Things Jurassic Park could have done better

Jurassic Park is a classic. No doubt about that. However, no matter how good a film is, there is always something that could have been improved on, or done better.

In my opinion, there was no reason why Hammond did not keep the security guards on the island. I mean, he was under a safety inspection, you'd think the entire security division stationed on Nublar would have remained on the island. (Plus it would correlate well with the novel's depiction of the Isla Nublar Incident). Also any medical staff and of course Alejandro and the other food service employees.

Care to share your constructive criticisms of Jurassic Park?

I think it would've been better to have Muldoon actually do something aside from rescue Malcolm and use himself as bait for Satler to hit the maintenance shed...like kill a raptor or something. He was severely underutilized in my honest opinion.

It's a complaint with JW, but seeing more of JP would've been cool too. Maybe more of the island's layout to confirm which dinosaurs were there or not, or more of the Visitor Center.

More loyal to the book, maybe? Especially TLW (but that's another discussion)

I would have liked to have gotten a little more into how the kids were dealing with their parents divorce.

Also, the crazy disappearing T.rex paddock moat.

Tyrant Lizard wrote:

I would have liked to have gotten a little more into how the kids were dealing with their parents divorce.

This would have been a good addition... other than Gennaro's quick statement at the beginning of the movie, the divorce is never mentioned. They even took out the scene where Hammond mentions it to the others before the tour. I wouldn't want it to take over the movie or anything, but even a few extra lines about it would have added some more insight into the kids' personalities - particularly Lex's fear of abandonment - and why Grant is so important to the kids during the film. Also, I think their trek back to the visitor center could have been a bit longer than it was.

I also agree with Megatronus' comment about Muldoon deserving more screentime. They could have still killed him off, but letting him kill one raptor wouldn't have hurt. It might have even made his death more surprising if he was shown successfully hunting a different raptor beforehand.

I think they should've had more screen time for Muldoon and Arnold. Have Muldoon or Grant kill one of the Raptors. Guns can be something useful in a dinosaur attack scenario, you know.

V.a.nublarensis wrote:

I think they should've had more screen time for Muldoon and Arnold. Have Muldoon or Grant kill one of the Raptors. Guns can be something useful in a dinosaur attack scenario, you know.

According to Samuel L Jackson, there would have been a scene with him being chased and killed by Raptors, but it got cut because the hurricane ruined the set.

That sucks. His death is just kind of abrupt in the film, and glossed over for the most part (like Muldoon's).

- During the "Shoot her!" scene, it's ridiculous that the raptor doesn't get killed, and the death of that raptor, say, after mortally injuring Jophrey, would've been more believable than a single raptor (The Big One) accounting for so many dead raptors.
- Speaking of The Big One, there aren't any identifiable factors. She looks exactly the same as the rest of them.
- The lack of background dinosaurs and establishing shots kind of makes the island feel smaller than Spielberg probably wanted to convey.

Why should have there been any more background dinosaurs?

I agree with the background dinosaurs. It would have been nice to see, for example, a stegosaurus or something in the back of one of the tour shots- or maybe compies somewhere once.

I think it would have been nice to see part of the jungle river cruise and the aviary with Grant and the kids as in the novel, maybe including some species that weren't seen on-screen.

If they had to fit all of that into 2 hours, other scenes would've have been rushed or deleted and it would've hurt the end product. Maybe different case if it was a 2hour 30 minute film but you don't generally want your kid friendly adventure flicks to be that long.

The background dinos, I think it was already at it's limitations. Not only from the budget side, but you don't want it to feel too bloated. It's the first time audiences have been introduced to these things (some people before 1993 perhaps had never even seen dinosaurs on film, or in general altogether!) so you want to concentrate on things that matter.

Furthermore, apart from the Parasaurolophus which only appears in single establish shot, every single dinosaur in the film has a purpose that it serves. There are no "fillers" or so to speak (except that Para). The novel can get away with larger variety because it needs to tell a specific story and leaves lot to the imagination but I think the film would have only suffered by it.

I guess it's one of those "would be nice I guess" thingies, but not "we need it". I've literally never heard anyone complaining for the lack of variety in JP. It's like the Mos Eisley in the original Star Wars, no-one had an issue with it, but Lucas filled the screen with random CGI crap for his 1997 and subsequent Special Editions just because he wanted. Same with the Jabba dance scenes in Jedi, and so on and so on. The result is zero improvement, only detrimental effects...

Anyway each to their own.

I would say TLW did solid job at making herbivores a considerable factor in multiple scenes, which was fine alteration of the formula. The variety in the "game trail" made sense there too from various perspectives, it wasn't there just for the sake of it or visual pleasure. I don't think the film handled carnivores quite as well, except the compys of course (and raptors to extent), but still better than the other two sequels IMO.

One thing I wish it did better was establish that the goat dispenser in the T. rex Paddock was on an elevated platform, and the rest of the animal's paddock was on much lower ground, maybe by way of Richard Kiley exposition, just to clue the audience in and not make the later descent into he paddock appear contrived, maybe also show the car being dragged along by the T. rex.

I also wish they could have very subtly foreshadowed Rexy bursting into the Visitor's Center and attacking the Raptors, maybe by having Grant notice that objects in the building are shaking ever so slightly. Something that doesn't make Rexy's surprise rescue come off as a Deus Ex Machina.

Another issue I have that I would see a future release editing out are the strings on the Dilophosaurus frill, for some reason I always missed them as a kid but as an adult I can't unsee them! I know that the 3D blu-ray has edited them out, but I'm not buying that release because I don't like the reddish-brown look of it. I don't normally agree with the Special Edition mentality, but to fix that one effects hiccup I would be in favour of.

The message of the movie is just communicated poorly and unconvincingly. Humans can't control nature, the movie says. Ok, then how about showing us that instead of every example being something preventable? Electric fences going down? They didn't need to be fences in the first place (could've been moats). Dinosaur breeding? Use different frogs. And so on.

BoulderFaceplant wrote:

The message of the movie is just communicated poorly and unconvincingly. Humans can't control nature, the movie says. Ok, then how about showing us that instead of every example being something preventable? Electric fences going down? They didn't need to be fences in the first place (could've been moats). Dinosaur breeding? Use different frogs. And so on.

They had concrete moats in addition to the fences.

The message, is that human thinks he's right, but no, he's arrogant and makes mistakes. Just like with the frogs. Playing god with nature is impossible. Sure, mistakes can be fixed later on and things enhanced but ultimately and inevitably you end up making new mistakes. Just like for example with climate in real life. Because that is life and human nature.

Part of the appeal of Hammond was his naivety. Plus the fact that even though he says no expense has been spared, it's clearly not the case. And, and, even if he had been the most brilliant businessman on Earth and hired the best scientist of the world and not left any holes in the plan,
A) As said before humans make mistakes
B) The park was not ready
C) There's still the case of investors, backers and lawyers. These tend to complicate matters and things are rushed. At the end of the day this is a business, not science fair.

They could have stayed true to scientific evidence. Take the Dilophosaurus for example. It was given an extendable neck frill and the ability to spit poison when there's no fossil evidence to suggest it had either of those things.

Here's the things I would have liked to have seen in the original movie.

Ed Regis. He plays a relatively prominent role in the book and doesn't even get a mere mention in the movie. There are people who think Ed Regis is supposed to be the guy driving the jeep that Hammond and Gennaro are in just before they stop and see the Brontosaurus but it doesn't seem to be conclusive.

Ian Malcolms rants could have been done better. he basically abuses Hammond every chance he gets in the book over the whole theme of creation and why it doesn't work but in the movie we get basically a completely dumbed down version of Malcolm. I just feel Goldblums character could have been awe inspiring had they have included some of his rants from the book.

The scene from the book where they realize they have dinosaurs breeding around the island because the computer is counting more than the expected number of dino's. now THAT should have been in the movie. that would have added so much more suspense.

Muldoon doesn't die in the book, so why does he die in the movie?

The island gets nuked by the military in the book but it doesn't happen in the movie?

FoxHound4690 wrote:

Here's the things I would have liked to have seen in the original movie.

Ed Regis. He plays a relatively prominent role in the book and doesn't even get a mere mention in the movie. There are people who think Ed Regis is supposed to be the guy driving the jeep that Hammond and Gennaro are in just before they stop and see the Brontosaurus but it doesn't seem to be conclusive.

Ian Malcolms rants could have been done better. he basically abuses Hammond every chance he gets in the book over the whole theme of creation and why it doesn't work but in the movie we get basically a completely dumbed down version of Malcolm. I just feel Goldblums character could have been awe inspiring had they have included some of his rants from the book.

The scene from the book where they realize they have dinosaurs breeding around the island because the computer is counting more than the expected number of dino's. now THAT should have been in the movie. that would have added so much more suspense.

Muldoon doesn't die in the book, so why does he die in the movie?

The island gets nuked by the military in the book but it doesn't happen in the movie?

It was a Brachiosaurus not Brontosaurus. Also, in the book, the island gets napalmed, not nuked. My guess is that in real life, Costa Rica doesn't have much of an air force. And that's what saved Nublar.