Whoopee! 3D IMAX works in this Dino-rama experience. Is it a dinosaur? A tyrannosaur? Help? What is it? What is that sound? The thumping? Surely you've seen Jurassic Park by now, but if you haven't, you're in for a real treat. The sound and the terrific state of the art special effects from Stan Winston, Phil Tippett and Michael Lantieri -- all part of George Lucas's Industrial Light and Magic -- make for a terrifying journey back to the days when dinosaurs, according to Steven Spielberg, were kept as pets. Spielberg is at his finest in fantasyland just as in this story, the creation of the great late Michael Crichton, and in films where our imagination becomes a character. His Lincoln and War Horse dripped in sentimentality, but this dino dream roars of stand up tall courage vs. fear. You must choose a side. Will you cover your eyes cowardly like I did when one of the prehistoric monsters is about to devour a youngin' or you might identify with the boy who had the courage to face the jaws of a roaring tyrannosaur.
The IMAX is better the second time around. Like love. Laura Dern, Sam Neill, Samuel Jackson, Sir Richard Attenborough, Jeff Goldblum. A magnificent cast not including the good enough to eat youngins, Ariana Richards and Joseph Mazello.
In case you need a refresher in plot, an eccentric billionaire, John Hammond (Sir Richard Attenborough) invites Dr Alan Grant (Sam Neill) and Dr, Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) to his playland of prehistoric pets created by cloning dino DNA frozen in sap from trees where it was dormant for centuries. An island off the coast of Costa Rica is the location of the magnificent and majestic Jurassic Park, an immense animal preserve housing real brachiosaurs, dilophosaurs, triceratops, velociraptors and a tyrannosaur rex
Hammond sends his grandchildren along with Dr Grant, Dr. Sattler accompanied by the cynical scientist Ian Malcolm in a computer controlled jeep through the jungle of Jurassic Park for a jaunt to meet and greet his pets. A storm is brewing. Once out of the safety of the electronically protected fortress our band of merry men and women meet all sorts of havoc, trouble, disaster and death,
It is worth a second visit to see this 3D IMAX tour de force because if your memory fails you as to the plot, the horrifying new sights and sounds of this incredible adventure will revive it. Get lots of hot buttered popcorn. Very hot. And as the butter drips on your hands, you can lick them with gratitude, thankful that you are in a movie theatre and not in Jurassic Park. But you have had your own adventure in 3D IMAX and unlike some of the characters in this film, you can live to tell about it.