Jurassic Park

It is the first installment in the Jurassic Park franchise, and the first film in the original Jurassic Park trilogy, and is based on Michael Crichton’s 1990 novel of the same name, with a screenplay by Crichton and David Koepp.

The film is set on the fictional island of Isla Nublar, off Central America’s Pacific Coast near Costa Rica, where a wealthy businessman John Hammond (Attenborough), 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, including Hammond’s grandchildren, 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 before its publication in 1990.

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 on June 11 in 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 in 1997. It also remains the highest-grossing film directed by Spielberg to date.

The film was also a critical success, with praise directed at its special effects, sound design, action sequences, John Williams’s score, and Spielberg’s direction.

The film won over 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 $1 billion 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 five sequels – The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), Jurassic Park III (2001), Jurassic World (2015), Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018), and Jurassic World Dominion (2022) — a television series, video games, theme park attractions, comic books, and various merchandise.

After a Velociraptor kills a dinosaur handler, the park’s investors, represented by lawyer Donald Gennaro, demand a safety certification.

Gennaro invites chaotician Ian Malcolm, and Hammond invites paleontologist Alan Grant and paleobotanist Ellie Sattler. Upon arrival, the group is shocked to see a live Brachiosaurus and other dinosaurs.

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 and scoffs at the park’s design, saying it will inevitably break down.

Hammond’s grandchildren, Lex and Tim, join the others for a tour of the park, 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 sick 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 do so as well.

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 retreat to an emergency bunker, while Arnold heads to a maintenance shed to complete the rebooting process.

When he 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. Muldoon, simultaneously, is caught off-guard and killed. 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 them while the group flees. Hammond arrives in a jeep with Malcolm, and they board a helicopter to leave the island.