It could have all been so very different. Jurassic Park was the event film of 1993 and another movie milestone created by Steven Spielberg. But let’s be honest, all the other franchise entries have never gotten anywhere near the shock, awe, wonder, and chills of the first movie. Jurassic World came closest in 2015, but that was arguably because it followed the premise of Park so closely and took it to the next logical step. In short, rather than be trapped on an amusement island with dinosaurs awaiting visitors, the park was open and full of juicy victims to terrorise. The wheels came off the dino-wagon in the next two films, though. Despite the tantalising promise of dinosaurs rampaging about in capital cities and the world in general, this was wasted in preference of focusing on some absolutely unfathomable shite about giant locusts, plenty of handwringing about cloning humans, bringing back legacy characters for no reason, and trapping the protagonists in yet another dino-crammed restricted area to escape from. Disappointing to say the least. So, a reboot (or Rebirth if you will) was probably the best move to make. Kiss goodbye to any member of the previous cast, because here we have Scarlett Johansson and her merry band of mercenaries hunting down dinosaurs, because… reasons. It’s been directed by Gareth Edwards (Godzilla – 2014) and written by David Koepp (Jurassic Park and its immediate sequel). With the ongoing potential of man vs. Dino still being a massive audience draw, is this a case of ex-stinks-tion or everyone-saw-us?

 

The inevitable last-time-on-Jurassic-franchise opening crawl explains that the escaped dinosaurs from the earlier films have all but died out. Some are kept in zoos, but the only ones to thrive and survive have migrated to natural surroundings on lands around the equator. So that dinosaurs-are-loose-everywhere plot thread has already been clipped dramatically. In (what must be a shrewd meta-comment on the franchise and society in general), some character dialogue establishes that most of the global population is bored shitless with the return of the animals and can’t even be bothered to visit or study them. But hold that thought, because Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend), a corporate sort from a pharmaceutical company, has recruited a black-ops mercenary named Zora Bennett (an engaging and having-fun Johansson) to gather specific DNA from three types of dinosaurs to create a super-drug. Yes, we’re back to the old “super-blood” plot so beloved of sci-fi movies everywhere. She gets her old gang back together, along with reluctant palaeontologist Dr Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey), to travel out to a forbidden zone in the Atlantic Ocean where all the animals live in proximity to each other. Of course, it doesn’t go to plan. They almost immediately encounter a shipwrecked family, the dinosaurs don’t donate easily, and then there are the mutated creatures that should never have been created…

 

Starting with the good stuff… Rebirth is far better than the two previous films and quite possibly the best entry in the franchise since the first World. However, that is admittedly a very low bar to set, and there are still plenty of issues. Of course, nothing still touches the original Park for greatness and technique, and this certainly doesn’t come close to it. But Koepp and Edwards have pared back the formula and tried to regain the feeling of awe and danger that came with the first film. It doesn’t quite pay off, but there are small callbacks and Easter Eggs to keep that connection without resorting to mugging cameos from the earlier cast. The “When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth” banner is a nice touch, as is the brief mention that Loomis once studied under Dr Alan Grant (meaning that his character could have theoretically appeared in a past film as a background detail). Rather than just keep to the kernel idea of a “Dinosaur Island” though, they just couldn’t help throwing an extra wrinkle in with (yet another!!) “secret” cloning base that just happens to be on their target patch. I mean, seriously, just how many so-called “secret bases” did InGen and all the other pharmaceutical companies have in this cinematic universe? Include the (presumably canon) versions from the Netflix animated shows, and it must be well into double, possibly treble, figures. It’s a trope that allows for mutated versions of the old favourites to appear, but it seems unnecessary to some extent.

 

Speaking of tropes, and “Jurassic” ones at that, Rebirth is packed with them, even if some of them are low-key to some extent and changed in context. Needlessly protracted and sadistic eaten-to-death endings for innocent red-shirt characters (which stretch the PG-rating)? Yep, present and correct. Untrustworthy corporate bad guy in place? You’ve got him. Child in absolute peril from a rampaging T-Rex? Hold my beer! Standing still or using decoy flares to escape the big bad? Say no more. What is surprising is that the requisite velociraptors are missing… apart from a comedy cameo involving a toilet break, believe it or not. The biggest similarity and formula hold-fast, though, is the central narrative arc. Yet again, the plot contrives to have small groups of people in an isolated dino-infested holding area, using their wits, courage, and limited resources to escape. Every Jurassic film, ever. Yes, there’s the MacGuffin of the super-DNA being smuggled out (shades of Dennis Nedry) and the mutants, but there’s no further expansion to the setup. Apart from Johansson and the shipwrecked family, pretty much everyone is a cookie-cut character with little depth and shoe-horned-in exposition to attempt to make us care for them. Yes, Zora apparently lost a colleague in her last mission and had to tell the family, and Johansson emotes well, but does this really make a difference to the proceedings? We think not.

 

Amid all this mediocrity and obviousness, Rebirth does have some decent cards up its sleeve. Edwards has confirmed his skills with filming a colossus or two from a human’s perspective. He did so in Godzilla, but it’s mostly Monsters (his 2010 directorial debut) that comes to mind here. With two characters approaching a herd (if that’s the right word) of Titanosaurus, they gaze up in wonder as the gentle giants interact and move slowly. Nigh-on identical to a night-time scene from Monsters. It gets very close to creating the original feelings of empathy from Park. Better than this, though, and by far the biggest draw to see the film, are some exemplary action/chase sequences that are littered throughout the proceedings. The T-Rex river chase scene was originally envisaged for the first film but was lost due to budget constraints. Here, it is given a new lease of life in a superbly edited sequence where several characters are nearly snatched from a flowing river by its gaping maw. Great stuff and well-shot. Add some other excellent sequences to that, including the battle at sea (very much inspired by Jaws with Zora taking on the Quint role), the D-Rex looming out of the smoke and underlit by flares, the vertigo-inducing climbing scene, and the Velociranodon chasing down victims in the sewage pipes.

 

Whilst the Velociranodons are grimly fiendish (a mix of Velociraptor and Pteranodon), the D-Rex (Distortus-Rex) isn’t that great. It looks like a Star Wars Rancor with a migraine and an extra set of diddy arms. Although it’s (sort of) canon with the films and books, the use of mutants to excite interest seems a bit cynical and somewhat needless. Otherwise, there’s no real “star” of the show as far as the big guys go. The T-Rex soon makes its exit, there is no “Blue” equivalent, and the D-Rex has absolutely no personality. The only charismatic Dino is Delores the Aquilops, who is admittedly cute but surely a merch grab and pretty much superfluous to the plot. That said, apart from a couple of notable CG glitches, the SFX are pretty damned good, as are the interactions between cast and creatures.

 

It has to be said that most reviews are pretty mixed at the moment, and that’s not a generic statement. Some have been surprisingly positive, while others have called for it to be burned at the stake. As ever, the truth probably lies somewhere in between. This is nothing new or special, but at least it doesn’t have pretensions about that. It just wants to put puny humans at the mercy of scary dinosaurs and nothing more really. In that respect it succeeds. It helps that Edwards has shot some storming sequences and that Johansson is still her engaging action-hero self. Oddly enough, early box office takings suggest that it could be a notable summer hit, even with Superman and The Fantastic Four waiting in the wings, so maybe there will be a follow-up to this arc. It does really feel like they’re struggling for new angles though and all feels very familiar, despite the mutants and the land/sea/air element of this entry. Secret InGen base on the moon? Anyone