Jurassic World (a movie review post)

The first thing I want to say about Jurassic World is that it was much better than I expected it to be. Much. I liked Jurassic Park well enough but the sequels were... well, they were less than good. None of it inspired high expectations from a movie that has the appearance of being nothing more than a car on the Chris Pratt star train. Which is nothing against Chris Pratt, because I've been a fan of his since season one of Parks and Recreation.

Since we're already talking about Pratt, let's just continue to do that. Pratt was fine. Good, even. But it wasn't a part that called for Pratt, and he didn't do anything to make it his, not like with Guardians of the Galaxy. Peter Quill is inseparable from Chris Pratt, because Pratt made that part his. The most that the part of Owen Grady called for was for Pratt to be "a badass," or at least to look like one. He pulled that off, but it didn't take any particular acting skill.

Bryce Dallas Howard, on the other hand, does show considerable skill as the aloof Claire. It's not a role I've seen her play before; though, to be fair, I haven't seen her in a lot. Still, I think she did a good job as the woman trying to be in total control. Of everything.

The one I was really impressed with was Vincent D'Onofrio. I kept looking at him and wondering where I'd seen him before and just couldn't put my finger on it. I had to look up that he's the Kingpin in the current Daredevil series from Netflix. The two roles are widely divergent and, while I think he is the weak link in Daredevil, I now think it's because of some combination of the writing and directing rather than him just being a poor actor.

For Jurassic World, the kids prove to be the weakest element. Neither of them are completely convincing, though I think it's due at least in part to weak writing. Like the scene where Gray unexpectedly breaks down comes out of nowhere and is included just to make explicit something the writers had failed to be previously explicit about. Also, Zach's interest in girls. Which isn't odd except that they firmly establish that he has a girlfriend then repeatedly show him checking out other girls but that doesn't go anywhere have any impact on anything. It adds nothing to the story other than to muddle his personality.

Beyond that, the issues are only details, though there were two that bothered me more than the others. The first was the eggs hatching during the opening credits, which was completely wrong. Things that hatch from eggs hatch with their beaks and, if they don't have beaks, they generally have an egg tooth. Sometimes, they have both. The other thing was the kids getting one of the abandoned cars started, a 20 year abandoned car. I don't know much about cars, but I know enough to know that 1. car batteries don't hold a charge for that long and 2. even if they did, gasoline actually goes "bad." The idea that the boys, who had only ever helped work on a car once, could get one of those jeeps working was pretty much ludicrous.

BUT! Overall, it was a pretty decent movie and certainly worth seeing on the big screen. Despite Pratt not really being in a role that called for him, he was good, and his character was certainly the most interesting. Besides, the scene where he rides his motorcycle along with the velociraptors is almost worth the cost of the movie.