Merit Coba

Life, one story at a time

Story-telling: Jurassic Park part 2/3 : The T-rex, the raptors and the naked monkeys.

Welcome to part second part of the movie Jurassic Park in which I am trying to analyse the story-telling.

In a previous post I discussed the first fifty minutes of the movie including the introduction of the central characters. In this part I am going discuss the remaining two hours of the movie which might conceivably make for a very long post were it not for the fact that most of the movie is a lot of the same stuff: the humans trying to deal with the predatory dinosaurs and the dinosaurs trying to deal with the humans(by eating them).

We left part two with the picture of the dinosaur with the name I have a hard time typing properly: the triceratops, a kind of heavily armored rhinoceros(I am probably offending some dinosaur experts for this triceratops probably has got nothing to do with the rhinoceros.) The poor animal is ill and therefore lies prone on the ground. Which is handy for patting it.

jurrasic-park-16 — Poor trike.

This scene had me puzzled: why is there no fence between the cartrail and this particular dinosaur? I thought there were fences on both sides of the trail, but I was wrong apparently. The fence was meant to keep the meat eating dinosaurs inside I guess. But if so, why do Grant and the two kids climb a fence to get at the other side to escape an approaching T-rex(i think, for we don’t see it but only hear it) just to discover that there is a T-rex at the side they escaped to. Also this scene seems to add little to the story.. unless the illness of this triceratops and the illness of the brachiosaurus later in the movie are connected(which I though it was) and would point to a kind of War of the Worlds development in which the dinosaurs would all be killed by a disease. But nothing of the sort happens. This leaves me to believe this scene is just meant to show a dinosaur upclose. By the way, in the extra features there is a storyboard for a scene with a baby triceratops toppling Lex in a funny scene. It didn’t make it into the movie.

Part 3: The shit and the fan

We are now past the fifty minutes mark. In the previous part the scene is set and the characters are introduced. The domino pieces have all been put in their place. Time to make them fall. So it is time for action and we start with a rain storm. Storms are very neat devices in movies for the rain and the wind add to the confusion, help make communication harder thus adding to the isolation, make things more difficult to see and have then storm break things.. like power lines.

While the storm hits in full force..

jurrasic-park-20 — and the devil takes a swig(while telling Grant he loves kids)

jurrasic-park-18 — and Arnold lights yet another one(where is the ashtray?)..

jurrasic-park-19 — ..Nedry sabotages everything by computer, enters the place where the embryos are held and steals them. Nedry has a picture of a scanty clad girl in his computer cause nerds can only gape at things they never get.(Actually: it’s Nedry’s third wife.)

jurrasic-park-22jpg — And while Nedry looses his way because he knocks over the roadsign that should have told him where to go…

jurrasic-park-23pg — ..the largest land predator known to have existed on earth decides to put in an appearance(that is why you have plastic cups filled with water in cars, so the water shakes when the six ton heavy monster approaches)..

jurrasic-park-24pg — ..to the perplexed anguish of some,

jurrasic-park-25pg — ..and gobbles down a goat..

jurrasic-park32- — ,,which was introduced earlier but escaped it’s fate.. until now( I wonder about the horns).

jurrasic-park-26pg — The moment for a first time experience: eating canned peltless omnivores.

jurrasic-park38- — Things you might reconsider doing: using a powerful lightbeam to entice and annoy the huge carnivore next to the car.

jurrasic-park30- — Grant pissing of the T-Rex by cheating her(it’s a female) out of a meal by tossing a flare into a bush. Flares are part of the standard equipment of the automated tour cars, next to night goggles, portable search lights, plastic cups with water and rocket-launchers with T-Rex seeking missiles (which they missed in the rush to play fetch-the-flare with the T-Rex).

And after this climatic series of images the story actually settles down and is the same for the rest of the movie as Raptors and a T-rex make live difficult for the human cast and eventually kill four of them. There are a few more developments:

Grant’s character develops as he takes care of the kids, thus overcoming his unease with children.

jurrasic-park-29pg — Grant showing the claw of a raptor. Cool! And odd considering that they are on the prowl(but then Grant doesn’t know they are). Someone has a sardonic streak in him.

Hammond and Sattler have an emotional moment. While Hammond in an emotional moment shows he has not learned anything and vows to do better next time, Sattler goes even more emotional on him and tells him that people are dying for crying out loud cause he fucked up.. How about some yoghurt?

jurrasic-park31- — Hammond and Sattler in an emotional moment. Hammond: we can make it better!(Hurrah for mindless optimism!) Sattler: people are dying right now!(Spoilsport.)

jurrasic-park47- — After an emotional moment you have to eat.

After some tos and fros the surving cast ends up in the central building and Hammond calls for a helicopter to pick them up after Sattler reactivates the system. The group then heads for the helicopter pad while being chased by raptors. These manage to corner Grant, Ellie and the kids in the central hall, but they can escape when a T-Rex attacks the raptors.

jurrasic-park34- — Surprisingly it is Lex, the teen girl who knows her way around computers and flight simulators.

jurrasic-park36- — So she flies into the software program(it is UNIX) and locks the doors so the raptors can’t enter. Until they break down the door of course. Cause these raptors are smart (and have had Swat training.)

jurrasic-park37- — There is some intense hide and seek being done in a kitchen, with the raptors losing that round.

jurrasic-park33- — But they win the next one by trapping Grant, Sattler and Lex in the central hall(See that raptor grin: haha, caught you!)

jurrasic-park35- — Only to lose the game when they are rudely interrupted by a sneak ambush from this twelve feet tall T-Rex which nobody noticed approaching as nobody had plastic cups with water to warn them.

jurrasic-park39- — A moment of emotion when Hammond stares off screen into the direction of the park. Nothing is said.

Part 4: the end

So it’s time to finish the story and this is actually done in one of the better scenes in the story(in my humble opinion) which summarizes and then wraps up the storyline.

jurrasic-park44- — Hammond stares sadly at his walking stick that contains the amber with a mosquito. This is a recurring item in the movie. His dream is shattered.

jurrasic-park42- — Grant with the kids. He looks at Sattler. He has learned to live with kids…

jurrasic-park43- — so it might be time to settle down with the only available woman in the helicopter. Sattler let her hair down..so she is available.

jurrasic-park41- — One of the final shots: birds(Pelicans?) flying over the sea. The birds are considered descendants from the dinosaurs. Something that is told earlier in the movie. These aren’t large meat eating lizards so there is nothing to fear.

jurrasic-park40- — Off into the sunset we fly.. While this ends the movie, there is just enough of an open end to make a possible followup: the dinosaurs can mate and thus create offspring and the park is uncontrolled. Time for the colonial marines to intervene!

So this ends part 2 and we even have a part 3 to wrap up and make some overall observations.

Merit Coba

stories, story-telling

dinosaur, jeff goldblum, Jurassic Park, Laura Dern, movie, raptors, sam neill, Steven Spielberg, stories, story, story-telling, t-rex, tales

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