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Jurassic World: Rebirth

It's hard to keep track but this is the SEVENTH film in the Jurassic Park/World franchise and, aside from new characters and a couple of nice lines, it's pretty much the same as the others. The first film in 1993 has earnt its reputation as a high water mark in effects cinema (though I've never been a huge fan). To say returns have diminished since would be an understatement.

This film jettisons the 'new' cast (Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard) and the original cast (Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum), who returned on and off, for a fresh bunch of potential dino-feed, led by Scarlett Johansson and Mahershala Ali. They play mercenaries who are hired to extract samples from three of the biggest free-roaming dinosaurs left in the equatorial region. The reason? Big Pharma believe these blood samples will help the fight against heart disease, and the trillions in returns won't hurt either.

There are quite a few exciting sequences and the film's structure is both simple and helpful (kind of like the Four Weddings and a Funeral of dinosaur flicks). You could see this as tight, functional plotting or patronising, spoon-feeding....your choice. The film is written by David Koepp, the guy responsible for writing the first film, as well as a range of good to average famous films like Panic Room, Spider-Man, War of the Worlds and two (the most recent) Indiana Jones films.

Koepp and director Gareth Edwards lift from Aliens, Predator (thanks Rob), but most egregiously, from the other Jurassic films. The trope of the innocent family that the audience is prodded to sympathise with is here; as is the bozo kid who redeems himself; the cute creature that another kid adopts; and the hero parent who hopefully give us somebody 'real' to act as our surrogate. And of course, the expendable characters with metaphorical targets on their heads.

There's a great line about accounting, and the boss level T-rex/Beluga Whale cross was a sight to behold. Johansson's Zora and Jonathan Bailey's cute nerd scientist, Henry, have a nice platonic thing going on (that might be consummated in further editions). Rupert (Orlando) Friend (Bloom) is honkingly wicked and Ali brings some Oscar cred to the cast.

In the great wash-up though, this fails to breath anything new into the series. It'll still smear itself in filthy lucre, so what do I know?

See also:

Edwards's Rogue One (2016) is among the top 3 Star Wars films and Michael Crichton (from whose book all this has spawned) directed and adapted his own book Westworld (1973).

(Film stills and trailer ©Universal, 2025)

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