Released: June 22, 2018. Directed by: J.A. Bayona. Starring: Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Rafe Spall. Runtime: 2h 8 min.
This review contains spoilers.
Picking up three years after 2015’s Jurassic World, the dinosaurs on the island of Isla Nublar are in danger as the island’s volcano is about to explode and the U.S. Senate rules that they aren’t going to intervene with the dinosaur’s deaths.
Meanwhile, Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard) now leads an organization called the Dinosaur Protection Group and the film’s adventure kicks off when she receives a call from Eli Mills (Rafe Spall) – who works for an old friend of John Hammond – that they plan to relocate the dinosaurs to a different island where they can live peacefully.
Raptor specialist Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) also tags along because Blue is still on the island and her survival is his motivation. The first half of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom features decent action on the island. But for the most part, the film’s more of the same, as we learn that Mills plans to sell the dinosaurs as weapons at an auction at his boss’s manor.
Spall’s great but his character is one-note and another forgettable human villain of the new trilogy. He’s also like Hoskins (Vincent D’Onofrio) of the first film, who wanted to use the raptors as weapons. Hoskins suggested dinosaurs could replace robots as war’s future, but now they can replace robots and combat nuclear war. But the argument’s basically the same and it’s annoying that they repeat all of this.
The main point is these dinosaurs are deadly and can turn on you at any point. That’s something Owen understands. He’s badass and the videos of him raising Blue are heartwarming. His development isn’t expanded on other than that. Claire’s development keeps growing as someone who loves the dinosaurs, an interesting change from when she only cared about her career and thought of the dinosaurs as numbers on a spreadsheet. Pratt and Dallas Howard still have a good chemistry.
The film has such a focus on its plot that it doesn’t develop Owen and Claire further than that and focuses on the new characters. This includes Franklin Webb (Justice Smith), a nerdy programmer who brings humour, and dinosaur veterinarian Zia Rodriguez (Daniella Pineda), who is super likable and has more purpose than Franklin.
Also new is Benjamin Lockwood (James Cromwell), Eli Mills’ boss, who is retconned into the universe as someone who helped John Hammond develop cloning technology. I was confused because I couldn’t remember if we ever saw him in previous films – Claire is very excited to meet him and we do not feel this excitement – but he’s just a new character.
His granddaughter Maisie Lockwood (Isabella Sermon) is our eyes and ears at the manor for the first half of the film as she listens in on Spall’s conversations – like when he yells at her because he’s on a very important phone call – as the heroes are still on the island. She’s fine and has a nice chemistry with Owen and Claire, but her character does have silly moments.
The film’s mostly non-stop action but it does have some nice, emotional moments. This includes a shot of a dinosaur that closes a chapter on the island. It’s well directed by J.A. Bayona and the cinematography by Oscar Faura – who’s shot Bayona’s four feature films – elicits such emotion in this scene.
Bayona capably directs the scenes on the island and finds his stride when the film’s tone evolves and turns into what you’d imagine a Jurassic Park-themed haunted house would be like. He delves into fears of monsters coming in through your window in one tense scene. Michael Giacchino’s score matches these scenes perfectly, and Oscar Faura’s cinematography is my favourite aspect.
It’s a nice change of pace from the first half of the film where characters run from dinosaurs on a giant island. Now, they’re running from a new creation in a gigantic mansion. The tone changes believably with the story and it has a decent flow – even if everything’s not interesting. Much of the film’s tone is dire – which makes sense, since it is a fallen kingdom.
Score: 65/100
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