Jurassic World Rebirth

As easy as it can be to say, there can’t really be an endpoint to the Jurassic franchise.

Despite diminishing returns, a Jurassic film will always hoover up box office revenue from its legacy of following one of the original and best ‘summer blockbusters’ and also because everyone loves freakin' dinosaurs.

So there can be no complaint that they’ve gone again, especially as this seemed to all the world like a sensible new direction: ditch the old characters and start afresh and bring in Gareth ‘Rogue One’ Edwards to direct.

Sadly for Jurassic World Rebirth, it isn’t quite the film it could have been and still can’t get anywhere near the standard set by the original Jurassic Park.

It sure does try with a few smart touches to avoid the slightly stale nature of the ‘Jurassic World’ films so far.

There’s no theme park here, as time has gone on the dinosaurs bred by the park have started to die out because of the atmosphere/food supply/disease etc. A few are scattered across the equator in an exclusion zone.

Enter a ‘big pharma guy’ who hires some mercenaries (and a scientist) to collect samples from the three largest specimens left (one water based, one land and one air) because the DNA could assist with a cure for heart disease.

Throw in a family stuck at sea who join this intrepid expedition (and we get there in double quick time) and it sounds like a recipe for some dinosaur-based fun, stripped back and simple.

And in some parts it absolutely is. There are some marvellous set pieces here and the usual iconic dinosaur shots. A T Rex chase along a river who later pops up to sneakily appear through some smoke are two examples of these.

It’s just let down by a pretty nasty edit job. A chunky carb load of exposition is always expected in a film of this nature and we can forgive the hokum about ‘why’ they need to do this and that in most scenarios.

However, the first ten minutes of the film sees us given the same exposition, from and even to the same character. It’s as if the decision was being made on when to deliver the audience information and they threw it in twice anyway.

It’s shockingly bad at points and there are a few scattered moments which lose the film any momentum it threatens to pick up. Not helped as well by some strangely wonky CGI (a school of dolphins at the end being an unnecessarily bad example).

Fortunately, once the three samples are in place, the climactic ‘get off the island whilst all hell breaks loose’ bit rather makes up for the first two thirds of the movie at least allowing audiences to leave on a high.

The three staged ‘collect the samples’ moments are ok. They’re paced decently well but enable that final segment to still feel like the correct climax.

Another genuinely new and nice touch is the use of more traditional pop music in the film. Sure, there are elements of the legendary John Williams score which will give the requisite goosebumps but the non-score music gives the film a freshness.

So another ‘not quite’ entry into this franchise built so much on moments rather than ‘actually good films’. Once again, enjoy the dinosaur action but don’t expect much more going on that you haven’t seen before.

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