Jurassic World: Fallen Screenplay

Mild spoilers abound: 

First the good news: Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom has a crackerjack opening sequence. 

A moody, undersea mission to plunder skeletal dinosaur remains – and the unexpected encounter with some that are still very much alive. I love dinosaurs, and was thoroughly entertained by Colin Trevorrow’s 2015 Jurassic World - it was crisp and epic and viscerally enjoyable, despite the occasional silliness. Unfortunately, director J.A. Bayona (The Orphanage, The Impossible, A Monster Calls) fares less well with this sequel, in large part due to a muddled script (Trevorrow, with Derek Connolly) that paints in broad strokes and strains disbelief time and time again.

It seems the dino’s home of Isla Nublar was actually a dormant volcano (who knew?!) that now threatens to make all dinosaur life on the island extinct. It turns out that original park impresario John Hammond had a partner (who knew?!), Benjamin Lockwood (James Cromwell), who summons Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) to his vast Gothic mansion to convince her to lead a covert rescue mission to the island to save as many dinos as possible. But first, she needs to convince Raptor-whisperer Own Grady (Chris Pratt), to stop building his house and join her, being the only one who can contain Blue, the last surviving Velociraptor. Their characters are even less pronounced this time, and have an uncomfortable lack of charisma together. A scene in a bar where Howard tries to persuade Pratt to go with her was reminding me of the infamous animal cracker scene in Armageddon. Plus, the ham-fisted product placement has them drinking Becks. I mean, this guy’s a supposed man’s man, house-building, wild-dinosaur wrangler in the age of craft beer – he’s not having Becks! He’d spit it out! Point being, I shouldn’t even be noticing the bogus beer choice. Pratt’s a wildly entertaining presence, but he seems neutered here, seldom getting to do anything funny. He’s wasted, stiffly running away from volcanic ash clouds like Ben Affleck in Batman v Superman.

Pratt and Howard are accompanied by two young assistants (Daniella Pineda and Justice Smith), and a suspicious gang of mercenaries led by “Put the lotion in the basket!” Ted Levine. Because guess what (who knew?!)? It’s all a sham! The dinos are being “rescued” to be weaponized to the (literal) highest bidder! Pratt and his gang have been hoodwinked! Now they don’t just need to save them from volcanic extinction, but save them from the evil that men do! The whole bestiary is crammed onto a single ship that looks like it could barely contain one or two – yet somehow this ocean-going clown car manages to contain dozens of poached dinos. 

Somehow this entire colossal operation happens without a single journalist’s camera being on the scene – despite earlier CNN coverage of the island’s nascent eruptions – as it’s the seismic event of the century – yet not a single press helicopter is there to witness the sauropod skulduggery. 

You’ve got several hundred tons of dinos? Where do you keep them? Why in the gigantic subterranean research lab/garage beneath your Gothic manor, that’s where! Poor James Cromwell has been duped by his nefarious jack-of-all-Ops guy (Rafe Spall), an oily suit who makes one long for the subtler villainy of Alan Rickman's Hans Gruber. You know Spall's a bad guy because he yells at children!

The thing is, Bayona is clearly a really good director. Working with DP Oscar Faura, Bayona captures some really fantastic images and knows how to stage a dynamic set piece. There's a lot of good material in Fallen Kingdom, but it's undermined by a tepid script with a plodding 2nd act. It's also frustrating to have the dinosaurs spend half the movie sedated and confined. You yearn for them to bust loose, and when they do, it's exciting as hell. Bayona loves classic Gothic atmosphere, and there are some great moments where he turns the film into a demented Hammer horror film. I just wish the script had let him go even crazier, as he understands the terrain between catastrophe and mortal dread very well.

When the inevitable 3rd film comes out, get some more apex predators in the screenplay department and please give Chris Pratt material that plays to his strengths. There's a bit where he's been tranquilized and desperately tries to escape rivers of encroaching lava - more of that! 

At the end of the day, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is pretty much review-proof. If you like dinosaurs and thrills, I'd still say go see it in the theater. I just wish the script had as much teeth as the carnivores it depicts. 

Annihilation's Realm of the Senses

Alex Garland's been a prolific sci-fi screenwriter, with 28 Days Later, Sunshine, Never Let Me Go and Dredd among his films. But it was his debut film as a director, 2015's phenomenal A.I. thriller Ex Machina, that really made his bones. That was no fluke. With Annihilation, Garland firmly establishes himself right alongside director Denis Villeneuve as one of the top visionaries in the genre working today.

Adapted from Jeff VanderMeer's novel (the first of a trilogy), Annihilation is a strange experience. A remote area of the southeastern U.S. has undergone some kind of strange transformation. Surrounded by a mysterious barrier, it's been cut off from the world at large, now dubbed "Area X." The government's sent in teams to explore it that have never returned - until one man does. The book was a surreal read, written in a sensory-disrupting style that had me rereading some pages three or four times before I felt I'd managed to really see what was happening.

Effective as the book was, Garland's improved on it dramatically, bringing more depth and definition to the characters, more tangible dread to the environment beyond "the Shimmer," and more intriguing hints about what may be behind this catalyst of mutating flora and fauna.

Natalie Portman is the biologist member of a small expedition - all female this time - who venture into the zone looking for answers. Jennifer Jason Leigh and Tessa Thompson (Thor: Ragnarok) are the more high profile members of the team, all well-drawn characters, all full of trepidation about the task at hand, all woefully under-prepared for what they'll find there. Oscar Isaac is the man who came back.

The less I say about particulars, the better. But know that this is intelligent science fiction that doesn't go for cheap shots, and isn't afraid to unnerve and disturb. Like Villeneuve's Arrival, Annihilation depicts life beyond our known experience as something our conventional senses may have a hard time processing - or even sanely perceiving. The film evokes other pictures like Ridley Scott's Alien, Altered States, The Mist and The Ruins, but retains a unique and original atmosphere throughout. Garland and his Ex Machina cinematographer Rob Hardy do a remarkable, painterly job of staging the bizarre, visionary mutations and landscapes that the expedition encounters. There's also refreshingly little explanation or exposition to reassure the audience. Sound and music are used particularly well to influence mood and unbalance the viewer.

I'm kicking myself for missing this one in the theater, as it's so uniquely immersive and visual. Really striking, original science fiction films are few and far between, and if you're game for a challenging, unsettling look into a realm of haunting beauty behind the chaos of nature, Annihilation is a fascinating experience, well worth seeking out.

Deadpool 2's Cyborg Cuddle-Party

Did you know we were getting a Terminator sequel this summer? A really good one? Well, we are - and it's called Deadpool 2. So rejoice, fans of self-aware meta-commentary and unhinged splatter! Because Deadpool 2 is easily the delirious equal of its 2016 progenitor.

Ryan Reynolds has found a character he can really paint the town with, and he wreaks every kind of havoc you can imagine here. New director David Leitch (Atomic Blonde) fills the void left by departing original director Tim Miller (more on that later), diving headlong into the action right out of the gate. The opening credits are a gut-busting send-up of the opening titles of every Roger Moore Bond picture's design-heavy kaleidoscope.

Wade Wilson doesn't handle tragedy well - and when his over-the-top healing factor throws a wrench in his self-immolating intentions, he decides to channel his need to save something into becoming the best X-Man ever! Well, best trainee ever. And in a world where mutant misbehavior is carefully monitored, he soon finds himself in the mother of all super-max prisons - the Ice Box.

What's great about this second outing is Reynolds doesn't just caper and smirk. Deadpool's 'tude comes from a place of real pain - and serious loss - and Reynolds does terrific work carrying the film's more serious moments as well.

So about that Terminator. Wade's immediate plans are disrupted by the arrival of a hard-case cyborg from the future - Cable (Josh Brolin) - who's journeyed through time on his own hell-bent mission to set things right. Hot on the heels of his work as Thanos, this has become The Summer of Brolin, and he's awesome, having seasoned into an indelible, hugely charismatic presence of steely intimidation.
Leitch does an incredible job with the scenes where Cable explodes into the present. Shot by Jonathan Sela (John Wick) and cut by a team lead by Craig Alpert, Cable's arrival is ruthlessly kinetic and evokes the heat and pneumatic violence of James Cameron's first two Terminator films. Cable's character design is superb, and he instantly becomes an iconic character.

Deadpool can't do everything by himself - after all, he's got to comment on not just the X-men, but this movie and Hollywood in general - so he recruits his own band of gifted mutant miscreants, dubbing them "X-Force." Newcomer Zazie Beets as Domino, steals the picture just as effectively as Tessa Thompson did in Thor: Ragnarok. Her superpower is being lucky, and Leitch (along with screenwriters Rhett Reese, Paul Wernick and Ryan Reynolds) take that less flashy-sounding ability and make it inventively tangible in one dynamite scene after another.

Here's the weird thing: back to director Tim Miller. As Terminator as things feel here, Miller and Reynolds had some of those pesky old artistic differences and parted ways, and now Miller's been hand-picked by James Cameron to direct next year's reboot of his Terminator franchise - ignoring the last three misfires as though they never happened.

There are plenty of surprises (and cameos - Dickie Greenleaf!) in Deadpool 2, so the less I say about further specifics, the more fun you'll have - and this picture is one helluva lot of fun. Like the first film, if you're easily offended, you should probably swipe left and look elsewhere. But if you dug the original, Wade, Cable and the X-Force are waiting to show you a really good, really sticky good time.