Steven Spielberg – ‘Jurassic Park’
“God creates dinosaurs. God destroys dinosaurs. God creates man. Man destroys God. Man creates dinosaurs”. The premise of Jurassic Park is so scintillating, so utterly imaginative, and ludicrous at the same time that the very act of showing us realistic dinosaurs could have been enough. It is, on the surface, a B-movie, a ‘monster flick’, and the entire gimmick of effectively raising the dead for entertainment would no doubt have still put bums on seats. But because it’s Steven Spielberg, the movie goes above and beyond, and the result is exceptional.
Based on the 1990 novel by Michael Crichton of the same name, Jurassic Park is a film existing on many levels. It is at once a cautionary tale about the dangers of genetic engineering, a parable about the hubris of humanity, a searing indictment of corporate/commercial America, and, last but not least, an unbelievably exhilarating romp involving people being chased by things with very sharp teeth.
On the tropical and remote Isla Nebula, the visionary business magnate John Hammond has successfully cloned and resurrected the once-extinct dinosaurs. The ultimate goal of utilising such ground-breaking genetic technology? To create a theme park. When a park keeper is killed by a Velociraptor – a modestly sized but viciously intelligent creature that we’ll get to know very well – the park’s financers naturally get concerned, and an inquisition into the safety of the park is launched.
Hammond brings in paleo-scientists Alan Grant and Ellie Sattler, whilst the investors bring in a mathematician specialising in chaos theory, Ian Malcolm, with the aim being that the three academics, with their distinct knowledge and authority, will be able to sign off on an official safety certificate so that Jurassic Park can be opened to the public once and for all. Upon arrival, there’s a breathtaking scene where the trio witness not just one but a whole herd of dinosaurs pass them by. As John Williams’ magnificent score swells, and Grant shakily removes his sunglasses in incredulous awe, Spielberg invites us to marvel with them at these incredible creatures brought to life — and we do.
The group is then shown an educational video, designed to be shown at the beginning of every tour once the park opens, which explains the science behind the magic. By extracting small traces of dino DNA from prehistoric mosquitoes preserved in amber, genetic engineers are able to replicate the diverse group of reptiles that once ruled the Earth. As Hammond shows Grant, Sattler and Malcolm the live hatching of a dinosaur egg, the trio are conflicted. Marvelling at the innovation of it all, they can’t help but question the ethics of cloning, with Malcolm feeling particularly cynical about the concept of the park. As he so concisely puts it, referencing the famous ride at Disneyland, “If ‘The Pirates of the Caribbean’ breaks down, the pirates don’t eat the tourists.” If you hadn’t already guessed, Jurassic Park does break down, with all the same results that Malcolm had hinted at.
Beyond the sheer spectacle of the dinosaurs themselves, which was created through a mix of animatronics and CGI and remains some of the best-looking VFX to date, one of the most compelling elements of Spielberg’s sci-fi action adventure is the characters, which there are quite a lot of. Rather than just focusing on Hammond or the three academics, pitting them against the AWOL dinosaurs and letting that be that, Spielberg and screenwriters Michael Crichton and David Koepp paint a vivid picture of the entire ecosystem of the park and all its inhabitants. By becoming familiar with Ray Arnold, the chief systems engineer, or Robert ‘Clever Girl’ Muldoon, the game warden, we completely believe that Jurassic Park is a real lived-in place operated by individual, three-dimensional people with their own beliefs and desires. One particularly enjoyable but fiendish sub-story follows Dennis Nedry, a disgruntled computer programmer, who attempts to sneak out some dinosaur embryos so that he can sell them to a rival company for a handsome reward. Obnoxious, selfish, and blinded by the prospect of cash, Nedry shuts down the park’s security system in order to steal the specimens but unwittingly causes the catastrophe that sees our protagonists put in mortal danger.
Spielberg, gifted with a deft ability to stage jaw-dropping sequences of unparalleled tension and suspense, brings everything in his arsenal for Jurassic Park. His use of animatronics and puppets was learned and honed with Jaws in 1975 and 1982’s E.T., and his knack for high-concept science-fiction demonstrated in Close Encounters of the Third Kind; all of these combined for the ultimate blockbuster. What this director knows is that you can only warrant the pageantry and exhibitionism of seeing the dinosaurs by first letting us grow to care about the characters who must survive and escape them. The moments between Grant and Hammond’s grandchildren, Tim and Lex, serve a healthy dose of heart-warming sweetness. Watching the kids gradually erode Grant’s somewhat hardened exterior is a pleasure (“What do you call a blind dinosaur? Doyouthinkhesaurus”), and it makes the stakes all the higher when Tim and Lex are alone with the Velociraptors.
Jurassic Park really does exemplify what a truly great big-budget adventure can be. Spielberg has proved countless times that he’s a master of that genre, and this existential extravaganza shows a maestro at the top of his game. The only real, genuine and sincere problem I have with the film? It raises the bar so high that very few blockbuster adventure movies released in the 30 years since have come even close to matching it.
