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Happy Monday!
The park opens…again.
Jurassic World is poised to continue its dominance, this time with HBO subscribers. The 4th installment in the Jurassic Park franchise made its first television premiere this past weekend. Watching the opening sequence again reignites the imagination of viewers as to why it was the cinematic monster of last summer. The first 10 minutes of the film are quintessential Spielberg, proof that director Colin Trevorrow did his homework for rebooting the series with a familiar tone and trademark character development.
The tease for something mysteriously epic is established from the first frame.
And the first minute was perfect for the story that unfolds. In fact, these sixty seconds are a clever throwback to the original.
Here’s to Devising/Genetically-Engineering an Incredible Start to the Week!
Bringing a Tsunami of Chaos to the World
(Jurassic Park, Facebook)
Colin Trevorrow and Steven Spielberg collaborated to make Jurassic Park a real tourist destination (at least theatrically) in Jurassic World.
Can the director of The Impossible make us believe in a world with dinosaurs, sans fences and elaborate glass bird cages?
J.A. Bayona was given the reins of the prized Jurassic Park franchise to direct Jurassic World 2 (title still TBD), scheduled for June 22, 2018. Unsurprisingly, there is already tremendous buzz about this sequel. Why? First, Jurassic World earned a record-breaking $1.6 billion. Second…it’s the second film in the trilogy.
The plot of the first film in this new trilogy revealed there’s a good likelihood of dinosaurs (specifically Velociraptors) being militarized. Will this work? Is this the best idea for rebooting the franchise? Surely, Steven Spielberg has thought long and hard about this and, after many meetings and debates, has determined this is the natural path forward for genetically engineered dinosaurs.
The Impossible is a gritty, emotional movie with beautiful (though devastating) cinematography. Mr. Bayona knows how to film in the elements, especially when nature collides with a tsunami and the chaos that follows.
If Dr. Ian Malcolm were a real person, he’d give his real endorsement of J.A. Bayona as director with a Favorite or Retweet.
Even though there are some scenes in The Impossible that are difficult to watch, Mr. Bayona always scaled the setting and the story perfectly.
What do I mean?
The devastation from the monstrous tsunami was widespread, literally as far as the eye could see, and then some. When the audience needed to see the full landscape, he showed it using every inch of the silver screen. When we needed to see and connect to the characters and experience their highly-emotional struggles, he framed these moments with heart-wrenching precision. And those small, slow burning sparks of hope were there to keep us believing like the desperate families in the film.
The Impossible was both grand and intimate through the intricate collaboration of real-life and CGI (Computer-Generated Imagery).
J.A. Bayona: Welcome to Jurassic World.
P.S. Colin Trevorrow (39) had one notable hit before being hired for Jurassic World. J.A. Bayona (40) has a similar portfolio in preparing for Jurassic World 2. And yet, Steven Spielberg was already a legendary filmmaker when he took on Jurassic Park. Today, it’s regarded as one of the best movies ever made.
Should Spielberg have chosen more experienced and acclaimed directors for continuing his directorial legacy in the dinosaur franchise?
Just an observation to ponder.
Leaving the Cage
(Photo by Adam Berry/Getty Images)
“Actor Nicolas Cage returns stolen Mongolian dinosaur skull”
This is a real news headline found on Yahoo. It’s not April 1st. This is real life.
One of the reasons why people (myself included) love watching Nicolas Cage movies and searching for past interviews of Nicolas Cage is rooted in the headline above. He’s a uniquely strange human being who electrifies mankind with a talent and magnetism that hasn’t yet been discovered.
Not even the deepest reaches of an exotic rain forest has the answer.
“The actor bought the Tarbosaurus bataar fossil at a New York auction in March 2007” (AFP online).
The dinosaur skull is a part of the Tyrannosaurus family. And on a related note, a belated high-five goes out to America’s national treasure.
Sadly, Nicolas Cage didn’t track down the dinosaur skull by scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef and catching a rare fish that, when examined with a black light, revealed a specific scar that was the birds-eye view of an abandoned fishing village run by a skinny and intensely tan 83 year-old man with long white hair named Kiku who was holding in his possession a worn map that would lead to a specific patch of desert in Mongolia that contained the rarest dinosaur skull pursued by archaeologists from all around the world.
Instead, according to the Yahoo article, Nicolas Cage bought the skull (reportedly outbidding Leonardo DiCaprio) and unknowingly left the country with it in an illegal fashion. Mr. Cage is returning the skull without interference.
Kind of a bummer.
Nicolas Cage should always, always be able to ask someone, “Hey, do you wanna see my dinosaur skull?”
C’mon Mongolia, you’re better than this.
The Imagination Whisperer
A picture is not only worth a thousand words, but now it can inspire millions of people of all ages.
Exhibit A: Robin van Persie’s diving header against Spain in the 2014 World Cup in Brazil was the best goal of the tournament. Surprisingly, this moment nearly/does rise to the same level as the imagery of the Germans triumphantly lifting the World Cup trophy. That’s powerful. When that goal is replayed on television, it instantly encapsulates the top-level talent of the players and teams in that glorious tournament last summer.
This goal was the sports highlight of 2014.
Exhibit B: The highly-anticipated Jurassic World was expected to be a summer blockbuster, reinvigorating the franchise that started with the 1993 cinematic masterpiece Jurassic Park. The 2015 film will be remembered for many things, including its dinosaur-sized, record-breaking box office domination. Or how about how John Williams was welcomed back into our hearts, as well as to the top of the Billboard charts after 22 years. Jurassic World was the sequel everyone had been waiting for since watching the helicopter safely fly into the sunset over the oceanic horizon in June of 1993.
Enter Chris Pratt/Owen Grady.
As seen in the film and the trailers, Owen’s prowess for cautiously wrangling velociraptors is a spectacular sight of a person trying to control nature. There are several memorable scenes from the movie, but none like the raptor whisperer. However, the photograph after the screenshot is not directly from the film, but is instead of a child’s interpretation of the aforementioned scene with some parental coordination. And this pose has been done by many, however, this adaption showcases the dinosaur-loving kid in all of us.
This is the pose of 2015.
(Wired)
“Thank you to the parents of this little one. You’ve made my day” (Chris Pratt’s Facebook)
The image gets your attention, like a certain cup of trembling water…
Jimmy's Daily Planet 