Why are there no good dinosaur films?

The other thing that differentiates Spielberg's original work from all that's followed is the way it explored the details. From the sourcing of the amber, to the need to have paleontologists, botanists, and lawyers check Hammond's work, to the inclement weather, to the social interactions and workplace frustrations of the staff -- it all felt like much more of a living, breathing park than any of the renderings since. Like someone took out a sheet of paper and said, "If someone actually built this thing, what problems would they have to deal with?"

The newer movies -- even Spielberg's own sequel -- don't capture that. They start with some park or island miraculously up and running, no explanation needed. They hand us predetermined good and bad guys whose motivations seem less complex, more contrived. Jurassic World didn't give me the sense that anyone struggled and triumphed in creating the park. It was just hand-waved into existence, in a way that cheapens the ensuing drama.

A lot of strong opinions in the article, but Ebert wasn't stupid and wrong. He said - correctly, I think - that there was a sense of awe and wonder at the first dino scene, with the Brontosauruses:

  "But consider what could have been. There is a scene very early in the film where Neill and Dern, who have studied dinosaurs all of their lives, see living ones for the first time. The creatures they see are tall, majestic leaf-eaters, grazing placidly in the treetops. There is a sense of grandeur to them. And that is the sense lacking in the rest of the film, which quickly turns into a standard monster movie, with screaming victims fleeing from roaring dinosaurs."

*I'm sure I got the species slightly wrong, the long-necked extra-big ones

I didn't see any references to Rebirth, and I see that this was published before the latest film came out, so I'm guessing the author didn't want to wait to publish in case anything in there would have changed the tone of this essay. Having seen it this past weekend, rest assured that it would not have.

There's a bit of backstory in the new one about how dinosaur zoos are closing, and that no one wants to see dinosaurs anymore. That premise struck me as strange, as people have been going to zoos for a lot longer than these fictional dinosaur zoos would have been open, and so I have to wonder if it was aimed as a little dig at audiences. The rest of the film ends up exactly as the post spells out. Hollow characters with forced exposition and mutant dinosaurs that you haven't seen in any book, making them just another monster in a monster movie. Maybe it's just that Jurassic Park was the first movie to really capture the size and scale, bringing these creatures to life, and in doing so, became the standard bearer and yardstick to which all future movies get compared to. You'll never get to experience that sense of awe and wonder again. Maybe in another few generations when the original JP falls out of the cultural consciousness.

My son is a dinosaur enthusiast to say the least.

At some point, well into his accumulation of Dino facts we read an old book I had as a kid (mid 80s) and the book says all kinds of weird stuff I forget but abruptly ends with “they went extinct and we may never know how” and my son (age 4 at the time) is at a loss for words, “it was a asteroid dad, what dummy wrote this book?” For weeks he’d randomly look at me, “hey dad, remember that book that didn’t even know how dinosaurs went extinct? Sigh with disappointment.”

I hadn’t realized this was such a contemporary discovery that it wasn’t even part of my own initial understanding and education on the topic.

I adore the opening shots of Jurassic Park.

If you recall, the opening scene has a dinosaur being transferred from a container to a pen. If you haven't seen it for a while, you might remember seeing the attack. I know I did.

But go back and watch it, you might be surprised.

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Also, I challenge you to find a better technical exposition scene than Mr. DNA. Seriously, if you can think of a better technical exposition scene, I'd love to know it.

Because there's only one story to tell, for adults, and it's the Jurassic Park (et al.) story.

You can't tell a period story for adults, with dinosaurs birthed normally and no modern science, because then it's not a 'talkie', and we're about a century past it being possible to have the budget for a state of the art dinosaur-prop film with no dialogue.

> ”Nor did a lack of movement from prey visually impair the great beast’s hunt for flesh … “Don’t move. It can’t see us if we don’t move.”

This seems to work with birds, though. They can be oblivious to your presence even at a short distance if you stay still. But any movement will startle them and they’ll fly off. I guess that’s where this idea comes from.

But of course, ancient predators with forward-facing eyes probably worked quite differently.

In the book I found the character of Ian Malcolm fascinating. He was the math guy, grounded in "chaos theory" which basically posited that things don't work out the way you plan.

Jeff Goldblum's portrayal was pretty spot on for me - sure that it would all end in tears, and yet unwilling to leave simply because the opportunity to see his math play out in real life was irresistible.

And his line in movie 2 (or 3?) About how "it always starts with oooh and ahhh, but then comes the running, and screaming, and tearing of flesh" is such a meta observation of the film, and life in general, that it's always resonated with me.

And Ian delivers it perfectly- as if to say "I know how this plays, just like you do, but fate / math says I have to be here, so here I am. I'm right where I'm supposed to be."

"It's a Unix system. I know this." They don't make lines like this today I tell ya.

I’m not sure if “kicking in open doors” is an idiom in English, but this is a good example of that concepts. This is basically a rehearse of old tropes.

Hollywood has lost its story telling edge.

Jurassic park is inaccurate but successfully combines historical context with fictional storytelling, creating a sense of awe and reverence for dinosaurs.

Modern dinosaur films often suffer from heavy reliance on CGI and lacks soul.

The article is basically these points made over and over

So ironically the article is exactly what it accuses Hollywood of being: unoriginal and boring.

If you love hard-science dinosaur books, I cannot recommend Abby Howard's "Earth Before Us" series: https://www.goodreads.com/series/257878-earth-before-us

They are so so SO good, they have so much care about the science while also being delightfully whimsical and the art is beautiful. Please check them out!

I actually really enjoy dinosaur movies when I watch them with my toddler. To him, big dinos chasing people is pretty much peak cinema. Watching it with him is so much more entertaining than doing it alone, and tbh, the last thing I want to see is artslop where dinosaurs are a metaphor for the director's divorce or insecure aging professionals trying to feel better about their midlife crisis or whatever.

Dinosaur movies are really good at doing what they're supposed to do, lest we end up with one more genre sucked into the black hole of prestige entertainment.