Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

Score:  B-

Directed by J.A. Bayona
Starring Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Rafe Spall
Running time: 128 minutes
Rated PG-13

Long Story Short:  Fallen Kingdom is the fifth entry in the Jurassic dinosaur film franchise, one that continues to amp up the action - but diminish the overall quality.  Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard lead again, but of course it's the dinosaurs that are the real stars.  There are some massive, awe-inspiring sets, but at the cost of much of the series' trademark mystery and wonder.  The script and overall quality are weaker, too, but if you have a family in tow, it's still recommended.


Several years after the Jurassic World park was compromised and evacuated, Isla Nublar has returned to the headlines.  The island's volcano is set to erupt, possibly wiping out the only dinosaurs remaining on Earth.  While some, like Dr. Malcolm (Goldblum), prefer to let nature take its course, others, like Claire Dearing (Howard) and her Dinosaur Protection Group, want to save as many of them as possible.  Unable to get government support, Claire is relieved to find that Jurassic World's co-founder, Sir Lockwood (Cromwell), hopes to create a new island dinosaur sanctuary.  Although she has long since split up with him, Claire manages to get former park trainer Owen (Pratt) to accompany her to the island on the rescue mission.  As they race against the clock, they discover that there are others with more nefarious plans for the extraordinary yet deadly creatures.

Fallen Kingdom features the same co-stars from the last film, and introduces a slate of others who, for the most part, serve as dino fodder.  While Chris Pratt was Jurassic World's primary lead, this time he splits the focus pretty evenly with Bryce Dallas Howard's Claire.  It's still based on a clash of personalities, with Owen being the animal behavior expert, unsentimental save for the raptor he trained, and Claire being the more passionate, invested character.  However, Claire's motivation has swerved rather drastically: in Jurassic World, she fought to save the business of the park, and in Fallen Kingdom she has become an ardent conservationist with no thought to financial gain.  Bryce does a decent job selling it, but it's a pretty convenient flip-flop.  Meanwhile, Pratt is still fun but doesn't get nearly as much time; much more standard heroics as opposed to his unique deadpan wit.  The most significant new character is Lockwood's granddaughter, Maisie, essentially the latest version of the child-victim surrogate for the audience, and Eli Mills as Rafe is the new conniving villain; both are fine but forgettable.  Trailers and commercials teased the return of Jeff Goldblum's Ian Malcolm, but it's essentially a cameo appearance.

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is an entertaining summer blockbuster, but it also accelerates its predecessor's shift away from the original, leaving the franchise with a questionable future.  Both in tone and in many plot elements, Fallen Kingdom is to Jurassic World what The Lost World was to Jurassic Park.  The majesty of the first, optimistic despite the inevitable collapse of the parks and the ensuing chaos, makes way for a darker tone through both a plot emphasizing the exploitation of the dinosaurs for (especially) bad purposes and thus the dangers posed by other humans.  Just like Jurassic World took the original's park-based formula and magnified its scope significantly, Fallen Kingdom does the same to The Lost World.  They're not just trying to take dinosaurs to a sanctuary, they're saving them from a Cataclysmic Event in the form of a volcano.  The bad guys are not just trying to start a new park, they are developing all new Genetic Monsters out of them and selling them to other bad guys around the world.  In trying to do so much, Fallen Kingdom loses almost all of the mystery and suspense that were crucial elements of the first two Jurassic films.  The camera lingers on the new, genetically-designed dino (an aspect already used in Jurassic World and thus less effective), and so it loses its menace quickly.  There are some effective, top-quality action scenes, like the pre-credits scene - taking place at night, in the rain, one of the few semi-unpredictable moments - and some clever, even amusing ones like a ram-headed dino causing chaos in a crowd.  But others, like the centerpiece set of dinos fleeing the erupting volcano, do more to show off what they can do with CGI now rather than creating tense (much less even slightly realistic) action - it also doesn't help that so much of it was in the advertising.  Oh, and don't even bother listening to the dialogue, which is among the most cringe-worthy of recent years.

***

Fallen Kingdom takes another step away from the original Jurassic Park, disappointing to us devotees of that film, but it still has considerable general entertainment value, particularly for younger audiences.  It's now clear that the Jurassic franchise is mirroring what happened to Star Wars.  The originals were released, and then after a long hiatus, a new set of films were made in an entirely different tone.  Jurassic Park and The Lost World of course showed how spectacular its dinosaurs were, but open melees were kept at a minimum in favor of more intimate, suspenseful sets; the target audience was adults and older children.  Jurassic World and Fallen Kingdom is turning the franchise into a more family-oriented series; they accentuate the massive scenes of adventure and action and downplay the scares.  I'd also argue the new films are increasingly dumbed down and fantasized.  Still entertaining, certainly, just in a much different way.  So for families, I'd recommend this one; otherwise, go see it if you just want a big (if fairly simplistic) blockbuster.




By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=54381260