The fifth instalment of the Jurassic Park franchise is in cinemas and who doesn't love a raucous jaunt running away from terrible lizards. When I was a kid I was obsessed with Dinosaurs and going to the cinema as a 12 year old to see the original is one of my fondest memories from my childhood as it blew my tiny little mind. Now, my sons Harry (11) and Jack (7) have taken on my obsession so we dragged Heidi (9) along (Mrs. Cool was busy that night) and went to see Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.
Bryce Dallas Howard and Chris Pratt reprise their roles as Claire and Owen. This time joined by Rafe Spall as Eli Mills, Ted Levine as Wheatley, Toby Jones as Gunnar Eversol and James Cromwell as Benjamin Lockwood. Jeff Goldblum also returns to the Jurassic Park Universe after a 21 year hiatus as Dr. Ian Malcom.
The plot is pretty predictable, Dinosaurs that were left on the Island after the park was abandoned in the last film are threatened as the Volcano that makes up the island has become active again. Some people think the dinos should be left and let nature take it course but other want to rescue them.
Funded by Benjamin Lockwood, an old friend of John Hammond, Claire convinces Owen to join the rescue mission with the hope of finding Blue, The Velociraptor he trained from a baby. Lockwoods fortune is being managed by Eli Mills and immediately he seems like a smarmy shit.
Obviously the rescue turns out to be bullshit and Mills is really taking the dinosaurs off the island so they can be sold at auction to a bunch of shady bastards to fund the next phase of genetic engineering. The Indo-raptor is a new designer dino that uses the traits of the Indominus Rex from the last film and compacts it into the size of a Velociraptor. You can tell where the plot is going with this, right?
Chris Pratt is cool A.F. as Owen who acts like he doesn't care but really wants to save his fave dino, Blue. I think Claire is a pretty generic character and Bryce Dallas Howard is a better actor than the character she portrays allows (check out the 'Nosedive' Episode of Black Mirror). The character of Benjamin Lockwood, for me, seemed like he was just a replacement for John Hammond but I did think the side plot involving his granddaughter was and interesting one. Rafe Spall and Toby Jones were both great as the scheming bad guys trying to flog off all the dinosaurs. Ted Levine is also good as the archetypical mercenary hunter who leads the round up of the dinosaurs. I was however disappointed with the return of Jeff Goldblum, I love Jeff Goldblum and think he is brilliant in most things but with a lot of the hype and trailers involving him I felt his part in the film simply wasn't big enough.
The real stars of film though are the dinosaurs. The CGI effects that bring the dinosaurs to life are really spot on and some of the dinosaurs really steal the show. My personal favourite are Blue the Velociraptor and the Stygimoloch that helps Claire and Owen in one scene. Jack loves Rexy the T-Rex and this is Harry's favourite too. Heidi loved the baby dinos especially the Triceratops but said she was sad for the Brachiosaurus that was left behind on the Island.
The film is a lot more gory than previous films in the series and even though it is a 12A I felt some of the scenes were a bit much for younger kids. I could tell Heidi was little scared as she kept clinging onto me in some of the scenes. I also thought the soundtrack was little distracting, the musical score was big, epic and powerful to go with the dinosaurs but I think it was too much and couldn't been toned down in some scenes.
All in all we loved it, it was always going to be a winner for us and with another film scheduled for 2021 we can't wait to see what the future has in store for this franchise.
Well, that's all for now.
S
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