Something Has Survived…
by Brian Barth
…but it isn’t Sam Neill’s career. The star of Spielberg’s Jurassic Park didn’t just attempt to revive his role as Dr. Grant in Joe Johnston’s Jurassic Park III; the stakes were clearly greater the second time around. Neill’s acting trajectory is a clear story of having it and wanting it back. Which is also, surprisingly, the case for Johnston.
Turns out he directed Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989), and October Sky (1999).
Good on you, Joe. Although he made two films about small-town scientists and big dreams, the latter being surprisingly good, they didn’t seem to have taught Johnston anything about suspense film-making. Suspense is the core of storytelling. You read the next sentence–or watch the next scene–because an answer lies ahead. What was truly startling to me in re-watching JP3 was how, after being given a slow, hanging pitch of a concept, Johnston managed to avoid building any suspense whatsoever. Honestly: people are marooned on an island full of dinosaurs. How can you make that banal?
Like this: when the script fails, insert dino. When the script is non-existent, insert dino fight, flames.
Watching this in glorious high-definition merely amplified the fact that nothing was going on. The ostensible stakes (the protagonists’ are searching for their son, who turns out to be a sad mix of Dinotopia and George of the Jungle) aren’t even introduced until they’ve crash-landed. It’s too late to care.
Why am I writing about an 8 year-old mediocre sequel? Because as I was taking a break from editing my own short film “Part II”, I realized the necessity to care. A seriously dangerous and dramatic situation (i.e. marooned with dinos) became laughable because Johnston couldn’t make me care.
The eternal challenge is to find a way to make someone care about what you’re showing them. No matter how beautiful or dense your production is, it’s paramount that you constantly ask yourself “who cares?”