THE LOST WORLD: JURASSIC PARK
A film review by Phil Brady
Copyright 1997 Phil Brady
Well, on the good news side, the dinos are back..more dinosaurs, better than ever. While Jurassic Park introduced us to "real live" dinosaurs, the FX crew has had time to become acquainted with their cutting-edge technology. They have produced much more lifelike creatures, and the action is not stingy. One corollary to this is: more killing. The body count in Lost World rivals the numbers racked up by Sly and Arnie. You can judge for yourself whether it's good or bad news that Jeff Goldblum is actually the star of this film, as opposed to just attending Jurassic Park and ID4. But the big disappointment is Steven Spielberg's backslide into mindless action/horror cliches. He, better than most understands how to do it right. How could he let this happen?
The story opens with a good scene of a shore party coming upon some small dinos that are not as cute as they look. Cut to Jeff Goldblum being persuaded to go back to "Site B". It goes against all his instincts, but his palentologist girlfriend (Julianne Moore) is already there, so he must follow her to get her to safety. She's having none of that..this is an opportunity of a lifetime, and besides, it's her job to move the plot along by getting everybody into trouble! Spielberg lets her character alternate between trying to preserve natural habitats and trying to disrupt them.
As soon as we meet her, she rattles off a bunch of observations about the stegosuarus family structure, then she walks up to a nest with a baby steg, and pets it! Even modern-day birds would abandon a chick with a human scent; the only reason to touch the baby is so we can see her imperiled by the angry parents. Later, she comes across a baby T-rex with a broken leg, and she decides to carry it back (200 lb, easy) to the base camp, to set a splint. What a surprise that the parents show up and trash the camp! The ensuing FX are very good, but Spielberg has gotten flabby, letting these totally impossible actions move the story. Would it have been so tough to have a baby killed by another dino, and have the vengeful parent mistake something left by the humans as a scent clue? Okay, you need the baby later in the movie, so make the T-rex brood have two babies. How tough would that have been?
Later, corporate mercenaries round up some dinos for sale to zoos. Their Hatari!-inspired techniques are exciting. Our heroes sneak into the camp and break open the cages of these not-so-fuzzy creatures. A melee follows, destroying the camp..seems to me that they would be found guilty of murder, or manslaughter, at the least. Not a good lesson for the kids, but you don't want your kids to see this anyway. Way too many scenes seem to have been designed to inspire nightmares in youngsters. Spielberg tops his own lawyer-chomping scene by having two T-rex's "make a wish." Late in the film, A captured T-rex breaks loose, Kong-style, in San Diego. This lets us see some Godzilla scenes in a residential area. Spielberg punctuates his homage by having one streetful of fleeing pedestrians all Asian.
There's lotsa good stuff packed into this movie. Pete Posthelwaite, always a plus, plays a Great White Hunter leading the corporate team. And the action scenes are so good, I'll probably have to see the movie at least two more times. I doubt that Spielberg could have topped the original, but sometimes it looked like he wasn't even trying. I remember adolescence, when one friend after another drifted away from the group, as they got interested in sports, girls, or whatever. The super-child Steven doesn't want to come out and play anymore..Say it ain't so, Steven.
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