Jurassic World: Dominion

While it looks promising in the beginning, in the end the third Jurassic World isn't much better than the second. If it weren't for Doctors Grant, Sattler and (especially) Malcolm, I probably wouldn't have cared about a single character, and yet the new heroes were so entertaining and promising in the first film of the trilogy. I guess the problem is that the filmmakers didn't know what to do with them next, they were all about releasing dinosaurs into civilization and didn't bother with the humans. I simply didn't have much fun, from the middle of the film onwards I raised my eyebrows more and more, hoping that at least Colin Trevorrow would entertain me with visual effects and action, but they weren't even that great (how is it possible that Jurassic Park and The Lost World still look fantastic, while here you see digital dinosaurs that don't move completely smoothly, and animatronic dinosaurs that look like better toys?), and the action or suspense scenes didn't exactly take my breath away either (for example, the clash between the humans and the giganotosaurus starts off great, or copying Spielberg, but ends up being utterly ridiculous), and I wasn't worried about anyone. No, not even the pond scene, which was pretty lame. Apart from Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum, probably only Michael Giacchino didn't disappoint me... And I'd love to see the likeable DeWanda Wise in something better. (10/06/2022)

A totally unworkable plot of repetitive action scenes that jumps like a flea only to finally retell what has been told several times before, but in a much more clumsy and emotionless way. The screenplay is a disaster, the direction of the action scenes follows the Bourne Bond axis, but it is not very skilled at that either. In the end, it's a mix of cluttered dinosaur MMA and Sir Attenborough having a severe stroke. (08/06/2022)

The return of the main characters from the first Jurassic Park was pleasing, as they are still likeable, enthusiastic scientists who love dinosaurs. Drawing the viewer into a world that dinosaurs are a living part of is cool. The movie gets off to a good start with the trafficker’s den in Malta and the long action scene that takes place there. Chases on rooftops and on a motorcycle in the streets, as we know them from Bourne and Bond movies, upgraded with velociraptors...why not?! But the rest of the film, in which we are only transported to a different reservation than in the first film, is a lumbering retread of what we have already seen, and it’s not very exciting, for that matter, with a lame Tim Cook-esque villain, logical crutches and nonsense unworthy of this film franchise. And only one fantastically shot scene that recalls Spielberg (the dive into the lake). And sadly, it is a short scene. Dominion is the weakest instalment of the whole franchise. (08/06/2022)

Great individual scenes (the lake!) stuck together with very cheap glue full of cliché, homages to this (politically) hyper-correct time we are living in, frequent illogical behavior by the characters and dumb dialogs. All the same, this is a solid popcorn affair and pure fan service for lovers of the first Jurassic Park, but it’s worth a watch. It’s nice that the main powerhouse is made up of oldsters Sam Neill and Laura Dern and their hinted at love story from part one. Again this is about the classic struggle between evil corporation and mistakes made in the quest for profit by a miserable boss with the face of Tim Cook. This time round again, the story isn’t so much about dinosaurs as their clones, the genes of prehistoric locusts and good old whistleblowing. Dinos keep more to the sidelines, occasionally tripping up the main protagonists while they are trying to save the world from locusts and some sort of strange motivation driving them. A metaphor for wildlife protection (we have to act now, we should have done something...), but nothing else. In the end, it all boils down to quality, inventive action - the sequence on Malta is marvelous (will it be the new attraction in Universal Park?) - and who gets got by the T-Rex + who will help in the duel with the Giganotosaurus. The best thing here is Goldblum’s Malcolm who keeps on coming out with one-liners, going on and on about a dog that humped his leg so hard that he had blisters from it. P.S.: You made a promise to a dinosaur? (08/06/2022)

I walked out of the cinema angry after Fallen Kingdom, but after this piece of crap I just left feeling resigned. They basically failed to keep the promise promise of a dinosaur rampage in civilization, because the film, except for a few scenes, again takes place in a closed reservation where something goes wrong, and the dinosaurs practically do not interfere with the plot. The entirety of Jurassic World: Dominion is made up of uninteresting subplots that mostly rely on utter randomness, completely haphazard character motivations, constant disregard for the laws of physics, annoyingly cheesy fanservice, and last but not least, weird editing that gives the characters an artificial edge over the ultra-fast lizards, and most importantly, Chris Pratt's magical hands that can stop any attack at any time. Magic! The actors all look bored and annoyed, so how can I not be bored and annoyed? Objectively it's about 1*, subjectively I was slightly lulled by the return of old friends, of which Jeff Goldblum especially excels at glossing over the idiocies that take place in the film, so maybe I'll grind my way up to 2*. But let's face it, this once magical and majestic dinosaur franchise has hit rock bottom and now is a cheap box office cashgrab. If there was ever going to be a reunion of the original Jurassic Park cast, it should have been in a better film. (16/06/2022)