Jurassic World: Rebirth

Jurassic Park: Rebirth is the latest film in the long running franchise. Directed by Gareth Edwards and written by David Koepp, who co-wrote the first film and soloed the second one, this is a film the producers likely envisioned as a return to basics. In some ways, it accomplishes this, but not always as smoothly as you might hope for. There are many little and large flaws here, including problems in pacing and character, but it is ultimately a fairly entertaining work that arrives where it wants to go.

There are some truly questionable, even for this franchise, gaps in both logic and scientific fact, which may take you out of the experience. While the sets and visual effects are all very well done, with good details and imagination, it sometimes feels like the film is merely echoing earlier entries in the series, in an attempt to elicit praise. That eagerness to please is part of the overall problem in the film, yet also where it goes as right as often as it goes wrong.

Courtesy Universal

When the film begins, we are introduced to a research facility that experiences a dynamic failure, then are pushed forward nearly two decades, to a time when dinosaurs have become passee, and seeing a Brontosaurus on 6^th Avenue in Manhattan is like catching an elephant escaping from the zoo. Into this world enters Martin Krebs, a pharmaceutical representative who is putting together a team to retrieve the DNA from three large and dangerous specimens, from a forbidden region of the world, in order to increase the profit margins for his company.  To this end, he hires Zora Bennet, a covert operative and strong arms Dr. Henry Loomis, a former student of Dr. Alan Grant, into accompanying him on his mission.

Other than money and smirk, this character offers little and is immediately grifted into expanding his initial offer in order to get Zora the team she wants, which includes her friend, Duncan Kincaid. The sequences during which these two events occur take far longer than they need to and contain attempts at “con-game charm” that fall flat. At this point, you likely will not care about any of the people involved enough to find this anything other than annoying, and this is something which continues through the first portion of the movie. Indeed, it is because of these scenes that the film and its characters take so long to recover and grow.

Courtesy Universal

Into this mix is also introduced a small family, a father, his two daughters and the older daughter’s boyfriend, who get capsized during an ocean crossing on a small vessel, by an aquatic dino, and are rescued by the team, before getting separated from the other group. The majority of the film has the two groups going their separate ways, and it creates an instance where you wish the film had decided to either keep everyone together or just focus on one group. Just as you become emotionally invested in one group, or at least begin to find it interesting, the film shifts back to the other.

This is a film that seems to be unsure how to become the film it wants to be, which seems to be a film commenting on greed and urging compassion and personal healing, yet which finds itself lost in a maze of action tropes which engulf it. It is a film where little details annoy, such as the fact that Zoe, a supposed special forces operative, spends the entire film with more jewelry on the cartilage of one ear than the front window of Harrods. How is this going to help an operative like her blend in, or more to the point, be safe? Is it not possible those jewels get caught on something? Further, Scarlett Johanson seems uninvolved in the role she is playing, staring into the distance and playing at intensity. This results in giving the feeling of merely cashing a paycheck. Maybe they should have just hired Nicolas Cage? At least that would have added some interesting weirdness. The film could have used it.

Despite all this, the film is not unworthy of your time. While it does extend the welcome and outwear the concept, the film has moments of solid action, even if it relies a bit too much on jump scares, real or fake. It has some good character work, from Bailey and Ali, and the family eventually finds its place in the film, even if they deserved better. While uneven, it is entertaining.

JURASSIC WORLD: REBIRTH OPENS WIDE on JULY 2nd