the way we've made movies forever which earns it all the medals it deserves for that feat but the reason this movie works is not just because it looks good but because it looks good and is good.

This is a damn good story that tells a remarkably effective science fiction and horror story yes it is a horror story about science and the bad things that can happen if we tried to play God and control nature.

Seriously listen to the details in the exposition, it shows the whole park was a mess. I really love watching this movie before everything goes to hell because it does a great job foreshadowing everything, showing that everything that could go wrong will go wrong which makes the actual disaster all the more karma screaming dramatic and entertainingly satisfying.

It also is something of a good tragedy because while the movie is perfectly clear and ultimately effective in saying that this cannot work and should not have happened it still makes you wish that it could have worked because it is a glorious idea and something everyone would have loved to see come true.

I love the depiction of how nature is uncontrollable and unpredictable and while we may be able to keep it in check for a while they will evolve and that the real enemy you face his time because once they do you have lost it and it was foolish of you to think that you had any control from the start.

It's also a good horror movie for its reliance on suspense like the famous moments where water would slowly ripple with the footsteps of the upcoming beast. There are also little touches like during the chase scene where the camera showed the rearview mere of the Jeep that says "warning objects in mirror are closer than they appear" and the object in the mirror is the bleeping Tyrannosaurus Rex getting closer and whose open jaws are literally overlapping than mirror.

You remember that bit and you remember going "OH MY GOD!!!" Next the other spotlight stealers are of course the velociraptors. Now before I go on let me just get this off my chest bear with me for a moment: the raptors in this movie are an artistic license raptors were much smaller and somewhat similar but not really.

The raptors are much more based off of Deinonychus. Also both raptors and Deinonychus had feathers but I don't know whether that was known back then in the 90s. I'm not holding this against the movie Hollywood have been making artistic licenses since movies freaking began so let us move on and besides raptors sounds scarier and cooler.

The raptors are awesome they are horrifying they are everything that is scary in the world. In fact when I went to see this in theaters in 3-D I was legitimately surprised that I jumped and screamed at the scene and that was the scene where immediately after she fixes the power and is cheering in victory one of the raptors jumps out from hiding right the heck behind her and screeches.

People don't think that jump scares are scary screw that that was freaking horrifying. That thing had no buildup or foreshadowing and it was gloriously because as soon as it happened she had to run thinking out with her life.