Steven Spielberg is arguably the most successful film maker in modern Hollywood. His ability to create long-running sequence of commercially successful films was bound to bring him to the position of great influence. His influence wasn't always the most beneficial for the American film industry - each of his triumphs was accompanied by multitude of disasters, usually for those who unsuccessfully tried to copy his formula. Spielberg's influence through the years also reflected in narrowing the base of cinema audience - big feature films these days are created mainly for children or teenagers, thus having their content strictly limited. Spielberg also contributed to the rise of so called "event movies" - extremely expensive, spectacular and relentlessly hyped films where certain gimmick or "high concept" was promoted at the expense of story, characters and all the other elements that make truly great films. All those issues could be seen in one of Spielberg's most successful films, 1993 adventure film Jurassic Park.
The "high concept" behind Jurassic Park was based on the plot very popular in science fiction genre, especially among authors preferring adventure to the extrapolation of boring scientific facts - modern human characters who are, somehow, able to interact with dinosaurs, magnificent creatures that became extinct 65 million years ago and that are nevertheless able to inspire awe simply by being fossilised skeletons in museums. In his novel, developed together with the film, Michael Chricton used modern technology and ingenious way of bringing dead giants to life – by extracting remains of DNA from ancient fossils, scientific labs with enough equipment and financial backing could, at least theoretically, create living embryos of the extinct creatures. In the film, company led by eccentric John Hammond (played by Richard Attenborrrough) has done not only that, but actually grew those embryos into full-size adult specimens. They are put on the island off the coast of Costa Rica where they should serve as attractions in the world's greatest theme park. The project doesn't go as smoothly as planned and Hammond is forced to bring few experts to evaluate risks and hopefully calm the investors. The experts are palaeontologist Dr. Alan Grant (played by Sam Neill), his girlfriend Dr. Ellie Sattler (played by Laura Dern) and mathematician Dr. Ian Malcolm (played by Jeff Goldblum). Their tour of the island turns into nightmare when Hammond's greedy computer expert Ian Nedry (played by Wayne Knight) sabotages theme park's security systems in order to steal embryos. With security systems out of order, animals are free to roam around and some of them start hunting helpless humans for food.
There are many things wrong with Jurassic Park, but lacking focus isn't one of them. Spielberg engaged this project with one very simple and clear aim -bringing to screen the most realistic and the most convincing dinosaurs possible. In doing so he invested almost all of his creative energy and gathered around him the team made out of Hollywood's top special effects experts. With enough money and advanced technology at their disposals, those experts achieved more than impressive results. Old techniques like animatronics and stop-motion photography were complemented by brave and ingenious introduction of CGI. Until Jurassic Park, CGI technology was still new, untested and seldom used in feature films. It was considered next to impossible to have computer generated images that could pass as living and realistic objects and interact with human actors. Spielberg's team did just that and Jurassic Park started revolution that would change Hollywood by making many impossible films possible.
Some effects of that revolution weren't positive and the most obvious is CGI technology and its display becoming not only the main, but the only attraction in the films. This problem can be seen even in Jurassic Park. By having his eyes set on recreation of dinosaurs, Spielberg paid very little attention towards anything else. That included the script by Michael Crichton and David Koepp, which didn't provide film with memorable characters or strong plot. Unlike Jaws, Spielberg's 1975 film which Jurassic Park is most compared to, human characters play second fiddle to the monster and the actors playing them didn't do anything to write home about. The only exception is Richard Attenborrough, whose character of well-meaning but childish theme park tycoon creates some kind of sympathy among audience. The other characters are one-dimensional, cartoonish or behaving like idiots. Sam Neill and Laura Dern, actors so capable in other films, are forgettable, just like Jeff Goldblum, wasted in the role that consists of delivering cool one-liners, some oversimplified scientific theories and doing nothing. Other actors are terribly miscast, like Bob Peck in the totally unconvincing role of big game hunter who couldn't handle paper tiger or Wayne Knight as one of the most ineffective comic reliefs in the history of cinema. Two adorable children, played by Joseph Mazzelo and Ariana Richards, are more than obviously added only to increase film's revenues in family audience and, as such, they only help to shatter illusion so carefully constructed by special effects crew. With dinosaurs alone, Jurassic Park could have been exciting adventure; with Crichton's and Koepp's characters audience can sense that they are watching prosaic Hollywood blockbuster.
The plot also conspires to harm film's general credibility. While the way in which the dinosaurs (both in the film and the novel) have been recreated looks convincing, the circumstances behind their rampage do not. They point not only towards poor storytelling and lack of creativity, but also towards rather obvious attempt to fool less perceptive segments of the audience. Anyone comparing novel with the film would notice that the number of dinosaurs and human characters was reduced; while reduction of the former can be justified with financial considerations and insufficiently developed CGI technologies, the latter can't be explained. The theme park is threatened by tropical hurricane -the response of the park's management is evacuation of the technicians, scientists, security and any other personnel in the very situation when their presence would be required to handle emergencies. Even worse example of management is theme park's over-dependence on single computer network and single individual which allows even the minor and very probable accidents, rather than elaborate scheme of malevolent genius, to lead to complete disaster.
All that, of course, can be explained by Spielberg's pandering to technophobia and other cultural trends that were dominating 1990s Hollywood. That includes pandering to American audience's hatred of legal profession, best seen in the way of greedy corporate lawyer, played by Martin Ferrero, gets portrayed and disposed of. Even more obvious is pandering to Luddism, vegetarianism, neo-Roussean ideas of "return to nature" and other extreme forms of "political correctness" that ran rampant in early 1990s America. The film takes schizophrenic stance towards the whole idea of genetically recreating long-extinct animals - while explicitly showing the whole procedure to be wrong and sinful it doesn't take the logical step in dealing with that sin and removing its aftermath. Because of that, our characters, despite having means and opportunity to do so, don't use the very raw but effective methods of getting rid of rampaging man- eaters. At the very end of the film, when common sense (and Spielberg's original storyboards) would point towards that course of action, the dirty deed is provided by one of the most unconvincing examples of deus ex machina in the history of cinema.
Jurassic Park can still inspire some awe, even after the decade in which CGI technology advanced beyond anyone's expectations. But ground-breaking films (or commercially successful, like this one) don't always have to be good. All those who really want to see CGI put to good use or some intelligent films about dinosaurs could do themselves much better favour if they watch Walking with Dinosaurs or similar science documentaries.
RATING: 4/10 (+)
(Note: The text in its original form was posted in Usenet newsgroup rec.arts.films.reviews on January 26th 2004)
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