Jurassic Park (1993)

[**** stars / *****]

Robert Muldoon: 

Quiet, all of you! They're approaching the Tyrannosaur paddock.

Anticipation, breathless excitement, the wait in the rain and then the Tyrannosaurus rex appearing with a deafening roar, the dinosaur egg-hatching moment, they don't make sci-fi action like that anymore. 

The coronavirus lockdown has enabled my rediscovery of yet another sci-fi action adventure masterpiece, Steven Spielberg's magnificent 'dinosaurs and not sharks eat/kill humans'  movie experience, Jurassic Park (1993). 

My first time 
This was the first Hollywood movie I ever watched in a cinema hall as a kid and it was as wondrous to again get the first awe-struck view of the gentle Brachiosaurus, the heart-pounding moment of the Tyrannosaurus rex crossing over the non-functional electric fences, and the scarily intelligent can-open-door-handles-no-big-deal Velociraptors. 

Flat TV screens do help replicate the big screen experience to a teeny-weeny degree. 

Human drama
Again, as in Jaws (1975), Jurassic Park is still immensely watchable because of the human conflicts unfolding in between the body count. 

Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neill) doesn't fit around kids and ends up protecting John Hammond's (Richard Attenborough) two grandchildren Tim (Joseph Mazzello) and Lex (Ariana Richards),  Dr. Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), Grant's partner, is ahead of her times, assured, confident woman who gets the best lines: 

Ian Malcolm: 

God creates dinosaurs. God destroys ... Man creates dinosaurs.

.

Dr. Ellie Sattler: 

Dinosaurs eat man, woman inherits the earth.

Shades

Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) as a flirtatious mathematician, John Hammond as the rich, ambitious but rash park owner, Dennis Nedry (Wayne Knight) as the greedy, scheming computer man, Robert Muldoon (Bob Peck) as the sharp game warden, honest matter-of-fact computer worker Ray Arnold (Samuel L. Jackson) and the money-minded lawyer Donald Gennaro (Martin Ferrero)...there are as many varied shades of human characters as the numerous dinosaur species of the park, adding layers to the drama, and supporting the fabulous action. 

What makes Jurassic Park tick?        

The dinosaurs for the first time in movie history, look scarily, intimately real, like they were beasts come alive and not monsters, as many previous dinosaur movies made them out to be.

The sheer scale and size proportion of the dinosaurs gets conveyed through the screen, you actually sense their size. 

The beautifully choreographed action sequences, there is so much conviction in how the animals attack, sound, run, plan, and eat. Even though Velociraptors opening doors may have been a bit too much. At that rate, they must have evolved beyond humans by now. 

Also, how does Dr. Grant know that the T-rex can only sense movements? He knew that just by digging dinosaur bones?! But the action is such an impressive takeaway, it all sticks in Jurassic Park. 

The close-up human-dinosaur relationship has never been equaled in any other sequel, Sattler sampling Dinosaur shit, Grant heaving with an ill dinosaur's breathing, all pure cinema magic. This deceptive peace makes the later attacks look even more real, like the video of a tiger attack during a otherwise routine jungle safari. 

The gorgeous Dean Cundey cinematography and the stunner John Williams music. Jurassic Park with music by another composer, would that have been as effective?  

Universal, timeless story of man taking nature for granted and nature in turn teaching us a lesson, under the present circumstances, you better believe it.