Prepare for thrills and chills on the silver screen as some familiar faces revisit
the terror of being chased down by carnivorous dinosaurs in Jurassic Park 3.

Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neil) has returned to his original chosen profession of archaeology
after facing extinction himself in the first Jurassic Park movie. Once again,
however, his life is about to change with the appearance of Paul Kirby (William
H. Macy) and Amanda Kirby (Tea Leoni).

The Kirby couple tells Dr. Grant that they want to do something special for their
anniversary by flying over Isla Sorna. While Dr. Grant is hesitant, Paul is insistent,
and is prepared to offer him a large sum of money for his services.

Dr. Grant and Billy Brennan (Alessandro Nivola) both go along for the ride over
the island, and upon their arrival learn that the couple had more than just a
fly over on their minds.

An unscheduled landing on the island soon turns disastrous at the hands of Amanda,
who insists on calling through a megaphone, thus attracting a rather large surprise
to their landing area. The attempt at takeoff results in a crash shortly after
the end of the landing strip, thus stranding everyone on the island.

This leads into the adventure of trying to escape the island while at the same
time looking for the Kirby’s lost son, Erik (Trevor Morgan). However, the
group is rather unprepared for the many surprises that InGen had living at site
B, which included a large number of raptors, a T-Rex, some pterodactyls, and one
very large, very hungry, and very carnivorous ichthyosaur.

The movie was somewhat disappointing to the shadow of the past two Jurassic Park
movies. It had a more relaxed atmosphere, with fewer chase and somewhat less suspense
than the other movies.

However, to end on that note would be selling a good movie short. Where the movie
lacked in suspense, it made up for it with the terror factor. In addition, the
special dinosaur effects this time around were off the charts.

Not only did they improve upon the dinosaurs from the first and second movies,
but they also did an exceptional job on the new additions to the lineup of terror
monsters.

Overall, the movie was definitely worth the time and money it took to see it.
While it didn’t really live up the expectations I had based on the first
two movies, Jurassic Park 3 was still in a league of its own among monster terror
movies.

On a scale of one to 10, this movie deserves a 7.5.

E-mail the author: David PalmerLIFE Footnotes Writer