In the latest addition to the Jurassic Park/World franchise, the likes of Sam Neill and Bryce Dallas Howard are replaced with a fresh crew of A-listers who are once again faced with the limitations of being human. There’s a new director (Gareth Edwards), new actors (Scarlett Johansson and the like), new dinosaurs (mutated), but unfortunately, not so new themes.
Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend at his slimiest), an executive at pharmaceutical company ParkerGenix, hires Zora Bennett (Johansson), an ex-military operative, to collect blood samples from the three largest dinosaurs on earth, crucial for a new heart disease treatment. The mechanics of it are unclear, but there are a lot of zeros involved, so Zora is game. They are joined by lovable palaeontologist Dr Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey), and Zora’s old friend Duncan Kincaid (Mahershala Ali), who brings his driver, mercenary and security chief along for the ride. The mission should be simple, considering dinosaurs now supposedly roam among humans – except the year is 2027, and in this world, dinosaurs are near extinct and confined to an island in the Caribbean, which has been placed under a travel ban. En route for this (extremely illegal) secret operation, they also happen upon a family lost at sea – this unlikely rag-tag bunch must tackle the treacherous paths of Ile-Saint-Hubert, mutated dinos and all.
Rebirth in many ways does what Jurassic World does best – CGI, quick flirting between the two mains, and slow pivots on drooling, blood-thirsty dinosaurs. Interestingly, a lot of damage is done very quickly, and tension runs high – nail-biting wise, it’s up there with the original. There are some genuinely brilliant shots at sea, particularly the introduction to the family, headed up by father Reuben (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) which almost feels like a scene from Jaws. It also injects a lot more light-hearted humour into the franchise, a quality that had been lost since Jeff Goldblum’s leather-clad Ian Malcolm. Nevertheless, Rebirth finds itself in a defining catch-22 situation: it must, on one hand, move away from the confusing convolutions of the previous two instalments, all while distinguishing itself from the original’s existential minimalism. While its attempt is valiant, it goes too far in the direction of simplicity without any of the psychological weight – big pharma wants dino blood, hires military and brains, with ultimate goal to make money (saving lives is an extra). Not a single character escapes the archetypes established by the original (or any action film for that matter) – bad executive, brave warrior, bespectacled nerd, traumatised civilian. Some characters are, quite genuinely, useless – Ed Skrein’s security guard features for all of ten minutes before meeting a gory, predictable death, and the rest of Duncan’s crew seem to be characterised solely by French subtitles. While this is a godsend after crazed dinosaur actions, genetically altered children, dino black markets, and the impeding doom of ecological collapse, it also doesn’t pose any new questions about humanity’s insatiable need for progress – in this sense, Loomis’ speeches about our fallibility and intelligence are almost laughable, like a bad rewrite of a timeless classic. We have heard the evil corporation vs Mother Earth dilemma before. The beauty in the first film was the slow realisation of what John Hammond had created. Without the classic Jurassic Park philosophy to drive it, the best thing this franchise can do is continue to embrace the action – unless it can find some new questions to ask us.
