Classic Movie Review Jurassic Park 3

Jurassic Park 3 (2001) 

Directed by Joe Johnston 

Written by Peter Buchman, Alexander Payne, Jim Taylor 

Starring Sam Neill, Tea Leoni, William H. Macy, Alessandro Nivola 

Release Date July 18th, 2001 

Published June 14th, 2023 

After having compromised to make arguably the worst movie of his remarkable career, The Lost World Jurassic Park, Steven Spielberg was finally ready to leave the dinosaurs behind. There was no amount of money that studio executives could promise Spielberg in order to get him back in the director's chair for Jurassic Park 3. That said, staying on as Executive Producer, and retaining his lucrative back end deal, Spielberg did have a hand in choosing his directorial successor. 

Joe Johnston is a long time friend and collaborator of Steven Spielberg and happened to be coming off a pair of well liked and successful films, the 1995 blockbuster, Jumanji, and the critically beloved 1999 drama, October Sky. That plus having worked behind the scenes on each of the previous Jurassic Park movies made Johnston the most natural choice to pick up the reigns on the popular franchise. With Johnston came a new writing team for Jurassic Park 3. Out was writer David Koepp and in was the unlikely duo of Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor, fresh off the success of very non-Jurassic Park indie hits Citizen Ruth and Election. 

It's strange to think that Alexander Payne chose to follow up Election, a black comedy of razor sharp wit, with something as wit-free as Jurassic Park 3. Much like Spielberg did his career worst work on The Lost World Jurassic Park, it would be fair to say that Jurassic Park 3 marks a low point in the career of Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor. A paycheck is a paycheck and being hot off of a critical and commercial hit created the strange cosmic coincidences needed to put the future auteurs behind Sideways into the Jurassic Park universe. 

That said, while I do think this is the worst script of the career of Payne and Taylor, that doesn't mean the movie is that bad. Jurassic Park 3 is actually an improvement over The Lost World Jurassic Park. Director Joe Johnston smartly keeps his Jurassic Park movie under 100 minutes in length and maintains a frenetic pace throughout its 96 minute runtime. A script this thin could not sustain a movie much longer than that, especially with characters this obnoxious and simplistic. Making Jurassic Park 3 any longer than 96 minutes would be an agonizing watch. As it is, it's not great but it is fast and the action is genuinely well directed. 

Jurassic Park 3 returns Sam Neill to the role of Dr. Alan Grant. After being greatly missed in The Lost World Jurassic Park, having Neill back in Jurassic Park 3 is, at the very least, a welcome bit of nostalgia. Also briefly back is Laura Dern as Dr. Ellie Sattler. Her inclusion is perfunctory and convenient, a loving nod to the original Jurassic Park. She's there to be used as needed by the script to underline a plot point early on and provide a convenient ending for the film. 

Sorry, my cynicism keeps sneaking through. I was talking about being happy to see Dr. Grant again. Sam Neill is a steady, calming, soothing presence in Jurassic Park. He's an absolute necessity as he provides a grounded element amid the chaotic special effects frenzy that Joe Johnston is unleashing in Jurassic Park 3. It's easy to see where Johnston's work on Jumanji influenced his work here. Much like Jumanji, Jurassic Park 3 is at its best when it doesn't stop running, upping the stakes, and being an action movie. 

The plot kicks in when Dr. Grant receives an offer to play aerial tour guide for a rich married couple. Paul and Amanda Kirby have charted a plane to fly over Isla Sorna, the second of John Hammond's dinosaur islands and the location of the last movie, The Lost World Jurassic Park. Grant is promised that the plane will not land on the island and that he will just narrate a few facts about what few dinosaurs can be seen during the flyover. What he doesn't know is that he's actually on a dangerous rescue mission. In a convoluted opening sequence, Paul and Amanda's son, Eric has been stranded on the island.

The crew aboard the plane are actually mercenaries who've been hired to extract the boy from the island. Naturally, things don't go well and people end up getting eaten by dinosaurs. Since we don't know the names of the actors playing the mercenaries, and they lack what I like to call 'main character powers,' they're the first to go. The only name supporting actor, Michael Jeter, is also doomed for being a liar and a bit of a weasel, bad guys getting ugly comeuppance is a trope of the Jurassic Park films, aside from John Hammond, the greatest villain of the series, who gets to escape because he's played by kindly grandpa, Richard Attenborough. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review The Boston Strangler

The Boston Strangler (2023) 

Directed by Mark Ruskin 

Written by Mark Ruskin 

Starring Keira Knightley, Carrie Coon, Chris Cooper 

Release Date March 17th, 2023

Published March 16th, 2023 

The Boston Strangler takes the perspective of the two real life reporters who put together the story of the killers behind The Boston Strangler. Keira Knightley stars as Loretta McLaughlin, an experienced reporter tied to the Lifestyle section of her paper. When her mother mentions the murder of an elderly woman in her neighborhood, Loretta's instincts take over and she begins to investigate, even before she's managed to get herself assigned to this story. In order to keep the story once it starts to get bigger and more complicated, Loretta is teamed with Jean Cole (Carrie Coon), a more experienced and connected Crime Reporter. 

Together, the duo of reporters follow disparate leads to multiple suspects all the while watching as the Boston Police Department fumbles the investigation. How bad are the cops on this case? The lead detective, Detective Conley (Alessandro Nivola) begins telling Loretta how poorly his bosses are handling the case. The film avoids making it appear that the reporters are better at investigating the case than the cops by simply being honest about the challenges that the cops were facing and the politics behind the awful decisions they were making. 

One cliche the movie cannot avoid is the spouse who gets upset when their successful wife/husband is spending too much time at work. Loretta's husband begins as an incredibly supportive and forward thinking, for the 1960's, guy. Then, when the movie needs to force some drama and deal with the fact that Loretta's marriage did end in real life, the script resorts to scenes that feel deeply forced and perfunctory about Loretta not being home for dinner a few times or missing a bedtime or two for their kids and blows these things up into world ending dramas. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media. 

Movie Review The Eye

The Eye (2003) 

Directed by David Moreau, Xavier Palud

Written by Sebastian Gutierrez

Starring Jessica Alba, Alessandro Nivola, Parker Posey

Release Date February 1st, 2008

Published February 3rd, 2008 

Growing slowly into her star power, Jessica Alba steps up to the solo lead role in the Japanese horror remake The Eye. Alba is hoping to find the same kind of mainstream success that Naomi Watts and Sarah Michele Geller found after each topped the box office in their respective remakes, The Ring and The Grudge. Alba has the advantage of having the best source material of the three, the original The Eye was a creeptastic freakout. The dumbed down American version, clipped for mass PG 13 consumption, fails to do justice to the source material but doesn't stink nearly as bad as The Ring or The Grudge, financial success never an indicator of artistic success.

Sydney Wells (Jessica Alba) has been blind since a childhood accident at the age of five. Now, more than 20 years later, her sight is going to be restored. A donar retina has been found and the surgery perfected to apply it and give her sight for the first time in decades. Unfortunately, with her new sight comes the visions and memories of the former owner of the eyes. According to scientific studies, there are documented cases of transplant patients who take on the personal habits of the people who donated to them. The case most cited is of a marathoner who received a donated liver from a smoker. After the surgery she started smoking.

Nevertheless, her sister Helen (Parker Posey) and her new doctor Paul Faulkner (Alessandro Nivola) both believe she is cracking up. Maybe she is but we believe her because we see everything she sees.

David Moreaux and Xavier Palud co-directed The Eye from Sebastian Gutierrez' watered down, PG 13 script. In typically sub-genre fashion Moreaux and Palud are pigs at the Hollywood trough, willingly dumbing down their work for the benefit of their bank accounts. Gee guys, why not just make another The Ring movie, or another The Grudge. We don't confuse audiences by challenging them too much. The Eye is close enough that the audience you think is rather pea brained anyway will get the close association with those other The.... horror flicks, but you don't want to confuse the children.

Kids 13 to 17 I understand that you are desperate for entertainment but the more you are willing to watch movies like The Grudge, The Ring and The Eye, the more Hollywood will make them. These producers really think you are stupid. And you aren't helping change that. You've seen the same movie, counting the Ring and Grudge sequels, 6 times now. Hollywood has given you PG-13 photocopies 6 times and you keep going back. It's the same with those awful spoof movies. When you throw away money on Meet The Epic Date Scary Movie, you give Hollywood the idea to make more of them.

Kids, you must stop this yourselves! Demand something different or they will continue to think you are stupid.

The Eye is not the worst of this genre, merely the latest. Jessica Alba continues to be an engaging presence but she needs to fire her agent for putting her in a series of bad movies meant solely to pad her bank account. Then again, that may be the only reason she got into the biz. Maybe she's just after the fat cash. She took that role in Fantastic Four despite obvious issues with those two awful scripts. She took the lead in Awake, a unique but flawed thriller from late last year. Now she stars in a Japanese horror remake and picks up a fat paycheck and little else.

If it's just about the money it makes sense. If however Ms. Alba is serious about her craft or about entertaining people, I hope she begins finding better roles. It's not that she lacks the talent to play better roles. Rather, she has simply chosen badly thus far in her career.