Without a doubt, this is easily the weirdest and campiest Jurassic Park film to date. Watching Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom feels akin to the experience of watching clips from multiple movies at once, and even though none of these clips are especially bad, they add up to a fairly inconsistent vibe.
Genuinely intriguing ideas, like whether or not the safety of the dinosaurs is an important animal rights concern, are briefly explored, alongside some surprisingly touching moments, before the audience is plunged into yet more explosions and humans (mostly the evil ones) being gobbled by rogue prehistoric lizards.
And I can’t say I don’t admire it for its attempts at change. Without spoiling much, there’s an effort on the part of co-writer Colin Trevorrow, producer Steven Spielberg and director J. A Bayona to expand the manner in which the dinosaurs are probably going to be used in future films. But there’s more of an emphasis on action and special effects throughout the movie’s running time.
This time, the dinosaurs of Isla Nublar are in the line of an exploding volcano that threatens to destroy the entire island, which would certainly result in their extinction- and Dr. Ian Malcom (Jeff Goldblum, in far too small a role for how he’s been advertised), always skeptical of Dr. John Hammond’s cloning of the dinosaurs, isn’t too broken up about the prospect of their doom.
But even after overseeing the fiasco that was the Jurassic World park three years ago, Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard) still has affection for the massive reptiles. She reunites with dino-whisperer Owen Grady (the always affable Chris Pratt. They team with a grizzled merc (Ted Levine), a geeky hacker (Justice Smith) and a teen veterinarian (Daniella Ineda) to help Hammond’s former partner Sir Lockwood (James Cromwell) rescue them, getting them to a sanctuary before it’s too late.
Once the gang reunites with Owen’s pet raptor Blue, the island begins to lose its ever loving mind, resulting in what is easily the film’s most visually impressive sequence.
It’s a hoot watching Pratt flee hysterically from a miasma of destruction and rampaging dinos, which is why it feels like such a letdown once that segues into a tired subplot of a conniving businessman (Rafe Spall), his partner (Toby Jones) and their plan to turn the dinos into military weapons- which was already explored by Vincent D’Onofrio in the last Jurassic World movie. Isabella Sermon has a decent performance as Lockwood’s precocious granddaughter, but her major plot revelation is easily among the film’s most bizarre.
Sometimes it seems like Kingdom is more concerned with nailing certain Jurassic Park tropes- greedy people who want to exploit the dinosaurs, the T-Rex eating a helpless victim before roaring triumphantly, a thrilling chase, the battle between two dinos- than it is truly making a film that breaks out from others in the series, let along the monster movie genre.
The story starts to drag as it progresses into the second half before the action picks up again for the conclusion, where more revelations that will affect the course of the series are exposed.
Still, this movie does understand that the dinosaurs themselves are more of a draw to the audience than Owen and Claire, even though Howard and Pratt are fine enough in their respective roles. A lot of the family drama in the first Jurassic World felt like an unneeded diversion to what most moviegoers bought tickets to see, so it’s wise on the part of the filmmakers to give the non-human characters the bulk of the spotlight this time.
Thinking about it, I don’t recall too many moments in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom where the audience is truly allowed to absorb the majesty of the dinosaurs, save for one brief scene when Daniella Ineda’s character is in awe of a brachiosaurus. Outside of it, the pacing is rather bang-bang-bang up until the slowdown two-thirds in, which hurts it from a substance perspective. I can’t say that I didn’t have fun watching this movie, but for me, it was a silly, “so bad and wild that it’s good” film- and I definitely wasn’t bored.
All in all, I’d say my thumbs are firmly in the middle with this film. I can’t ignore the flaws in the story (and believe me, there’s quite a few) and erratic tone, but I certainly didn’t regret buying a ticket- some of the cheese was just appealing to me.
If you had a chance to open the theater door, get on the floor and walk the dinosaur, drop us a line at @Official_FAN on Twitter and let us know your thoughts!