Jurassic Park

"So, what are you thinking?"

"We're out of a job."

"Don't you mean extinct?"

John Hammond (Attenborough), the CEO of InGen bio, wants to open a new theme park called Jurassic Park.  The park will feature live dinosaurs, cloned from prehistoric DNA, and state-of-the-art security features.  However, after a few incidents, his investors are nervous.  Before the park is allowed to open, they want a group of experts to sign off on the park.  The investors recruit their lawyer Donald Gennaro (Ferrero) and mathematician / chaos theorist Dr. Ian Malcom (Goldblum), while Hammond invites noted paleontologist Dr. Alan Grant (Neill) and his colleague paleobotanist Dr. Ellie Sattler (Dern).  The park is located on the island of Isla Nublar, off the coast of Costa Rica.

On the island, they are joined by Hammond's grandchildren: Lex (Richards) and Tim (Mazzello).  Tim loves dinosaurs and is thrilled to meet Dr. Grant.  As they begin a tour of the island, there are problems at the control center.  Disgruntled employee Dennis Nedry (Knight) sabotages the systems to steal valuable information.  With a strong storm approaching the island and most of the safety systems shut down, can they make it off the island alive?


In 1990, Michael Crichton wrote the novel "Jurassic Park."  Before the novel was released, the film rights were purchased by Universal Studios.  They expected the novel to be a big success, which it was, and hired Crichton to write the screenplay.  They brought in palentologist Jack Horner to serve as an advisor for the film.  Horner also served as the inspiration for the character of Dr. Grant in the novel.

The film differs from the novel in several places / ways.  Crichton's identified the most with the character of Dr. Ian Malcolm, played by Jeff Goldblum.  Spielberg identified most with the character of John Hammond, and they made some changes to the character to make him more likeable in the film.  The fate of a few characters is different as well.  The cast is excellent and work well in their parts.  Goldblum reprised his role as Dr. Malcolm in The Lost World, and Sam Neill returned as Dr. Grant in Jurassic Park III.

I remember watching this film a few years after it came out and was terrified of the dinosaurs.  I am still impressed with the vision director Steven Spielberg and Crichton had for this film, and how well they were able to translate it to the screen.  The T-Rex was brought to life with animatronics.  It is the coolest dinosaur in the film, and the most easily recognizable.  The majority of the other dinosaurs were brought to life as puppets or CGI.  It is still impressive 20+ years later.

It is an iconic film.  It won 3 Academy Awards: Best Sound Editing, Best Sound Mixing, and Best Visual Effects.  It was also named in AFI's Top 100 lists: 100 Years...100 Thrills.

In 1995 Crichton wrote a sequel, titled "The Lost World."  Two years later, it was adapted to film The Lost World: Jurassic Park, again with Spielberg in the director's chair.  To date, there have been 2 additional films in the Jurassic Park series: Jurassic Park III in 2001 and Jurassic World in 2015.

Jurassic Park (1993) 127 minutes
Rating: PG-13 for intense science fiction terror
Director: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Sam Neill as Dr. Alan Grant
Laura Dern as Dr. Ellie Sattler
Jeff Goldblum as Dr. Ian Malcolm
Richard Attenborough as John Hammond
Joseph Mazzello as Tim Murphy
Ariana Richards as Lex Murphy
Martin Ferrero as Donald Gennaro
Bob Peck as Robert Muldoon
Wayne Knight as Dennis Nedry
Samuel L. Jackson as Ray Arnold