 ***PLEASE NOTE: A Blu-ray 3D disc is only compatible with 3D Blu-ray players.*** Tagline: Life finds a way. It's been three years since theme park and luxury resort Jurassic World was destroyed by dinosaurs out of containment. Isla Nublar now sits abandoned by humans while the surviving dinosaurs fend for themselves in the jungles. When the island's dormant volcano begins roaring to life, Owen (Chris Pratt) and Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) mount a campaign to rescue the remaining dinosaurs from this extinction-level event. Owen is driven to find Blue, his lead raptor who's still missing in the wild, and Claire has grown a respect for these creatures she now makes her mission. Arriving on the unstable island as lava begins raining down, their expedition uncovers a conspiracy that could return our entire planet to a perilous order not seen since prehistoric times. Storyline: Four years after the Jurassic World theme park was closed down, Owen and Claire return to Isla Nublar to save the dinosaurs when they learn that a once dormant volcano on the island is active and is threatening to extinguish all life there. Along the way, Owen sets out to find Blue, his lead raptor, and discovers a conspiracy that could disrupt the natural order of the entire planet. Life has found a way, again. Written by Jake LogsdonReviewer's Note: Reviewed by Martin Liebman, September 20, 2018 If there's one lesson to be learned from what is now more than two decades of Jurassic Park unwritten rules and regulations, it's to never return to the park, no matter the reason, no matter the possibilities for profits, no matter the stakes, no matter the morality of the action. "How many times must the point be made?" Ian Malcolm asks at film's end. Until revenues begin to dry up, Ian. True for the profiteers in the movies and true in the board room at movie studios. Indeed, the franchise, which began with Steven Spielberg's groundbreaking Jurassic Park, was rebooted in 2015, and is now on the fifth film in the series, the second in the World trilogy, and has never been shy about telling stories featuring characters making relatively poor decisions, albeit usually with good intensions, that lead to disastrous results. Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is every bit the spectacle it should be, but whether it's a worthwhile film is another matter entirely. The film explores good ideas on life and death and the existence of the species -- man and dinosaur alike -- but the red meat within the movie rings a bit hollow, playing with familiar beats that most closely resemble the storyline from the first sequel, The Lost World: Jurassic Park. An unstable volcano is threatening to destroy everything on Isla Nublar, including the last remnants of dinosaur life, leaving them once again extinct. But a political firestorm has erupted alongside the volcano, with some claiming the dinosaurs should be saved while others, including Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), argue for their extinction, for man to accept nature's course correction and again free the world of their presence, as it had been for millions of years. Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard), who is fighting to save the endangered creatures, is introduced to a plan to transplant the dinosaurs to a safe, isolated sanctuary with "no fences, no cages, no tourists." It's an illegal and risky venture, but Claire agrees to return to the derelict park in the name of saving several of the creatures, including Blue, widely believed to be the most intelligent of the dinosaurs. But Claire will need help. She recruits Owen (Chris Pratt) to assist in capturing Blue, and brings two of her co-workers, Zia (Daniella Pineda) and Franklin (Justice Smith), for their expertise. Little do they know that treachery abounds and some will risk everything in hopes of profiting from the dinosaurs one last time. It's impossible to watch Fallen Kingdom, especially from the outset and through its first half, and not feel a little like the movie is headed down the same well-beaten Jurassic path. It must be difficult to innovate the same basic concept: dinosaurs run wild, humans run for their lives, chaos ensues. Admittedly there are some new twists -- the addition of an erupting volcano adds a fair bit of drama and a newfound source of intensity missing from the previous films -- but it's not until the second half, which blends the stuff of dinosaur nightmares with some more heady ideas and concepts that the movie finally finds a distinction from the others in the pack. Perhaps most interestingly, the film offers a unique peek into the earliest history of Jurassic Park and introduces some of the braintrust behind the original idea, those who were very close to, but previously unseen with, the old guard face of the franchise, John Hammond. The movie delves fairly deep, albeit with action still the main driving force alongside, into some interesting and dangerous ideas that concern both hard science and hard profiteering, neither of which, admittedly, are necessarily new to the series but that are presented in a way that advances the understanding of the world within the series while still allowing for plenty of bread-and-butter dinosaur action scenes and scares, the latter in particular in the film's final act. Indeed, there is some impressively realized horrific imagery throughout the film which yields some of the most intense, and scariest, moments in what is now a five-film franchise. The visuals bring an immediacy and sense of dread to the film and franchise, which has always used perspective and portending terror to frighten characters and audiences, but it's a little more amped up here. The general dinosaur visual effects are first-rate, as viewers have come to expect, and there's a complete seamlessness between man, dinosaur, and environment, and whatever demarcations between real and digital there may be in any given scene are nearly impossible to see. The cast is fine, including a few newcomers such as Toby Jones and James Cromwell, neither of whom will likely go down in franchise lore as amongst the best developed characters but who, in this film, add their own necessary qualities into the narrative, which does help propel it down a thematically darker road in its second half. Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom sees the franchise teetering on fatigue, though this film's ending does at least show the promise for what might in store for the coming 2021 sequel. Fallen Kingdom is the most idea-driven film since the original. The trade-off is that it's not as purely fun as Jurassic World. The first half delivers classic franchise thrills while the second half takes on a darker tone as characters wrestle with a number of ethical questions and surprise revelations, of course still with the trademark dinosaur violence and action scenes in full bloom, not to mention a fairly healthy dose of horror cues mixed in as well. Universal's Blu-ray 3D release of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is disappointing, offering 3D visuals that barely ascend to "average." A few decent little moments can't improve on a 3D image that rarely takes advantage of anything the format has to offer beyond the most cursory scene extensions. The audio is terrific (kudos to Universal for carrying over the best soundtrack to the 3D release) and the supplements are fine. Pick up the 2D-only or UHD disc instead. [CSW] -3.3- Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is the quintessential, summer blockbuster, popcorn movie. It gives you what you expect in a movie like this. Anyone in the audience expecting the movie to be an Oscar contender is crazy. We get fun, suspense, great villains, Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) in tight jeans, great special effects, and we get to see dinosaurs eat and rip apart humans. The story is weak and nearly irrelevant to the special effects, which are excellent. These movies are at their best they try to make them somewhat realistic situations for an unrealistic storyline. This one did have a few too many dumb moments. That said it is still thoroughly entertaining and worth seeing. [V5.0-A5.0] MPEG-4 AVC - D-Box really helped this movie out and the 3D, though not eye-popping did add to the enjoyment. Cast Notes: Chris Pratt (Owen Grady), Bryce Dallas Howard (Claire Dearing), Rafe Spall (Eli Mills), Justice Smith (Franklin Webb), Daniella Pineda (Zia Rodriguez), James Cromwell (Benjamin Lockwood), Toby Jones (Mr. Eversol), Ted Levine (Ken Wheatley), Jeff Goldblum (Ian Malcolm), BD Wong (Dr. Wu), Geraldine Chaplin (Iris), Isabella Sermon (Maisie Lockwood), Robert Emms (Tech Merc), Peter Jason (Senator Sherwood), Kevin Layne (Sub Pilot). IMDb Rating (07/01/18): 6.6/10 from 65,559 users
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