25 years later, Jurassic Park remains a classic
By Dan Girolamo
Before Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom dominates the box office, let’s take a look back at the original blockbuster, Jurassic Park, which became a worldwide phenomenon.
“Welcome… to Jurassic Park.”
The famous words spoken by John Hammond not only introduced Dr. Grant, Dr. Sattler, and Dr. Malcolm to the revolutionary park, but invited the audience to a world of dinosaurs. Before 1993, dinosaurs had been portrayed in films such as the Godzilla series and The Land Before Time. However, Steven Spielberg’s vision in Jurassic Park became the standard of how dinosaurs are envisioned today.
Jurassic Park is based on the 1990 novel of the same name by the late Michael Crichton. Do you want to know how badly Universal Studios and Spielberg wanted the rights to this publication? Before the book was even published, Universal and Spielberg acquired the rights to Jurassic Park for $1.5 million. Crichton was even hired for an additional $500,000 to help adapt the novel into a screenplay. That means that $2 million was invested into this story before it was ever made, which is a lot of money in the early 90s.
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From the actors to the screenplay to the cinematography, Jurassic Park is the perfect storm for what makes a film successful. It’s billed as a science-fiction adventure film, but there are also elements of action and suspense. One of the reasons why this film resonates to so many people is because its ageless. Spielberg has a knack for making ageless films such as E.T. and Jaws and Jurassic Park falls into that category. The film caters to the desires of both adults and children. Scientific advancements and intense action sequences satisfy the adult crowd. However, a fatherly relationship between Dr. Grant and the children as well as the awe of seeing a dinosaur brings out one’s inner child.
The heart and soul of the film are the dinosaurs themselves. The CGI technology of bringing dinosaurs like Velociraptors and Brachiosauruses to life was ahead of its time. However, one could argue that the lack of CGI gave this film a more real, organic feeling. In fact, there are only 14 minutes out of the 127-minute runtime with dinosaur visual effects. Spielberg used full-scale models of dinosaurs like the T Rex in order to combat the lack of CGI. Some cite Jurassic Park as the best use of CGI in a movie.
The well-paced story and visual effects made Jurassic Park a true summer blockbuster, and audiences backed that statement up. Jurassic Park became the highest grossing film of 1993, but it also became the highest grossing film of all-time with a gross of $914,691,118 worldwide, which was eventually beaten by Titanic. After its re-release in 2013 for the 20th anniversary, Jurassic Park crossed the billion-dollar threshold in ticket sales, making it the seventeenth film in history to accomplish that feat.
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Before you run to the theaters to see Chris Pratt in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, make sure to thank the first Jurassic Park for spawning a beloved franchise that has lasted for over 25 years. Hold on to your butts because there’s more dinosaur action on the way.
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom hits theaters on June 22, 2018.