Well, It's Better Than the Other Two Sequels.

Rating: 7/10 (13 June 2015)

The original Jurassic Park was a technological marvel, but it's not perfect. The internet has brought the numerous plot-holes of the original film to the fore-front, but it still holds up. We can watch that movie and ignore the fact that this supposed hacker genius teenage girl isn't smart enough to not turn off a flash-light that's attracting the attention of an angry T-Rex. We can watch that movie and ignore the fact that Hammond spares no expense in everything, but hires one man to write all the code. We ignore these things because the special effects in that film, hold up to this day. The feeling of terror during the T-Rex reveal scene, still holds up. We forgive the fact that it's not a perfect film logically, because it's still a perfect film technically and emotionally.
There's no way of topping the first film. Spielberg couldn't even do it himself with The Lost World, you just can't recapture that nostalgia, and to expect that much of THIS movie is pretty asinine...the best it can do is be it's own clever film that still respects the original.
That being said, the film comes pretty dang close. It's probably the most entertaining Jurassic Park sequel thus far. It's not overly stupid like the third film, and not overly preachy and emotionless like the second film. Instead it's just kind of stuck in the middle. There are MANY of good things in this film, but SO MANY missed opportunities.
The actors do a good job. Chris Pratt is pretty much just playing Chris Pratt. Vincent D'onfrio is a decent dumb bad-guy. The brothers get a few good scenes and prove to be somewhat capable actors. Surprisingly the best character is Bryce Dallas Howard, she's still a stereotypical character like the others. But at least she goes through some form of an emotional arc throughout the story. She's pretty much the Alan Grant of this film, the only character that changes during the movie. The other characters are pretty much just there to help that character to survive.
The big missed opportunity with the film, is the special effects. They're god-awful. Apparently they used animatronics on set, but the entire film looks fake. All the dinosaurs look like CGI cartoons. I'm guessing they "polished" the animatronics to make it look more realistic....it didn't. It just looks like the actors are responding to air.
So the film failed to be as technologically inventive as the original, but at least the film TRIED to be as emotionally effective. It's not just a bunch of disaster scenes with dinosaurs. It does actually stop and let the characters breath. The action doesn't even start till about half and hour into the film. Everything up to that point is letting the characters explore and showing off the park. Even when the action does start, there's still a rather sad scene with Claire and Owen and a Brontosaurus. But that's not to say there isn't a ton of cool scenes with the Dinosaurs. It does actually try to show-off the coolness of the dinosaurs. The scenes with the Mosasurus is cool, the Pteranodon attack is a blast, and the climatic battle is AMAZING!!! Such a thrill!!!
I walked out of the film, satisfied. The special effects are garbage compared to the original. But the actors all do a good job with their stereotypical characters (The original had it's fair share of stereotypes), one of the characters does go through an emotional arc, it's about as logical as the original was, and the film does actually stop and breath and show off the real stars of the show, the dinosaurs.
It's okay.
7 out of 10