This has long since become a tired franchise, but’s a treat now to revisit Steven Spielberg’s original film for its 30th anniversary. It is a spectacular and thrilling movie about Jurassic Park, the hubristic tourist attraction offering real-life dinosaurs cloned from dinosaur blood that has been extracted from insects encased in ancient amber. But what if something goes wrong and the dinosaurs turn out to be bigger, stronger and angrier in captivity than we thought?
The film is based on a bestseller by Michael Crichton, and – as with Spielberg’s version of JG Ballard’s Empire of the Sun – the darker, dystopian notes of the original have been strategically de-emphasised to focus more brightly on the adventure and conventional jeopardy involved, along with childlike awe and wonder. Jurassic Park also has one of the boldest and catchiest John Williams scores with a classic central theme, and it has one of the meatiest cast lineups of any Spielberg picture.
