JURASSIC WORLD: FALLEN KINGDOM

JURASSIC WORLD: FALLEN KINGDOM: A-

The fifth installment (yes, fifth) of the JURASSIC franchise proved to be an action packed adventure from start to finish that capitalized upon formulaic method of design structured upon a sense of urgency.

From the dark, captivating opening to the left to wonder what is next ending, JURASSIC WORLD keeps its audience excited from one scene to the next.

Strengths of the film were many. The story simplistic on the surface and complex within its depth. Plenty of CGI special effects and cool dinosaur kills for adrenaline junkies and interesting characters interwoven throughout a film as unafraid to answer questions as it was to ask them.

The idea of a compassionate, protective velociraptor was quite interesting. Here is a creature known to be a mindless killing machine, and we find ourselves empathetic to it the same way we would a loyal dog.

It amazes me how pedagogic the film is, and yet it seems to take no responsibility for how inaccurate it displays the information it puts on the screen. Some will argue, "it's a movie" which is a fair argument to make, but when a film's moral is, "We ask if we could, we should've asked if we should?" Then make no bones about it, adults and youths alike will walk away having an image in their minds of what these animals looked and behaved like, when scientific evidence highly suggest otherwise.

Honestly though, that was my only real biff with the film. Dr. Malcom's one sided and biased speech was nice and all but one has to question the other side of the argument. If we approached all issues under his train of thought, you wouldn't be reading this right now. I'd have died sometime in my mid twenties most likely, from a disease we look at today as easily preventable or curable.

The double cross betrayal of Eli Mills wasn't all that surprising but when it is discovered that Dr. Wu has sold out, that was a dagger to the old heart. It was the part in the film that effected me the most emotionally.

Jumping forward to the casting, as they were in the previous film Ronnie Howard's little girl was spot on and Chris Pratt once again stole the show. The only thing that would have pleased me more with the cast is if Ted Levine had walked into the Indoraptor's cage with a hose and a bottle of lotion.

Lastly I'll say playing the original theme on an unaccompanied piano during the who's to blame dialog between the two main characters was brilliantly placed.