Jurassic Park
Jurassic Park is a 1993 American science fiction adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Michael Crichton and David Koepp, based on Crichton's 1990 novel. Starring Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, and Richard Attenborough, the film is set on the fictional island of Isla Nublar near Costa Rica, where wealthy businessman John Hammond and a team of genetic scientists have created a wildlife park of de-extinct dinosaurs. When industrial sabotage leads to a catastrophic shutdown of the park's power facilities and security precautions, a small group of visitors struggle to survive and escape the now perilous island.
Before Crichton's novel was published, four studios put in bids for its film rights. With the backing of Universal Pictures, Spielberg acquired the rights for $1.5 million. Crichton was hired for an additional $500,000 to adapt the novel for the screen. Koepp wrote the final draft, which left out much of the novel's exposition and violence, while making numerous changes to the characters. Filming took place in California and Hawaii from August to November 1992, and post-production lasted until May 1993, supervised by Spielberg in Poland as he filmed Schindler's List. The dinosaurs were created with groundbreaking computer-generated imagery by Industrial Light & Magic, and with life-sized animatronic dinosaurs built by Stan Winston's team. To showcase the film's sound design, which included a mixture of various animal noises for the dinosaur sounds, Spielberg invested in the creation of DTS, a company specializing in digital surround sound formats. The film was backed by an extensive $65 million marketing campaign, which included licensing deals with over 100 companies.
Jurassic Park premiered on June 9, 1993, at the Uptown Theater in Washington, D.C., and was released two days later throughout the United States. It was a blockbuster hit and went on to gross over $914 million worldwide in its original theatrical run, surpassing Spielberg's own E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial to become the highest-grossing film of all time until the release of Titanic, surpassing it in early 1998. The film was praised for its special effects, sound design, action sequences, John Williams's score, and Spielberg's direction. It won 20 awards, including three Academy Awards for technical achievements in visual effects and sound design. Following its 20th anniversary re-release in 2013, Jurassic Park became the oldest film in history to surpass $1billion in ticket sales and the 17th overall.
Jurassic Park's pioneering use of computer-generated imagery is considered to have paved the way for the special effects practices of modern cinema. In 2018, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". The film spawned a multimedia franchise that includes six sequels, video games, theme park attractions, comic books, and various merchandise.
Plot
John Hammond has created Jurassic Park, a theme park of de-extincted dinosaurs, on the tropical island Isla Nublar, off the coast of Costa Rica. After a Velociraptor kills a dinosaur handler, the park's investors, represented by lawyer Donald Gennaro, threaten to pull funding unless experts certify the island's safety. Gennaro invites chaotician Ian Malcolm, and Hammond invites paleontologist Alan Grant and paleobotanist Ellie Sattler. Upon arrival, the group is shocked to see living Brachiosaurus and Parasaurolophus. At the park's visitor center, the group learns that the cloning was accomplished by extracting dinosaur DNA from prehistoric mosquitoes preserved in amber. DNA from frogs, among other animals, was used to fill in gaps in the dinosaurs' genome.To prevent breeding, the dinosaurs were made female by direct chromosome manipulation. The group witnesses the hatching of a baby Velociraptor and visits the raptor enclosure. During lunch, the group debates the ethics of cloning and the park's creation. Malcolm warns of the implications of genetic engineering while Grant and Sattler express uncertainty over the ability of humans and dinosaurs to coexist. Hammond's grandchildren, Lex and Tim, join the others for a park tour in two self-driving electric Ford Explorer tour vehicles, while Hammond oversees them from the control room. Most of the dinosaurs fail to appear, and the group encounters a sick Triceratops. The tour is cut short as a tropical storm approaches. The park employees leave for the mainland on a boat while the visitors return to their railed-electric tour vehicles, except Sattler, who stays behind with the park's veterinarian, Dr. Harding, to study the Triceratops.
Jurassic Park's disgruntled lead computer programmer, Dennis Nedry, was previously bribed by Lewis Dodgson, a man working for Hammond's corporate rival, to steal frozen dinosaur embryos. He deactivates the park's security system to access the embryo storage room and stores them inside a container disguised as a Barbasol shaving cream can.
Nedry's sabotage cuts power to the tour vehicles, stranding them as they near the park's Tyrannosaurus rex paddock. Most of the park's electric fences have also been deactivated, allowing the Tyrannosaurus to escape and attack the group. After the Tyrannosaurus overturns a tour vehicle, it injures Malcolm and devours Gennaro while Grant, Lex, and Tim escape. On his way to deliver the embryos to the island's docks, Nedry gets lost in the rain, crashes his Jeep Wrangler, and is killed by a venom-spitting Dilophosaurus. Sattler helps the game warden Robert Muldoon search for survivors; they find Malcolm just before the Tyrannosaurus returns and chases them away. Grant, Tim, and Lex take shelter in a treetop and encounter a Brachiosaurus herd. They discover the broken shells of dinosaur eggs the following morning. Grant concludes that the dinosaurs are breeding, which is possible because of amphibian DNA—animals like West African frogs can change their sex in a single-sex environment, enabling the dinosaurs to breed. The three later encounter a Gallimimus stampede being hunted by the Tyrannosaurus.
Unable to decipher Nedry's code to reactivate the security system, Hammond and chief engineer Ray Arnold decide to reboot the park's systems. The group shuts down the park's power grid and retreats to an emergency bunker while Arnold heads to a maintenance shed to complete the rebooting process. When Arnold fails to return, Sattler and Muldoon head over, discovering the shutdown has released the Velociraptors. Muldoon distracts two of them while Sattler turns the power back on before being attacked by a third and discovering Arnold's severed arm. While she escapes, Muldoon is caught off-guard and killed by a Velociraptor.
Grant, Tim, and Lex reach the visitor center. Grant heads out to look for Sattler, leaving Tim and Lex inside. The raptors appear and pursue Tim and Lex throughout a kitchen, but they escape, locking one in a freezer before joining Grant and Sattler. The group reaches the control room, and Lex restores the park's systems, allowing them to contact Hammond, who calls for help. As they try to leave, they are cornered by the two remaining raptors, but the Tyrannosaurus appears and kills the raptors while the group flees. Hammond arrives in a jeep with Malcolm, and they board a helicopter to leave the island. Grant and Hammond agree not to endorse the park.
Cast
Production
Development
's 1990 novel Jurassic Park was originally conceived as a screenplay in the 1980s, and went through numerous changes before being published as a book. In the late 1970s, a bidding war began for the film rights to Crichton's then-upcoming novel Congo, which would not be made into a film until 1995. With Jurassic Park, Crichton hoped to avoid another bidding war and the same protracted outcome by offering the film rights at a fixed price of $1.5 million, as he was primarily concerned with ensuring that a film actually be produced; he was less interested in receiving a top offer.Crichton submitted the Jurassic Park manuscript to his publisher in May 1990. Director Steven Spielberg learned of the novel that month while he was discussing a screenplay with Crichton that would become the television series ER. Spielberg, who had a life-long fascination with dinosaurs and had long admired the work of Ray Harryhausen, expressed interest in Jurassic Park. After reading the galleys, he committed to direct the film adaptation. He liked the novel's sense of adventure and its scientific explanation for dinosaur resurrection, saying it provided "a really credible look at how dinosaurs might someday be brought back alongside modern mankind".
Crichton was represented by an agent at Creative Artists Agency. Spielberg recalled that "the agency got ahold of it; and they, of course, encouraged a bidding war, even though Michael had kind of promised me the book privately." Major studios bid for the film rights, each with a director in mind. This included Warner Bros. and Tim Burton, Columbia Pictures and Richard Donner, and 20th Century Fox and Joe Dante. Crichton spoke with each director and endorsed Spielberg as the most likely candidate to get the film made, noting it would be "a very difficult picture" and calling Spielberg "arguably the most experienced and most successful director of these kinds of movies". Universal Pictures, also backing Spielberg as director, acquired the rights on May 15, 1990, less than a week after they were offered for sale and six months before the novel's publication. The film was announced on May 25, 1990.
James Cameron revealed in 2012 that he had tried to purchase the rights, only to discover that Spielberg had acquired them a few hours prior. Cameron said his version of Jurassic Park would have been "much nastier", comparing it with his 1986 film Aliens. He realized he was not the right director for Jurassic Park after seeing the finished product, commending Spielberg for making a film which could be enjoyed by children. Dante also praised it, but disagreed with Spielberg's decision to make Hammond more of a protagonist, a departure from the novel.
Storyboards and sketches were already being produced weeks after the rights were acquired. In order to ensure the scenes would work in 3D space, the storyboards were later expanded by Amblin employee Stephan Dechant into simple animatics made with an Amiga 2000 and the Video Toaster. Because of the island setting and abundance of dinosaurs, Spielberg believed it would be advantageous to hire a production designer as soon as possible, choosing Rick Carter about two years before the start of filming. They both read the galleys and held many meetings to discuss which scenes would work best in the film adaptation.
Spielberg, who, as a child, had been fascinated with dinosaurs and imagined what it would be like to meet one, felt that it was important to channel that childlike sense of wonder for the film. Spielberg said that with Jurassic Park, he "was really just trying to make a good sequel to Jaws, on land." He was also heavily inspired by the 1933 film King Kong, calling it the "high-water mark" for special effects and for imagining "what it would be like to do a King Kong of today." He cited the 1962 film Hatari! as another inspiration, calling it "the high-water mark of man versus the natural in a feature film." Spielberg described the 1956 film Godzilla, King of the Monsters! as the most masterful dinosaur film of his youth, stating that it made him and viewers believe it was really happening. Although he did not set out to make a dinosaur film better than any others, he did want Jurassic Park to be "the most realistic of them all."
It eventually became clear to Spielberg that Jurassic Park would require more time in development, in order to determine the effects needed to create the dinosaurs. He shifted focus to his 1991 film Hook, while continuing to monitor progress on Jurassic Park, including script revisions. The art department went on an eight-month hiatus from Jurassic Park to work on the 1992 film Death Becomes Her, another Universal film. After completing Hook, Spielberg wanted Schindler's List to be his next film. Sid Sheinberg, president of Music Corporation of America gave the greenlight to Schindler's List on the condition that Spielberg make Jurassic Park first. Set designs began to be finalized in January 1992; a hotel was among locations at the fictional park that would be cut from the film. The film's budget is disputed; some sources place it at $63 million, while others, including Spielberg, have stated that the budget was $56 million.
Kathleen Kennedy, who co-founded Amblin Entertainment with Spielberg, would serve as a producer on Jurassic Park alongside Gerald Molen, who had worked with Amblin in the past. Kennedy handled the creative aspects of the project, while Molen managed production-related elements. Dean Cundey, the cinematographer for Hook, would rejoin Spielberg for Jurassic Park, signing on to the project relatively late in pre-production. However, he had followed the film's progress through an association with Carter; both had worked on Death Becomes Her. Cundey described his cinematography as "a realistic, crisp, color-saturated look," aligning with Spielberg's vision for the film. He described the look of the film as "heightened reality", with unrealistically dramatic lighting and imagery, but without diffusion or camera filters. He explained that one of his largest challenges working on the film was balancing the necessity of the effects crew of placing dinosaurs primarily in shadow, Spielberg's penchant for dramatic imagery, and the audience's expectation of realism. Michael Kahn, Spielberg's longtime film editor, would also return for Jurassic Park.