Wednesday 28 September 2011

Jurassic Park (1993)



Hold on to your Butts!

Jurassic Park really doesn’t need any introduction. An absolutely fantastic adventure that blew me away when I saw it back in ‘93, and still looked amazing this year when it was re-released for a short time. I’d forgotten how amazing the initial T-Rex attack is! Every bit as breathtaking as the train crash in Super 8 or the train/robot shootout in Sucker Punch. The cast is completely superb, Spielberg really knows how to direct this kind of action, and John William’s score is so evocative (I still got goosebumps as the music swelled while the helicopter first lands on the island).

Of course an important part of the film are the dinosaurs; and ILM’s groundbreaking (in ‘93) CG blend seamlessly with Stan Winston’s incredible animatronic creatures. However, the amazing thing I noticed this time was actually there is not that much dinosaur action in the film! Sounds crazy huh? Well it just so happens that the excellent cast infer as many terrible lizards as we see. It has been said that 80% of acting is reacting (I just made that figure up, but you know what I mean), and Jurassic Park really demonstrates this. None more so than Dr Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern):

The Shiznit does it best: http://www.theshiznit.co.uk/feature/jurassic-park-week-the-many-faces-of-dr-ellie-sattler.php

Laura isn’t the only one to get her dino-reaction on though:



and the fabulous Nedry (Wayne Knight):


In fact, other than the dinosaurs I think Nedry might be my favourite thing; he’s just so brilliantly nervous, not really wanting to get into any kind of trouble, yet absolutely loving the espionage gizmos! Though actually Jeff Goldblum is typically brilliant; and Richard Attenborough is great; and John Williams’ score is amazing; and that T-Rex scene is truly outstanding! Dammit! It’s all fantastic. I want to see it again, now!

No comments:

Post a Comment