The Lost World: Jurassic Park - Film Review
The Lost World: Jurassic Park is directed by Stephen Speilberg and stars Jeff Goldblum, Julianne Moore, Vince Vaughn, Pete Postlethwaite, Vanessa Lee Chester, and Richard Attenborough, and based off the book The Lost World by Michael Crichton.
Plot
A research team is sent to the Jurassic Park Site B island to study the dinosaurs there while another team approaches with another agenda.
Review
Shouldn't the title be the other way around?
The reason this film exists is because Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park became a hit so Steven Speilberg made it into the movie Jurassic Park, which became a hit so he asked Michael to write a sequel to his book so it can be made into a movie that is the sequel to the first movie. D'ya get all that?
I'd say this is when the series started to go downhill, but it just got worse with the third one. This film has a lot of flaws with it. It's actually quite different from the first Jurassic Park, of course a sequel being different from the first can be a good thing like Star Wars: The Last Jedi, but some just aren't.
Also, I have not read Michael Crichton's The Lost World, so I am not comparing this to the movie.
I actually was zoning out a few times during this movie, which makes this review kinda hard to write.
Some of this movies flaws include stuff like it just introduces a new villain in the form of Hammond's nephew when you could just replace him with Dodgson, like instead of saying that Hammond built an amphitheater in San Diego, say Dodgson did it, connecting it more to the first movie and we'd get more to do with a minor character from the first movie. It'd be the exact same movie, but Dodgson instead of Hammond's nephew still wouldn't make the movie that good.
Another low point of the movie is when the raptors attack Ian (Jeff Goldblum again), Sarah (Julianne Moore), and Kelly (Vanessa Lee Chester). I think it's supposed to be serious, but it doesn't feel like that. We know they're going to live, you know that Kelly is going to live because earlier in the movie, John Hammond says that the girl in the beginning survived being attacked by those baby dinosaurs. Also we just know that Ian will survive because of course he will.
Also, this gives us one of the dumbest parts in the movie, Kelly doing gymnastics to kick a velociraptor out of a window and then Ian asks her "the school kicked you off the team?". I know that scene was like, 15 seconds, but I didn't like it.
Also, when Sarah pulls the velociraptor off the roof, it lands on another velociraptor and she lands on the ground next to them. But the velociraptors are fighting each other while dinner is right next to them getting away. In the first movie, they were snipping at each other a little bit, like in the kitchen scene, but it never got in the way of what they were trying to do.
Another flaw is the tyrannosaurus rex in San Diego. While the shot of the T. rex in front of the city was cool, it just feels like a Godzilla ripoff. You even see a few Asian men running away from it. Just like Godzilla. The T. rex even eats a dog in the movie. It just feels like a flawed movie attached to another flawed movie.
It does have some good parts, like the opening scene with the rich family on the island. That was actually a scene in the first Jurassic Park novel, but it was put as the opening in this movie. It's also funny when they show the girl's mother screaming and then it cuts to Ian yawning at what you think is an island but it's just a subway station.
The effects in this movie aren't bad, but they're not as good as the ones in the first movie. The animatronics and puppets look good, but the CGI definitely looks dated.
Now let's talk about the characters. Jeff Goldblum is back as Ian and he's still pretty good, but like a sane person, he doesn't want to go on this mission John Hammond offers him to go after what happened in the first movie. But after hearing that his girlfriend is on the island, he goes on the mission.
Julianne Moore is ok as Sarah, Ian's girlfriend. She goes on this mission and puts herself in danger by getting to close to the dinosaurs to get photos of them. She is also responsible for the T. rex stalking the crew by wearing a jacket with T. rex blood, even though she knows that they can smell stuff like this, so why is she still wearing it? I can't really think of much else to say.
Vanessa Lee Chester plays Kelly, Ian's daughter and the movie's attempt at diversity. She's ok. He tells her not to go on the mission with him, but by taking his parental advice and not listening to him, she becomes a stowaway. She definitely has some traits passed down from her father, like she refers to a babysitter as a troglodyte because she doesn't have a Sega, and Ian says "Cruel, but good word use." She also kills a velociraptor with gymnastics. She's ok.
Also, in the first Jurassic Park, Ian says that he has three kids, and we only meet Kelly, so why don't we know anything about the other two?
Vince Vaughn is not very good as Nick Van Owen, a photographer who goes along with Ian and the others on this mission. Even though Peter Ludlow is the villian, Nick might as well be one too. He's Vince Vaughn, he unleashes the dinosaurs from their cages, risking the lives and possible killing some of the hunters, who haven't done anything to Nick's group directly. And why does the triceratops need a special lock on it's cage? Then he frees and injured baby T. rex, then brings it to the team's RV to fix it's broken leg, and while it's insane that he does this, but it makes him slightly more likable, which is something this movie needs. And the RV scene and Eddie's (Richard Schiff) sacrifice are some of the better parts of the movie. And then he gets rid of Roland Tembo's bullets and drops them on the floor, which means that when the T. rex attacks, Roland can't kill it, so has has to tranquilize it. This means Nick is responsible for all the deaths from this point on and he shows no remorse for this.
Pete Postlethwaite is good as Roland Tembo, he's just not used that well. In the beginning, we understand that he wants to hunt a male tyrannosaurus rex. He even has a story about Mt. Everest that he uses to explain why he wants the T. rex and it's quite fascinating. He gets to hunt the T. rex, but it's very forgettable, if you blink, you'll probably miss it. Good character, but just didn't turn out well.
Richard Attenborough is back as John Hammond, but he's only in the movie for a few minutes. He's the one who sets this mission up. It's nice to see him back.
Also, Ariana Richards and Joseph Mazzello come back in a cameo as Lex and Timmy, so that was cool.
Overall, The Lost World: Jurassic Park isn't a very good movie. It's got flaws, it can be forgettable, and it's just not that good, but it's not the worst of the series. I can see why some people say it's a guilty pleasure for them, but not for me.
The Lost World: Jurassic Park gets a 5.5/10.
Previous review - Jurassic Park
Next review - Jurassic Park III
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