Latest news with #JurassicPark
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
I Heard Jurassic World Dominion Was Bad, But I Would Watch It Over Any Other Jurassic Sequel
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. SPOILER WARNING: The following article gives away, just about, the entire plot of Jurassic World Dominion. If you have not yet seen the 2022 Jurassic Park movie, act like Owen Grady holding up his hand to magically neutralize a dinosaur, and proceed with caution as you read on. With Jurassic World Rebirth hitting theaters soon, I figured it was about time that I do something I had been reluctant to do: catch up with the full franchise and watch Jurassic World Dominion. Considering the beastly reviews from critics and audiences, I was braving the worst, but, to my surprise, I thought it was far from it. To be clear, I would not call Colin Trevorrow's sequel a good movie. I think it suffers from a pitifully lazy script, sleepy acting, and throwing out the previous film's setup for a dinosaur-ridden dystopia in favor of, echoing Eric Eisenberg's Jurassic World Dominion review, two bland, disparate plotlines that have little to do with, ya know, dinosaurs. However, I do not at all regret watching it and would choose to watch it again over most sequels to Steven Spielberg's 1993 classic, which I realize may come as a shock to many Jurassic fans. Well, allow me to explain… In previous articles of mine, such as my reaction to the recent sci-fi thriller Companion, I have made it clear that I am a staunch technophobe who fears how dangerously technology's advancement could, or already has, affected our society. However, there is one fear of mine that I have been a bit less vocal about in my writing until now: bugs, especially ones of unusual size. So, you might be able to imagine how I felt when the genetically engineered locusts appeared on the screen. Now, I will agree with the widely shared opinion that a Jurassic Park movie focusing its plot on a non-reptilian prehistoric creature is a mistake, but said creatures did manage to get my adrenaline going faster than any of the dinosaurs that appear in Jurassic World Dominion. That being said… Whenever a dinosaur would appear on screen in Dominion, I found it nothing short of impressive. The special effects, boasting the classic blend of practical animatronics with some of the best CGI Hollywood has to offer, were so convincing, I am surprised there was not more praise about that aspect, at least. Aside from their visual effects, I felt that the action sequences involving dinosaurs are genuinely some of the best that the franchise has ever seen. I recall, in particular, being thoroughly riveted by a scene taking place in Malta, when Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) is chased on a motorcycle through the city by Atrociraptors. I had to stop and think to myself, Wow, I am actually having fun with this movie, and it did not stop there. Some have said the extended edition of Jurassic World Dominion is better than the theatrical version, but you can get both on a Blu-ray and 4K UHD set from Amazon for nearly half off the regular price!View Deal The one reason I had to be somewhat optimistic about finally watching Dominion was the one aspect that I had heard positive rumblings about: DeWanda Wise as Kayla Watts. I could not agree more with my colleague Sarah El-Mahmoud that the daredevil pilot is the best character from the Jurassic World trilogy for her bravery and quick wit, and for just being a badass. If there are any downsides to Kayla, I would say that she makes most of the other newer characters (including Mamoudou Athie's Ramsay Cole and even Pratt's Grady) look weaker than I already believed they were, and that she should have been introduced to the franchise earlier. With all due respect to Scarlett Johansson and Mahershala Ali, a part of me wishes that she were the focus of the upcoming 2025 movie, Jurassic World Rebirth, instead. Despite my harsh words about the newer Jurassic characters, I have to admit that I really enjoyed seeing them finally interact with Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neill), Dr. Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), and Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum). In fact, I don't think I was ever amused by the OG heroes' return until that moment, as the parameters of their reunion and the moments the trio shared never felt particularly natural. And don't get me started about the random callbacks to the first film, like Lewis Dodgson (Campbell Scott) somehow possessing the fake Barbasol canister and displaying it in his office. What?! Anyway, I can't say that 'natural' is a word I would use to describe Grant, Sattler, and Malcolm's meeting with Grady, Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard), and others in the final act either. The events that lead them to each other are far too convenient (like many other aspects of the plot), and much of their dialogue feels egregiously forced. Yet, there was something about seeing them all gathered together and relying on one another to survive against the prehistoric wildlife that left me wishing the movie had dedicated more time to bringing them together. Of course, any Jurassic Park fan knows that the real draw of this franchise is not the meat, but the meat-eaters, and the one who rules them all is the Tyrannosaurus Rex. Any return by that big behemoth in these movies, no matter how convoluted the reasoning may be, is warmly welcomed by me, and its appearance in Dominion was no exception, especially since it was not alone. I actually really dug how the T-Rex was treated as a hero, Godzilla style, in the film's final act, when it teams up with a Therizinosaurus to bring down the Giganotosaurus. Watching the T-Rex throw the Giganotosaurus onto the Therizinosaurus' claws, fatally impaling it, made for a more satisfying final battle than the Indominus Rex showdown in 2015's Jurassic World, if you ask me. I don't see a future in which I ever boot up my Peacock subscription to watch Jurassic World Dominion again, unless I get curious and decide to check out the extended edition, which I hear is an improvement. Yet, I can't say I feel that I wasted my morning watching it the other day, which is something I can't say about most of the follow-ups to the original '90s movie classic, and that calls for a modest roar of applause in my book.
Scottish Sun
9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Scottish Sun
Mystery surrounds abandoned Maldives resort left to rot with decaying villas, filthy pools & dust-covered massage tables
The resort's origin was revealed in a tour of the haunting island Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) AN ABANDONED luxury resort rotting away in the Maldives with derelict villas and dirty pools has become shrouded in mystery. A decaying island within the holiday hotspot - which is usually known for its picturesque sights and tropical landscapes - holds a string of villas which have been left for dead. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 8 An abandoned resort in the Maldives has been shrouded in mystery Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock 8 Rotting pools and toilets lay inside the lifeless island Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock 8 Unfinished villas sit on top of the water Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock Once a promising paradise-to-be, the resort sits on one of the archipelago islands, situated southwest of Sri Lanka in the Indian Ocean. YouTube star Kale Brock revealed the mysterious area in a video posted to the social media site. The Australian said his group spotted the eerie location in the distance while on holiday with a tour guide in the Maldives - and convinced him to take them there. Extraordinary footage showed the group touring half-finished villas, as well as piles of debris and dilapidated bedrooms. Broken toilets stood aside heaps of rubbish at the swanky hotel surrounded by swathes of tropical forest. Unkempt pools overflowing with algae can also be seen alongside generators which haven't been powered in years. Brock told that the island was supposedly owned by a prominent Maldivian politician. And he said that construction on the resort reportedly started over a decade ago. The surfer and YouTuber said: "They were building for two years then for 'political reasons'. "We don't really know, ostensibly maybe they ran out of money." Abandoned EFL stadium left to rot with pitch covered in weeds just five years after hosting final match He explained: "They've literally abandoned the project… There's bathtubs in unopened but deteriorating boxes." Shocking footage also showed unopened spa equipment and massage tables - which were never used to accommodate visitors. A centrepiece pool filled with murky water and dead bits of plants is also seen on the resort. The only bit of life that can be seen is the lush palm trees which tower over the forgotten construction. In one eerie corner of the island, the group stumble across an old Mazda and Nissan — both caked in rust and clearly untouched for years. 8 A YouTuber explored inside the abandoned hotel and villas Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock 8 The old site was reportedly abandoned by a Maldivian politician Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock 8 The interiors were seen rotting away Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock They press on to a creepy generator room, lined with bizarre, old machines. Explorer Brock said the scenes reminded him of films like Ghostbusters, Jurassic Park, and Lost. Chilling footage showed the most harrowing part of the island, and its supposed crown jewels. Luxury overwater bungalows that were meant to rake in $5,000 a night sit completely empty, now just crumbling skeletons of wood and steel. Brock is also seen strolling along a half-destroyed concrete platform where a fancy boardwalk should have been if the project was finished. Peering out at the sea, Brock said: 'World-class lives one kilometre away.' 8 Shocking images show the dilapidated villas and unfinished walkways Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock
The Irish Sun
9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Irish Sun
Mystery surrounds abandoned Maldives resort left to rot with decaying villas, filthy pools & dust-covered massage tables
AN ABANDONED luxury resort rotting away in the Maldives with derelict villas and dirty pools has become shrouded in mystery. A Advertisement 8 An abandoned resort in the Maldives has been shrouded in mystery Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock 8 Rotting pools and toilets lay inside the lifeless island Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock 8 Unfinished villas sit on top of the water Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock Once a promising paradise-to-be, the resort sits on one of the archipelago islands, situated southwest of Sri Lanka in the Indian Ocean. The Australian said his group spotted the Extraordinary footage showed the group touring Advertisement READ MORE WORLD NEWS Broken toilets stood aside Unkempt pools overflowing with algae can also be seen alongside generators which haven't been powered in years. Brock told that the island was supposedly owned by a prominent Maldivian politician. And he said that construction on the resort reportedly started over a decade ago. Advertisement Most read in The US Sun Breaking The surfer and YouTuber said: "They were building for two years then for 'political reasons'. "We don't really know, ostensibly maybe they ran out of money." Abandoned EFL stadium left to rot with pitch covered in weeds just five years after hosting final match He explained: "They've literally Shocking footage also showed unopened spa equipment and massage tables - which were never used to accommodate visitors. Advertisement A centrepiece pool filled with murky water and dead bits of plants is also seen on the resort. The only bit of life that can be seen is the lush palm trees which tower over the forgotten construction. In one eerie corner of the island, the group stumble across an old Mazda and Nissan — both caked in rust and clearly untouched for years. 8 A YouTuber explored inside the abandoned hotel and villas Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock Advertisement 8 The old site was reportedly abandoned by a Maldivian politician Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock 8 The interiors were seen rotting away Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock They press on to a creepy generator room, lined with bizarre, old machines. Explorer Brock said the scenes reminded him of films like Ghostbusters , Jurassic Park, and Lost. Advertisement Chilling footage showed the most harrowing part of the island, and its supposed crown jewels. Luxury overwater bungalows that were meant to rake in $5,000 a night sit completely empty, now just crumbling skeletons of wood and steel. Brock is also seen strolling along a half-destroyed concrete platform where a fancy boardwalk should have been if the project was finished. Peering out at the sea, Brock said: 'World-class lives one kilometre away.' Advertisement 8 Shocking images show the dilapidated villas and unfinished walkways Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock 8 Generators stood powerless inside the resort Credit: You Tube/Kale Brock
San Francisco Chronicle
10 hours ago
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
How do you make a 'Jurassic World' movie? With these 'commandments'
NEW YORK (AP) — If you're going to let dinosaurs run amok, it's good to have some ground rules. That's how screenwriter David Koepp saw it, anyway, in penning the script for 'Jurassic World Rebirth,' which opens in theaters July 2. Koepp wrote the original 'Jurassic Park and its 1997 sequel, 'The Lost World. But 'Rebirth,' the seventh film in the franchise, marks his return to the franchise he helped birth. And Koepp, the veteran screenwriter of 'Carlito's Way' and 'Mission: Impossible,' saw it as a chance to get a few things in order for a movie series that had perhaps strayed too far from its foundational character. Inspired by the animator Chuck Jones, Koepp decided to put down a list of nine commandments to guide 'Jurassic World Rebirth' and future installments. Jones had done something similar for the Roadrunner cartoons. His 'commandments' included things like: the Roadrunner never speaks except to say 'meep meep"; the coyote must never catch him; gravity is the coyote's worst enemy; all products come from the ACME Corporation. 'I always thought those were brilliant as a set of organizing principles,' Koepp says. 'Things become easier to write when you have that, when you have a box, when you have rules, when you agree going in: 'These we will heed by.' So I wrote my own, nine of them.' Koepp shared some — though not all of them — in a recent interview. 1. The events of the first six movies cannot be contradicted 'I hate a retcon. I hate when they change a bunch of things: 'Oh, that didn't actually happen. It was actually his twin.' I don't like other timelines. So I thought: Let's not pretend any of the last 32 years didn't happen or happened differently than you thought. But we can say things have changed.' 2. The dinosaurs are animals, not monsters 'On the first movie, anyone working on the movie would get fined for referring to them as monsters. They're not monsters, they're animals. Therefore, because they're animals, their motives can only be because they're hungry or defending their territory. They don't attack because they're scary. They don't sneak up and roar because they want to scare you.' 3. Humor is oxygen. 'You can't forget it.' 4. Science must be real 'The tone that Steven (Spielberg) found and I helped find in that first movie is really distinctive. I haven't gotten to work on a movie with that tone since then. So to go back to that sense of high adventure, real science and humor, it was just kind of joyful.' 'And then there were a number of other rules that I would define as trade secrets. So I'll keep them to myself.'
Yahoo
10 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
David Koepp is Hollywood's go-to scribe. He's back with a fresh start for 'Jurassic World Rebirth'
NEW YORK (AP) — EXT JUNGLE NIGHT An eyeball, big, yellowish, distinctly inhuman, stares raptly between wooden slats, part of a large crate. The eye darts from side to side quickly, alert as hell. So begins David Koepp's script to 1993's 'Jurassic Park.' Like much of Koepp's writing, it's crisply terse and intensely visual. It doesn't tell the director (in this case Steven Spielberg ) where to put the camera, but it nearly does. 'I asked Steven before we started: What are the limitations about what I can write?' Koepp recalls. 'CGI hadn't really been invented yet. He said: 'Only your imagination.'' Yet in the 32 years since penning the adaptation of Michael Crichton's novel, Koepp has established himself as one of Hollywood's top screenwriters not through the boundlessness of his imagination but by his expertise in limiting it. Koepp is the master of the 'bottle' movie — films hemmed in by a single location or condensed timed frame. From David Fincher's 'Panic Room' (2002) to Steven Soderbergh's 'Presence' (2025), he excels at corralling stories into uncluttered, headlong movie narratives. Koepp can write anything — as long as there are parameters. 'The great film scholar and historian David Bordwell and I were talking about that concept once and he said, 'Because the world is too big?' I said, 'That's it, exactly,'' Koepp says. 'The world is too big. If I can put the camera anywhere I want, if anybody on the entire planet can appear in this film, if it can last 130 years, how do I even begin? It makes me want to take a nap. "So I've always looked for bottles in which to put the delicious wine.' Reining in 'Jurassic World' By some measure, the world of 'Jurassic World' got too big. In the last entry, 2022's not particularly well received 'Jurassic World: Dominion,' the dinosaurs had spread across the planet. 'I don't know where else to go with that,' Koepp says. Koepp, a 62-year-old native of Pewaukee, Wisconsin, hadn't written a 'Jurassic' movie since the second one, 1997's 'The Lost World.' Back then, Brian De Palma, whom Koepp worked with on 'Carlito's Way' and 'Mission: Impossible,' took to calling him 'dinosaur boy.' Koepp soon after moved onto other challenges. But when Spielberg called him up a few years ago and asked, 'Do you have one more in you?' Koepp had one request: 'Can we start over?' 'Jurassic World Rebirth,' which opens in theaters July 2, is a fresh start for one of Hollywood's biggest multi-billion-dollar franchises. It's a new cast of characters (Scarlett Johansson, Mahershala Ali and Jonathan Bailey co-star), a new director (Gareth Edwards) and a new storyline. But just as they were 32 years ago, the dinosaurs are again Koepp's to play with. 'The first page reassured me,' says Edwards. 'It said: 'Written by David Koepp.'' For many moviegoers, that opening credit has been a signal that what follows is likely to be smartly scripted, brightly paced and neatly situated. His script to Ron Howard's 1994 news drama 'The Paper' took place over 24 hours. 'Secret Window' (2004) was set in an upstate New York cabin. Even bigger scale films like 'War of the Worlds' favor the fate of one family over global calamity. 'I hear those ideas and I get excited. OK, now I'm constrained,' says Koepp. 'A structural or aesthetic constraint is like the Hayes Code. They had to come up with many other interesting ways to imply those people had sex, and that made for some really interesting storytelling.' The two Stevens Koepp's bottles can fit either summer spectacles or low-budget indies. 'Jurassic World Rebirth' is the third film penned by Koepp just this year, following a nifty pair of thrillers with Steven Soderbergh in 'Presence' and 'Black Bag.' 'Presence,' like 'Panic Room,' stays within a family home, and it's seen entirely from the perspective of a ghost. 'Black Bag' deliciously combines marital drama with spy movie, organized around a dinner party and a polygraph test. Those films completed a zippy trilogy with Soderbergh, beginning with 2022's blistering pandemic-set 'Kimi.' Much of Koepp's career, particularly recently, run through the two Stevens: Soderbergh and Spielberg. 'What they have in common is they both would have absolutely killed it in the 1940s,' Koepp says. 'In the studio system in the 1940s, if Jack Warner said 'I'm putting you on the Wally Beery wrestling picture.' Either one of them would have said, 'Great, here's what I'm going to do.' They both share that sensibility of: How do we get this done?" Spielberg and Koepp recently wrapped production on Spielberg's untitled new science fiction film, said to be especially meaningful to Spielberg. He gave a 50-page treatment to Koepp to turn into a script. "It's even more focused than I've ever seen him on a movie,' says Koepp. 'There would be times — we'd be in different time zones – I'd wake up and there were 35 texts, and this went on for about a year. He's as locked in on that movie as I've ever seen him, and he's a guy who locks in.' 'Your own ChatGPT' For 'Jurassic World Rebirth,' Koepp wanted to reorder the franchise. Inspired by Chuck Jones' 'commandments' for the Road Runner cartoons (the Road Runner only says 'meep meep"; all products are from the ACME Corporation, etc.), Koepp put down nine governing principles for the 'Jurassic' franchise. They included things like 'humor is oxygen' and that the dinosaurs are animals, not monsters. A key to 'Rebirth' was geographically herding the dinosaurs. In the new movie, they've clustered around the equator, drawn to the tropical environment. Like 'Jurassic Park,' the action takes place primarily on an island. Going into the project, Edwards was warned about his screenwriter's convictions. 'At the end of my meeting with Spielberg, he just smiled and said, 'That's great. If you think we were difficult, wait until you meet David Koepp,'' says Edwards, laughing. But Edwards and Koepp quickly bonded over similar tastes in movies, like the original 'King Kong,' a poster of which hangs in Koepp's office. On set, Edwards would sometimes find the need for 30 seconds of new dialogue. 'Within like a minute, I'd get this perfectly written 30 second interaction that was on theme, funny, had a reversal in it — perfect," says Edwards. 'It was like having your own ChatGPT but actually really good at writing.' 'Everyone's got a note' In the summer, especially, it's common to see a long list of names under the screenplay. Blockbuster-making is, increasingly, done by committee. The stakes are too high, the thinking goes, to leave it to one writer. But 'Jurassic World Rebirth' bears just Koepp's credit. 'There's an old saying: 'No one of us is as dumb as all of us,'' Koepp says. 'When you have eight or 10 people who have significant input into the script, the odds are stacked enormously against you. You're trying to please a lot of different people, and it often doesn't go well.' The only time that worked, in Koepp's experience, was Sam Raimi's 2002 'Spider-Man.' 'I was also hired and fired three times on that movie,' he says, "so maybe they knew what they were doing.' Koepp, though, prefers to — after research and outlining — let a movie topple out of his mind as rapidly as possible. 'I like to gun it out and clean up the mess later,' he says. But the string of 'Presence,' 'Black Bag' and 'Jurassic World Rebirth' may have tested even Koepp's prodigious output. The intense period of writing, which fell before, during and after the writers strike, he says, meant five months without a day off. 'I might have broke something,' he says, shaking his head. Still, the three films also show a veteran screenwriter working in high gear, judiciously meting out details and keeping dinosaurs, ghosts and spies hurtling forward. Anything like a perfect script — for Koepp, that's 'Rosemary's Baby' or 'Jaws' — remains elusive. But even when you come close, there are always critics. 'After the first 'Jurassic' movie, a fifth-grade class all wrote letters to me, which was very nice,' Koepp recalls. 'Then they wrote, 'PS, when you do the next one, don't have it take so long to get to the island.' Everyone's got a note!''
