Movie Review: Jurassic World: Rebirth

The fourth entry in the “Jurassic World” franchise, Jurassic World: Rebirth, continues the cycle of decline of the overall franchise that began with the release of Jurassic World in 2015. Sadly, this new film feels like a retread of stories and ideas that were handled more effectively over thirty-one years ago when the original Jurassic Park was released.

Taking place five years after Jurassic World: Dominion, the Earth has proven to be inhospitable to the reconstituted dinosaurs. Those that do still exist, live primarily in an isolated environment along the Earth’s equator. This area is largely off limits to humans until a small group of explorers are tasked by a pharmaceutical company to secure DNA samples from three of the largest known “currently” living dinosaurs in an effort to create miracle drugs that could bring about the end to various diseases plaguing humankind.

It goes without saying that the “company” turns out to be the villain in all of this – a fact that has been in place since the very first film was released – and everything that could go wrong with the expedition does go wrong. This is, of course, complicated when a family on sailing excursion – led by father Reuben (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) – is capsized by a dinosaur and the quest to find dinosaur DNA is put on hold to rescue the wayward family. It is an attempt to give the stakes some emotional weight that would be lacking otherwise, but it feels shoehorned in and an overtly forced tactic.

Director Gareth Edwards does as well as can be expected with the action, given his work on 2014’s Godzilla and 2016’s Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, but the whole enterprise suffers from the same problems that plagued all of the films in the “Jurassic World” cycle – Jurassic World (2015), Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018), and Jurassic World: Dominion (2022) – lack of character depth and story. This is simply a series going through the motions until audiences get entirely fed up with them. Until that happens, they will keep resurrecting the behemoth creatures.

“Jurassic World: Rebirth.” Photo by Universal Pictures and Amblin Entertainment – © Universal Studios. All Rights Reserved.

Screenwriter David Koepp, who penned the script for the best films in the series – Jurassic Park (1993) and The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) – returns to the franchise with Rebirth. But, again, the story proves to be a retread of ideas previously executed far more effectively in earlier films.

The cast, including the likes of Scarlett Johansson as the main dinosaur hunter (or, rather procuring of hard-to-obtain items) and Mahershala Ali as the old boat captain, serve as stock characters moving a tired and worn-out story from beginning to end with little at stake.

Despite the longevity of the “Jurassic” series, and its apparently enduring popularity, the latest installment – Jurassic World: Rebirth – provides little in the way of hope that the series will rebound and find new ground upon which to tread in the future, other than simply regurgitating the same old formula again and again.

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Mike Tyrkus

Editor in Chief at CinemaNerdz.com

An independent filmmaker, co-writer and director of over a dozen short films, the Editor in Chief of CinemaNerdz.com has spent much of the last three decades as a writer and editor specializing in biographical and critical reference sources in literature and the cinema, beginning in February 1991 reviewing films for his college newspaper. He was a member of the Detroit Film Critics Society, as well as the group's webmaster and one-time President for over a decade until the group ceased to exist. His contributions to film criticism can be found in Magill's Cinema Annual, VideoHound's Golden Movie Retriever (of which he was the editor for nearly a decade until it too ceased to exist), the International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, and the St. James Film Directors Encyclopedia (on which he collaborated with editor Andrew Sarris). He has also appeared on the television program Critic LEE Speaking alongside Lee Thomas of FOX2 and Adam Graham, of The Detroit News. He currently lives in the Detroit area with his wife and their dogs.

@miketyrkus

Mike Tyrkus

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