Dinosaur movies make me happy. So in between shark movies, and before the superhero capes come out next week, let's go see some dinosaurs!
I have always loved the Jurassic Park movies. The original trilogy can do no wrong in my eyes. (Yes, even the third one.) The Jurassic World trilogy was fun in places, but incredibly uneven and eventually stopped being about dinosaurs. Luckily, Rebirth is a lot closer to the original movies in both tone and sheer fun factor.
This is straight up popcorn, blockbuster fun. The story is definitely something closer to a video game ("Collect Three Things!") or a thrill ride than anything more substansial, but I don't need a deep plot when it comes to dinosaur movies. All I need is to watch dinosaurs eat people and feel like there are actually some kind of mortal stakes in play. That's what I got.
I also got essentially two groups of characters. Our first group, led by Scarlett Johansson, Mahershala Ali, and Jonathan Bailey, are hired by a sketchy pharamaceutical company to collect blood samples from living dinosaurs. I loved this group. I would quite happily watch them talk and banter and rappel down cliffs for hours.
There was just a brightness to them. They all made their scenes sparkle, and I was sad whenever we went to go visit our second group of characters.
This second group is the Delgado family, played by Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Luna Blaise, and Audrina Miranda, plus David Icanon as the teenage boyfriend that no parent would ever approve of. (He also seems to be allergic to ever buttoning his shirt in the rare occassions he actually wears one.)
And they're fine. Don't get me wrong, all four actors are very strong. I completely believed that they were actually a family, and even the boyfriend had moments where he was actually likable and showed that he had depths.
They just didn't need to be in this movie. If the plot completely focused on them, then I probably would have enjoyed their scenes a lot more. They had some good ones too! The T-Rex was genuinely scary again, and felt like one of my favorite scenes from the novel.
The movie wears its love for the original Jurassic Park very proudly. The Easter eggs come thick and fast, whether it's a school bus from Chrichton Middle School or studying under Dr. Alan Grant. There is a line, though, between a homage and outright copying, and Rebirth crosses that line. Blatantly.
There's one particular scene in the last act that recycles not only the general idea but specific shots from Jurassic Park as well. What should have been a tense scene turned into me just shrugging and being annoyed at it all.
The only good part about it is that it helped me figure out what one of the dinosaurs the Mutadon was a hybrid of. Putting aside the fact that it sounds like something from Godzilla, it and the D-Rex really didn't work for me. The idea of mutated dinosaurs and dino hybrid is interesting. In theory.
In practice, it fell flat. Both hybrids are underutilized, especially given the expectations that the opening scene sets up. At least the Indominus Rex had a presence and felt like a major threat. Here, the mutants are just boring. They don't add anything that a normal dinosaur couldn't do instead.
Normal dinosaurs are super cool, even if the general public in the movie doesn't think so. 33 years, and no one cares about dinosaurs anymore, to the point that they have to close down the museum exhibit? Really? The only part that made sense to me was the fact that dinosaurs aren't adapted to survive in the current environment and so most of them have died.
Either way, the movie was fun. It was genuinely funny in places. It had a bunch of good performances. I got to see a lot of dinos. It's hard to ask for anything more.
Random Thoughts
This is the first Jurassic Park sequel to have a completely new cast.
That is the sturdiest life raft that I have ever seen.
I want a Dolores.
Dolores was an animatronic in some scenes. The other dinosaurs were entirely CGI. They all looked fantastic, though.
It's always funny when you can see that a character's fate had obviously been changed at the last minute as the result of a test screening.
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An Honest Fangirl loves video games, horror movies, and superheroes, and occasionally watches far too many shark movies.
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