This post contains some small spoilers, so be aware if you plan to see this movie but haven’t yet.  Discussion of the movie in comments may also contain spoilers. There won’t be any major spoilers in this review.

Jurassic World is the fourth movie in the Jurassic Park franchise. Coming some 14 years after Jurassic Park 3 it has been a long wait for fans. Although not an avid fan I did enjoy the first three movies and I enjoyed this one too. The movie is set in the present day, although with more advanced technology in dinosaur cloning obviously and deals with the intervening period between the original Jurassic Park movie/park and the current iteration quite cleverly.

How awesome is Bryce Dallas Howard? Really awesome in this movie. She is an excellent leading lady. Her leading man is played by Chris Pratt.

Things I liked:

There isn’t a huge age disparity between the leading lady and the leading man.
The story is interesting and carries on the story arc of the earlier Jurassic movies but tells its own story as well.
The cast of people is diverse and the Bechdel test and the Racial Bechdel test (I’m sure this has another name but my googlefu has deserted me tonight) are both passed.
The product placement (that I noticed) is subtle.
The animatronics and  CGI were pretty good in my opinion. But I am not an expert in either so feel free to point out any glaring errors you noticed, in comments.
The baddies were satisfyingly bad but adversity was overcome.
Family relationships were realistically awkward at times.

Things I wasn’t so keen on:

Although the cast was racially diverse I don’t recall seeing anyone with a visible disability. I would expect that at least one person using a wheelchair or scooter would still be interested in going to a dinosaur theme park. They may have been there, but I don’t recall seeing anyone in the crowd scenes. The only relationships mentioned in the movie were hetero.
There were a couple of stereotypes which I think could have been left behind, which played out in the minor characters.
Either of the main characters could have been POC without changing the story in any way.
The shoes! OMG the shoes. I mean really.

But generally I found this an enjoyable addition to the Jurassic movies. We took Ms 9 which in retrospect probably wasn’t the best idea, it was a bit scary for her. In our defence she wanted to go so that her brother, who was seeing it with friends, couldn’t spoil it for her. I spent a lot of time cuddling her, and some time with my hand over her eyes so she couldn’t see the particularly scary bits. But thankfully none of us have had nightmares.

I’m guessing that there is also scope for a sequel. It will be interesting to see where they go with that, if it does eventuate.

Categories: arts & entertainment, Culture, fun & hobbies, Life

Tags: dinosaurs, Indominus Rex, Jurassic World, movies