A Reckless but Thrilling Successor

Rating: 8/10 (3 July 2013)

The first thing to know about 'The Lost World: Jurassic Park' is that it's not as good as 'Jurassic Park', which is a very high standard to reach. As a young boy, I had reservations about this movie, but it's actually started to slowly grow on me more over time. People may find this strange because of the huge amount of hate towards this film, but I find there's still merit to be found.
Story:
After a family on a yacht cruise discovers Isla Sorna, the factory floor island owned by InGen, and their daughter is attacked by a pack of compies, John Hammond is removed as CEO of InGen by his greedy nephew Peter Ludlow. Hammond summons Ian Malcolm, now scarred by experiences in Jurassic Park, and asks him to lead an expedition to document the dinosaurs (at a distance from the carnivores) to earn the government's protection. After discovering his girlfriend, Sarah Harding, is already there, Malcolm joins Nick Van Owen and Eddie Carr and sails to the island. Ludlow arrives with a taskforce led by Roland Tembo capture the dinosaurs and take them to San Diego to flaunt them in a zoo. At night, Nick sabotages the InGen camp and brings an injured baby T-Rex to their trailer to patch it's leg up after Roland had captured to bait the father Rex. The T-Rex parents soon retrieve the infant and push the trailer over a cliff, and Eddie is killed trying to save Malcolm and team before InGen arrives to help them out. Both stranded teams concede to join forces to get off the island. The film culminates in a fun (if divisive) 15-minute sequence when the male T-Rex rampages through San Diego searching for his infant, paying homage to 'King Kong' and 1925's 'The Lost World'.
One key problem most people have with "The Lost World" is that it's not as filled with wonder as the original, and this film certainly could have benefited from more scenes with the herbivores and characters enjoying the island ambiance. Judging by some unrealistic moments and plot holes, such as the way the trailer fell or the scene where Malcolm's daughter is able to defeat a Raptor with gymnastics, and the fact that the crew of the ship holding the Rex was killed with no clue as to how it happened, Spielberg was not fully committed to this film, which is a real shame. The build-up is also fairly slow, but can be skipped. Personally, the infamous gymnastic scene just makes me chuckle, it's not worth getting angry over. And I admit that I relished in the Rex's travels in San Diego and his reunion with the once-again captured infant.
Another major criticism is that main characters cause more death and destruction than the InGen team, and that is partially true. Sarah cannot seem to keep away from dangerous dinosaurs in the field and can be annoying at times, but she still helps lead the T-Rex away from civilians in San Diego. However, Nick is just awful; he's a self- righteous environmentalist whose actions include releasing the captive dinosaurs on the InGen team and stealing the bullets from Roland's rifle to prevent the T-Rex from being killed, thus putting more people in danger. Frankly, I regard him as a hidden antagonist responsible for the chaos, thankfully he's absent from the San Diego sequence. Ultimately, the lack of defined heroes and villains feels more in keeping with the grimness of Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park novel, which was very cynical, and potentially disconcerting to certain people.
In this movie's defence, some characters do stand out in a positive light; Ian Malcolm is just as eccentric and witty as ever if more cynical (Jeff Goldblum an acquired taste, really). Another worthy character is Eddie Carr, who is killed by the T-Rexes in the act of saving Malcolm, Sarah and Nick. Hammond's brief appearances were a delight to watch, and the character Roland Tembo is a bold, tactical hunter with an air of dignity and passion that earned my respect as an anti-heroic figure.
It isn't really a film about environmentalism so much a film about reaching compromise between two dangerous extremes, personified by Roland and Nick. Another theme is failure to treat what you create with responsibility, as seen with InGen's haughty regard for the dinosaurs as financial assets and not real animals, rather like Frankenstein's negligence towards his creation. Taking the dinosaurs to the mainland zoo would have been disastrous, as Crichton's underlying belief that humans and dinosaurs don't mix is still present.
It's also worth remembering that this is a movie of dinosaurs in the wild so there will be higher danger than on the theme park island. I personally find it appealing that we can see the dinosaurs out in the wild simply being dinosaurs, especially the parental instincts of the T- Rexes. The dark, primordial atmosphere of Isla Sorna, accompanied by John Williams' excellent jungle-themed score, does instil a sense that you are in the midst of the dinosaurs' domain, with a few reprisals of the original themes. The CGI dinosaurs look better than most CG creatures today; their behaviour feels genuine, much like real animals, especially with the scenes involving a herd of Stegosaurus and the scenes with the T-Rexes. The animatronics are just as sharp and engaging as the first film, from a technical standpoint, it's well crafted.
Ultimately, "The Lost World" is an enjoyable, if reckless, survival film that gives the incredible dinosaurs of InGen a visceral return. Spielberg's style holds it up as an advancement of the Jurassic Park universe. There are plenty of thrills, engrossing action scenes, and a dark and wild atmosphere that could have been helped by more moments of wonder. I certainly wouldn't call this Spielberg's worst movie. Despite being dwarfed by its grander predecessor, it's a fun movie, if flawed.