JURASSIC WORLD DOMINION

the cast face dino-danger

JURASSIC WORLD DOMINION (2022). Director: Colin Trevorrow. 

Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern) and Alan Grant (Sam Neill) of Jurassic Park are reunited by the threat of very large and fearsome-looking locusts who seem to have been engineered by Biosyn, the company that helped bring dinosaurs to the 21st century. Lots of dinosaurs have escaped captivity and bred in the wild, and trainer Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) and his girlfriend, Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) of Jurassic World, look after some of them while being parents to young Maisie Lockwood (Isabella Sermon). Maisie is apparently the daughter of a deceased scientist who somehow reproduced asexually and grew her own clone in her womb (don't ask).

Escaping a voracious raptor

When Maisie is kidnapped by the evil Lewis Dodgson (Campbell Scott) of Biosyn, Owen and Claire go after her even as Ellie and Alan infiltrate the company's huge HQ to get evidence of what they've done with the yucky locusts. Eventually the two couples meet up, hooking up with the delightful pilot Kayla Watts (DeWanda Wise), helpful Biosyn executive Ramsay Cole (Mamoudou Athie), and, of course, Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) of the original film. Naturally there are chases, dinosaurs galore, pterodactyls smashing planes, and many exciting and thrilling moments along with the superior special effects. 

I found Jurassic World Dominion, which got many bad reviews, to be a big improvement over Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, which was awful. Admittedly I had lowered expectations, but I wasn't bored for a second during this rather long movie, and especially enjoyed several topflight sequences: the raptor chase through the streets of Malta; an attack on Owen and Kayla on a frozen lake by a weird and hungry bird-like lizard; a huge pterodactyl tearing apart a plane; and so on. Many viewers have complained about the pseudo-scientific aspects of the film, the moments of illogic and plot contrivance, and so on, but for Pete's sake, this isn't meant to be taken any more seriously than a Saturday afternoon cliffhanger serial, and on that level, the movie works. Ugliness is kept to a minimum, although I would rather have seen a vicious assassin-type lady get swallowed whole by a T-Rex than a perfectly innocent bystander in the square in Malta. BD Wong of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit appears as a remorseful scientist who worked with Maisie's mother; he's fine. There's also a nice score by Michael Giacchino. Although there were hints in Jurassic Park III that the Alan Grant character had a boyfriend, he hooks up with Ellie in this film and the boyfriend is nowhere to be seen. So much for LGBT diversity (although it's possible Kayla is a lesbian)! 

Verdict: Fun, fast-paced picture that still engenders some awe! ***.