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Yahoo
13-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Jurassic World: Rebirth' Review: For the Love of God, Can Something Please Kill All the Dinosaurs Again
The 'Jurassic' franchise has long become a lot like the bioengineered mutant dinosaur — amusingly dubbed 'Distortus Rex' — that escapes from an InGen research facility in the series' loud nap of a new installment: Pointless to keep alive but impossible to kill. The mere existence of Gareth Edwards' 'Jurassic World: Rebirth' would have been enough to clarify that condition, and yet this back-to-basics standalone — arriving just a few summers after the franchise's bone-dumb second trilogy ended with a billion-dollar blah — takes pains to remind us that the 'Jurassic' period won't stop printing money just because Universal doesn't know how to spend it. To misquote a certain mathematician: 'Your executives were so unpreoccupied with whether or not they should, they didn't stop to think if they could.' More from IndieWire 'The Naked Gun' Is the Most Important Movie of the Summer Celine Song Says Audiences Are 'Scared' of Taking Rom-Coms Seriously Due to 'Misogyny' In that sense, and in that sense only, I have no choice but to admit that Edwards' installment lives up to its much-advertised promise as a tribute to the 1993 masterpiece that started it all. 'Rebirth' certainly isn't any better than the previous five sequels that have already hatched from the original (though I'm relieved to report that it's less bloated and self-impressed than the last three), but the sheer nothingness of its spectacle — combined with a complete non-story that feels like it was 65 million studio notes in the making — allows it to become a singularly perfect legacy for Steven Spielberg's classic about how people lack the power to control their own creations. Life finds a way, and no 'Jurassic' movie since the first one has more convincingly illustrated how, in the absence of evolution, survival is forced to become its own reward. That idea is baked into the premise of David Koepp's script, which takes place 32 years after 'dinosaurs came back,' and roughly a decade after people grew bored of them (Koepp very much included). Parks aren't profitable, museums are empty, and the fine citizens of DUMBO just honk their horns at each other when a massive herbivore escapes from the zoo for a nap under the Brooklyn Bridge. And as if things weren't bad enough for our cold-blooded friends, it turns out that global warming isn't the best vibe for prehistoric lizards, and most of the remaining dinosaurs have retreated to a handful of equatorial islands whose climate more closely resembles the ancient world. We don't bother them, they don't bother us, and nature is left to run its course — or it would have been if not for all of those meddling corporations. This time it's a pharmaceutical giant called ParkerGenix, whose scientists have discovered that a trillion-dollar cure for heart disease could be cultivated from the blood of the three biggest dinosaurs left on Earth. Naturally, they want to brand it before anyone else gets the chance (nothing revs up the imagination like a race for medical patents!), which is why they've given sleazebag goon Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend, serving yassified Dennis Nedry) the blank check necessary to hire a team capable of going to Skull Island — or whatever the abandoned InGen testing site is called — and getting the samples ParkerGenix needs. Leading the pack is former special-forces operative Zora Bennett (a pathologically chipper Scarlett Johansson, often rocking some casual Linda Hamilton cosplay), who's allegedly still reeling from the death of a beloved colleague on her most recent mission. I say 'allegedly' because she never shows a hint of human emotion, even after witnessing the death of a beloved colleague on her current mission, but everyone makes a point of paying their condolences for her loss. After walking away with $200 million of ParkerGenix's money, Zora will be able to pay for them herself. Her Suriname-based war buddy Duncan Kincaid (Mahershala Ali, whose role is all presence and no acting) is hoping for a similar reward. Getting rich wouldn't ease the grief he feels for his dead son, which is a mighty cheap device for a movie so uninterested in its characters (Koepp's script doesn't exactly follow through on the notion of people internalizing 'life finds a way' on their own terms), but getting chewed alive by dinosaurs wouldn't hurt the guy anymore than he already is. Ed Skrein is definitely also there, along with Bechir Sylvain and Philippine Velge, who might as well be wearing t-shirts that say 'eat me first.' Styled to look like Steve from 'Sex and the City,' 'Wicked' star Jonathan Bailey rounds out the team as the bookish paleontologist Henry Loomis, who studied under franchise icon Dr. Alan Grant, but is still dumb enough to go to an InGen island full of untamed dinosaurs. Adventurous dad Reuben Delgado (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) might be even dumber for thinking he can sail around it, as the known existence of prehistoric species doesn't stop him from steering his two daughters — and the older one's wastoid boyfriend — straight through Mosasaurus territory as they make their way across the Atlantic. (These characters are introduced with a Vampire Weekend song, which is an amusingly multiplex-brained way of teeing up the fact that Reuben's eldest is going to NYU in the fall.) Zora's crew bails them out from the inevitable attack that follows, but the dinos return with a vengeance, and it isn't long before all of the film's characters find themselves stranded on the same island where the Distortus Rex escaped from its enclosure during the film's prologue (a sequence that bears an uncanny resemblance to the prologue from Edwards' own 'Godzilla,' and is worth noting in a movie that betrays almost no other trace of its director's fingerprints). From there, the rest of the film adheres to video game logic: If Zora's team can successfully extract blood from a swimming dino (the aforementioned Mosasaurus), a land dino (Titanosaurus), and a sky dinosaur (Quetzalcoatlus), they'll unlock the secret fourth boss you've spent the whole movie waiting to show up. Spoiler alert: It does! Distortus is a big ugly chungus, and it basically does so little that its enormous paw tracks are the only impression its capable of leaving behind. That would be disappointing in and of itself, but it's even more so with an effects wizard like Edwards at the helm, whose 'Godzilla' remains among the most sweeping and majestic monster movies of the 21st century (in addition to being an unfathomably perfect audition reel for directing a 'Jurassic' sequel). It's no secret that Edwards joined 'Rebirth' just a short while before it raced into production, and that Universal targeted 'The Creator' creator because he was one of the only proven filmmakers capable of delivering a CGI-fest like this in time for its predetermined summer 2025 release date. And as we all remember from 'Jurassic Park,' there are never any negative consequences for operating on a timeline that prioritizes shareholder value above structural integrity. It would be disingenuous to suggest that 'Rebirth' is totally deprived of tolerable setpieces and/or well-engineered thrills; the T-Rex cameo has some fun with an inflatable raft, while the Quetzalcoatlus sequence introduces a high-flying pinch of 'Indiana Jones' into a movie so desperate to coast off Spielbergian magic that it doesn't seem to care where it comes from. Edwards might have done better to set his sights on Joe Johnson-level fun, as 'Rebirth' — which channels the straightforwardness of 'Jurassic Park III' — would kill for a single moment that matches the aura of the Pteranodon emerging from the fog. Alas, to a less explicit but similarly enervating degree as the previous 'Jurassic World' titles, this movie is undone by its need to make dinosaurs feel modern enough to compete against the rest of today's multiplex fare. Much as I appreciate Edwards' decision to shoot on 35mm film, his facility with CGI ends up being less of a feature than a bug in the context of a franchise that requires your brain to believe in the context of its franchise. The dinosaur attacks in the original movie are so terrifying because of how palpably they collapse 65 million years of animal instinct — and how credibly they straddle the line between nightmare fuel and waking life. When the T-Rex runs its claws along the unelectrified fence of its paddock, our intellectual discomfort at the idea of playing God suddenly crystallizes into the stuff of clear and present danger. When the kids are hiding from the Velociraptors in the kitchen, the suspense is rooted in the bone-deep belief that the dinosaurs are as real as the humans they're trying to eat and vice-versa, and that belief was sustained by the simplicity of the action at hand. 'Jaws' works because the shark didn't, and 'Jurassic Park' endures as a movie for the same reason it failed as a destination: People could only exert so much control over the attractions. 'Rebirth' has a scene where a pair of Titanosauruses make out. It's great that Edwards can make a Mosasaur look tangible enough to touch as it glides under the surface of the ocean, but his film's pencil-thin characters betray the reality of the CGI dinos chasing them, who seem that much faker as a result of the ability to make them do whatever the director wants. It's no wonder that none of the kids in 'Rebirth' are ever sufficiently petrified about their situation, or that 'Jurassic Park' continues to be the only one of these movies that doesn't feel like watching people enjoy a theme park ride second-hand. Needless to say, 'Rebirth' doesn't do itself any favors by so frequently harkening back to the original. Bad as some of the previous sequels have been, none of them have been so eager to measure themselves against Spielberg's masterpiece. Nothing in this movie is quite as maddening as the second trilogy's attempt to make audiences invest in a specific Velociraptor (though Edwards half-heartedly tries to sweeten us on an adorable baby Aquilops named Dolores), but the extent to which this franchise is just fending off its own extinction has never been more obvious than it is in during the 'Rebirth' sequence that pays homage to the kitchen encounter from the first movie. The 'Jurassic' sequels were bad enough when they made an effort to evolve — they're even less worth seeing now that they already come pre-fossilized. Universal Pictures will release 'Jurassic World: Rebirth' in theaters on Wednesday, July 2. Want to stay up to date on IndieWire's film and critical thoughts? to our newly launched newsletter, In Review by David Ehrlich, in which our Chief Film Critic and Head Reviews Editor rounds up the best new reviews and streaming picks along with some exclusive musings — all only available to subscribers. 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Screen Geek
07-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Screen Geek
'Jurassic World: Rebirth' Review: It's Fine And That's Okay
It's been ten years since audiences were reintroduced to the world of dinosaurs with the release of 2015's Jurassic World . Yeah, I feel like that Matt Damon aging gif too. The legacy sequels to 1993's Jurassic Park gave us three movies, whose entertaining quality dropped like a pterosaur nose-diving into the ocean. However, the trilogy generated enough of a box office return that Universal Pictures and Amblin Entertainment gave it another try with Jurassic World: Rebirth . Rebirth is set to be another step in continuing to build the franchise by giving us what we love about dinosaurs in the modern world. The combination of director Gareth Edwards and David Koepp's writing showcases that the franchise still has legs. This somewhat new direction for the series leans further into a Dino Crisis-like setting and might be worth exploring in future films. Jurassic World: Rebirth , directed by Edwards, takes the script by Koepp and adds a more horror and adventure element to the franchise. The story revolves around a group of mercenaries on a mission to reach a research island—formerly owned by InGen—where dinosaurs were previously experimented on. Heading the group is veteran former ex-military covert operative, Zora Bennett (Scarlett Johansson), and paleontologist Dr. Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey). Bennett and Loomis are recruited by Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend) of ParkerGenix to travel to the island and gather pure dinosaur biomaterial samples. The hope is that these samples may lead to the development of a medical drug that could potentially bring significant benefits to humanity. Koepp's script hits the ground running with some of its characters in the first Act. The writing cleverly explains how dinosaurs have impacted the world and how the world, in turn, has affected them. It simultaneously brings interest back into this world and reflects how we, as a society, have kind of moved on from dinosaurs. This was actually great for Koepp and Edwards to work in conjunction in sprinkling in moments of amazement when the dinosaurs were on screen. It harkened back to the days of the '93 film, which tapped into that nostalgic feeling that we have all grown accustomed to. Yet, Koepp dug a bit deeper to give the movie its entertaining spin. Jurassic World: Rebirth draws on concepts from the Michael Crichton novel, The Lost World , and injects some horror and more intense scenes. The idea of mutated dinosaurs and the high threat level in the movie is something that kept it entertaining for the most part. Edwards has a history of working in monster films, and his talent was the perfect addition to the movie. There were several scenes in Jurassic World: Rebirth where I held my breath due to the extreme peril some of the characters faced. It allowed the movie's action to escalate in multiple settings and locations where the characters found themselves. Additionally, the character work is both a positive and a negative aspect of Jurassic World: Rebirth . Johansson excels with the material and portrays her character in a way that is reminiscent of her portrayal of Natasha Romanoff, albeit in a more enjoyable manner. Johansson came across as a tour guide on a wild jungle ride, which had fundamental elements of danger. Bailey's character felt like a cross between Alan Grant and Ian Malcom. There were moments where Bailey showed an authentic love and passion for dinosaurs, like Grant, while playing up the realistic and no-nonsense characteristics of Malcolm. Another positive aspect of the acting came from Mahershala Ali, who played Duncan Kincaid. He and the family caught in the middle of this excursion were basically the heart of the movie. Luna Blaise, David Iacono, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Audrina Miranda, along with Ali, carried most of the emotional beats of the movie, giving the film that much-needed human connection. Although it did work when needed, it felt forced at times. Jurassic World: Rebirth stumbled during the first Act because the movie required me to connect with its characters too soon. Some of the emotional beats at the beginning and to some extent in the middle of the movie felt forced, as if they were demanding a reaction from me. There's a particular moment in Jurassic World: Rebirth where Johansson and Ali are reunited after being separated for years. The two were giving these heartfelt moments that might have looked good on paper, but ended up falling flat because they were too vague, as if setting up something that was never truly paid off. Lastly, there was a level of predictability in parts of the movie. Several characters were either not properly introduced or their presence was given short shrift. That action pretty much telegraphed who was going to die. Krebs is a character who might as well have been twirling his mustache as he grips the knife behind his back tightly. Philippine Velge and Bechir Sylvain barely have names for their characters and might as well have been referred to as Person 1 and Person 2. The movie tries to make their fates impactful, but I didn't feel anything. Jurassic World: Rebirth feels like a theme park ride for most of the movie, and that works for the B-level story. The movie might have thrived as a direct sequel to '93's Jurassic Park , and it works on some level in today's cinema world. The large, deadly dinosaur depicted in the 3rd Act has a unique appearance that lends a horror monster feel to the movie. The franchise's new direction can breathe new life into this series and is sure to be another hit for moviegoers. It's popcorn cinema for audiences, and that's okay. Grade: C
Indian Express
06-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
Jurassic World Rebirth: 7 hidden callbacks to the 1993 Jurassic Park you might've missed
Jurassic World Rebirth, the seventh installment in the dino-loving universe that just hit theatres, marks a new chapter for the franchise with new island and new faces. While writer David Koepp tried to tone down the callbacks, director Gareth Edwards went all in, slipping in throwback clues, familiar lines, and even reworking scenes to fit the new setup starring Scarlett Johansson and Jonathan Bailey. Rebirth tips its hat to various chapters of the franchise, but there are a few blink-and-you-miss-it nods to the classic 1993 Jurassic Park. In the original Jurassic Park, there's that unforgettable scene of the T-Rex chasing the jeep, with Laura Dern's Ellie Sattler, Jeff Goldblum's Ian Malcolm, and Bob Peck's Robert Muldoon scrambling to escape. Rebirth replays that moment with a twist, Rupert Friend's Martin Krebs gets the same 'objects in mirror are closer than they appear' shot in his car's side mirror. Edwards admitted he wanted to reuse the gag. Even though the scene didn't make the final cut, he snuck in the mirror close-up during the last New York shoot just to bring that hit of nostalgia. He told EW: 'I just said to the person who provides the vehicles, 'Is there any way you could just get the 'objects appear closer' on the wing mirror?'' Dr. Alan Grant, played by Sam Neill in the original trilogy, gets a nod during a convo between Zora and Henry. Jonathan Bailey's character mentions he studied under Grant. The director added subtle details props to back it up. Henry's bag has a patch from the Snakewater dig site (same one from Jurassic Park's opening), and there's a digging tool clipped to his belt, just like the one Grant used. 'It was as if it was a national park badge of that dig site, as if [Henry] had worked there as a kid,' Edwards said. Also read: Jurassic World Rebirth worldwide box office collection hits $100 million in two days; highest franchise opener yet in India In the original Jurassic Park, there is an iconic opening scene where Robert Muldoon and his crew try to transfer a Velociraptor into its pen. That's when the raptor attacks the handler and drags him inside the cage, the start that sets the tone of the entire film. Rebirth recreated the same energy but with a twist. The prologue, that goes back 17 years before the main story, shows how a candy wrapper causes malfunction at an InGen lab. The mistake, though tiny, gives D-Rex its chance to break free. Another brilliant Easter egg was the chemistry between Bailey and Johansson, it had the same energy Alan and Ellie shared in the first film. The relationship never turns romantic, and maybe that's exactly the point. Throughout the film, there's tension, the will-they-won't-they tease, but in the end, the story seems to follow Spielberg's move from back then. He'd actually shot a scene where Ellie and Alan kiss at a dig site, but edited it out later, probably thinking, when dinosaurs are out to kill you, who's got time to flirt? Also read: Jurassic World Rebirth movie review: Scarlett Johansson, Jonathan Bailey film keeps heart both pounding and beating Remember when Alan and Ellie saw their first Brachiosaurus, they looked at in awe, with John Williams theme song playing in the background to capture the essence. Rebirth recreates that same scene only this time with giant Titanosaurs mid-mating and with the same music. In one of the scenes, Isabella wears a T-shirt with a pelican on it. It's a direct tribute to the ending of Jurassic Park, where Alan and the kids watch pelicans flying off. The shirt even reads 'Life finds a way' in Spanish. Rebirth also gives that iconic ending a twist, this time, replacing pelicans with dolphins. The film ends with the survivors looking out from a boat, watching dolphins jump peacefully, signaling a return to normal life. Towards the end, Mutadons, the hybrids of raptors and Pteranodons, arrive to carry the legacy of raptors. Their attack scene plays out like a modern-day remix of the original raptor kitchen scene. But this time, it's not visitor center but an abandoned convenience store. There's even a chase sequence through underground tunnels, just like the air ducts from back in the day.
New Indian Express
05-07-2025
- Entertainment
- New Indian Express
Jurassic World Rebirth Movie Review: Mutates back to original form, but not in a spectacular fashion
Set years after the events happened at Isla Nublar, Ile Saint-Hubert is both narratively and geographically distant from the former location. What forms a connection is the corporate firm InGen, which has been running operations at both sites and shifted operations totally to the Ile Saint-Hubert facility after the destruction of the one on Nublar. The introduction of a facility on a different island, run for the same purposes, serves as an apt setup for unleashing new dinosaurs that have undergone such mutations with the potential to wreak more havoc in more unthinkable ways. Characterisation was touch-and-go, as the internal conflict between the team members had the trappings of a subplot worth paying attention to. The group's headspace was effectively established without consuming much time or many scenes. But the makers decide to introduce another picnicking family marooned to tag along with the crew following their rescue. The crew's response to the family illustrates who could be who and do what in dire situations. But this play was entirely possible within the team. The family of Reuben Delgado (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo), Teresa Delgado (Luna Blaise), Isabella Delgado (Audrina Miranda), and David Iacono (Xavier Dobbs) merely occupy the screen and some screentime, adding less value to the narration. The scary scenes involving little Isabella do cause tension and drama, but Zora's team isn't in any way more equipped than the family. In a battle against a creature that is superior in strength and size to any human, the child-baiting to create a thrill seemed unnecessary. This choice renders all the characters weak, preventing us from establishing an emotional connection with any of them. Neither the four primary characters nor the four other characters are explored sufficiently. If Jurassic World plans to expand, subsequent to Rebirth, the bad news is that all the characters blend into the background. Scarlett's Zora is the only role to have an arc. But it looks forced. She is this money-minded adventurer in one scene and, scenes later, wants to stop their samples from getting patented to prevent profiteering by one corporation. What brings this profound change in her? We are left waiting for answers, to no avail.
Geek Tyrant
04-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Geek Tyrant
JURASSIC WORLD: REBIRTH Behind-the-Scenes Footage Previews a Dinosaur-Fueled Survival Nightmare — GeekTyrant
Universal has released a thrilling behind-the-scenes look at Jurassic World: Rebirth , and if you thought this franchise had exhausted its supply of dinosaur chaos, think again. The footage teases a relentless survival story centered on the Delgado family, a group of unsuspecting civilians who stumble into the jaws of something much bigger than themselves. At the heart of the film is Site C, a brand-new location in the franchise's ever-growing mythos. But this isn't another Isla Nublar or Isla Sorna. Site C was InGen's dirty little secret—so hidden that not even most of the company knew it existed. This remote island wasn't built for tourists or attractions; it served as a shadowy testing ground for InGen's most extreme genetic experiments, including dinosaurs considered too aggressive, unstable, or unpredictable for any theme park setting. Basically, if Nublar was a zoo, Site C is a nightmare laboratory that nature itself rejected. The footage features the Delgado family, Reuben (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo), Teresa (Luna Blaise), Isabella (Audrina Miranda), and Teresa's boyfriend Xavier Dobbs run into trouble at sea. A mosasaurus attack flips their sailboat and strands them in dangerous waters. Their story takes another sharp turn when they're rescued by Zora Bennett (Scarlett Johansson) and Duncan Kincaid (Mahershala Ali), two operatives aboard a submarine en route to Site C on a covert mission involving dinosaur DNA. In the film, 'The planet's ecology has proven largely inhospitable to dinosaurs. Those remaining exist in isolated equatorial environments with climates resembling the one in which they once thrived. 'The three most colossal creatures within that tropical biosphere hold the key to a drug that will bring miraculous life-saving benefits to humankind.' The director previously said that the movie is 'a giant love letter to Steven Spielberg and his earlier films. There are moments in this movie that remind me very much of Jaws. 'It's like little greatest hits of all those aspects of his films that I loved growing up as a child. It's essentially a little adventure odyssey across this island, a survival story, really.' The film is set five years after the events of Dominion , 'in which dinosaurs mingled with humans all over the globe, these creatures are now dying out. 'The present-day planet proved to be inhospitable to the prehistoric ilk, except for a small region in the tropics around the equator, where many of them now congregate. 'The three most colossal dinosaurs of land, sea, and air within this biosphere hold genetic material precious to a pharmaceutical company that hopes to use the dino DNA to create a life-saving drug for humanity.' The movie is in theaters now, and you should watch it!
