Movie Review: 'The Lost World - Jurassic Park'

Pros: Great CGI dinos, good John Williams score, and at least it's fast-paced.

Cons: Formulaic story, and the third act seemed forced.

Although Jurassic Park (in both novel and movie formats) was bound to spawn sequels just as Jaws did, it didn't have to fall into movie by the numbers territory, yet, surprisingly, The Lost World does just that. Even though screenwriter David Koepp, director Steven Spielberg, some cast members and all the techno-wizards are back for this 1997 sequel, one comes away from watching The Lost World - Jurassic Park wondering if Spielberg had his mind elsewhere...perhaps thinking about such projects as Amistad and Saving Private Ryan,or poring over script ideas for Indiana Jones IV. It's not an awful movie, mind you, otherwise I would not own it. But it isn't that great, either, and that is disappointing, considering it is a Steven Spielberg film.

Once again screenwriter Koepp takes a few scenes from Michael Crichton's equally uninspired sequel (which I have started to read but never finished) and tacks on several new ideas that were not in the novel.

This is okay, I suppose, because Jurassic Park also took liberties with its story to make it more kid-friendly. (By now, I'm sure, those who have read the novel know that Hammond in the movie bears little resemblance to the literary Hammond; I always pictured the book's eccentric billionaire looking like the old Mafioso in Prizzi's Honor rather than the almost cuddly Richard Attenborough.)

The plot, such as it is, revolves around InGen's Site B, the "factory floor" where the actual breeding of the dinosaurs was done. Located on Isla Sorna, some 87 miles away from the now infamous Isla Nublar, Site B was destroyed by Hurricane Clarissa, and dinosaurs which were supposedly lysine-dependent (if they did not ingest enough of that enzyme they would not live longer than a week...but then they were all females and supposedly could not breed, either!) are now thriving.

Unfortunately, InGen is now under the control of Hammond's nephew Peter Ludlow (Arliss Howard), and its board of directors, dealing with the corporation's impending bankruptcy, wants to exploit Site B to recoup the losses resulting from the "incident" at Jurassic Park. The nephew is no brighter than his uncle, however, since his scheme is potentially more dangerous than a dinosaur theme park on an isolated island.

Meanwhile, Hammond has a counter-scheme of his own. Knowing that only public opinion can rally support for his desire to preserve Isla Sorna as a refuge for the dinosaurs, Hammond recruits (bribes, actually) a small team of experts -- chaos theory maven Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), documentarian Nick Van Owen (Vince Vaughn), paleontologist Sarah Harding (Julianne Moore) and field equipment expert Eddie Carr (The West Wing's Richard Schiff) -- to film and document the dinosaurs before Ludlow and his team of poachers, led by hunter Roland Tembo (Pete Postlewhaite) can "harvest" some dinosaurs and take them to Jurassic Park San Diego.

As action pictures go, The Lost World is technically impressive. Four years of improvements in CGI techniques make the dinosaurs more lifelike, and Spielberg's talent shines through in the various set pieces where sheer action is involved.

However, the last act of the movie, when Ludlow's scheme of taking a T-Rex to San Diego goes disastrously awry, seems forced, as if Spielberg had planned it for Jurassic Park III but decided to tack on to this movie. Missing in action, too, are Sam Neill and Laura Dern, whose absence is never explained. Instead we get a subplot involving one of Malcolm's daughters who tags along to Isla Sorna in a pale attempt to echo the kids-in-peril subplot of the first film.

Of course, the movie looks and sounds good, and John Williams provides a nifty score, including a "Daktari" like theme that recurs throughout the film. The DVD transfer is good, and the extra features are okay...

Overall, this is good to watch on a slow summer day or night when everything else on TV is on reruns. At least it's better than those awful reality shows.