“Jurassic Park” is literally about clones — dinosaurs brought back to life by DNA extracted from mosquitoes preserved in amber — and the many sequels in the franchise are the same thing: iterations upon iterations of the same ideas, genetic mutations either monstrous or awe-inspiring or both, as different filmmakers have tried to capture the magic that Steven Spielberg brought forth with the 1993 original.
None have successfully achieved that nearly impossible task, and the “Jurassic World” films especially have seen diminishing returns. But along comes “Jurassic World Rebirth,” which hones in on some of the key characteristics that made the original work.
Director Gareth Edwards now steps into the lab, bringing his own pedigree, which includes epic sci-fi films featuring skyscraper-scale creatures, “Monsters” and “Godzilla,” and an emotional, dystopian family story in “The Creator.”
He also has a not-so-secret weapon in screenwriter David Koepp, who wrote the first two “Jurassic Park” movies, and brings “Rebirth” back to the basics, while weaving in DNA strands from such classic monster movies as “Aliens” and “The Island of Doctor Moreau.” Coupled with Edwards’ excellent cinematic craft, and a complete cast overhaul, “Rebirth” turns out to be one of the best “Jurassic Park” sequels.
Here, our tough mercenary heroine, Zora Bennett (Scarlett Johansson) is contracted by a slimy corporate pharma type, Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend), for a dangerous retrieval and extraction mission to obtain blood and tissue samples from the most colossal dinosaurs living in the wild, in order to develop a drug to combat heart disease.
Krebs wants to rake in trillions of dollars, Zora wants to make enough to get her out of this line of work and have a personal life again, while their third recruit, Dr. Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey), who did his post-doc under Dr. Alan Grant, just wants to see a dinosaur.
They assemble their crew, including captain Duncan Kincaid (Mahershala Ali) and a few obviously disposable soldiers for hire (Ed Skrein, Phillipine Velge and Bechir Sylvain), and set out to get that dino blood. The establishment of this setup is a tonal mess. Johansson’s performance is strange, swinging from oddly perky to grief-stricken by both the loss of her mother and a colleague in a car bombing. The whole thing feels ungrounded.
But the film locks into place with the introduction of the Delgado family, who happen to be on a long-distance sailing trip when they run into an underwater mosasaur and have to call for help. They’re picked up by Kincaid’s boat and soon find themselves under attack from more aquatic monsters, then stranded on the abandoned island where genetic experiments with dino DNA once took place. The family embarks on a journey to find rescue, in a parallel but intersecting story with the professionals who remain hell-bent on gathering their specimens, despite their dwindling numbers.
