Jurassic World: Rebirth

Official Australian release date: 3/7/25. Viewed: 3/7/25.
Director: Gareth Edwards
Actors: Scarlett Johansson, Jonathon Bailey, Marshala Ali, Rupert Friend
Genre: Action / Sci-Fi
Rating: M

‘Jurassic World: Rebirth’ (why didn’t they call it ‘Jurassic Park: Rebirth’, if it’s actually supposed to be a revival/return-to-form like the original?) is the seventh Jurassic film, and thankfully slightly better than the last two films (‘Fallen Kningdom’ and ‘Dominion’). We have a whole new cast, with Krebs (Friend) the shady money man funding a trip to South America (apparently Suriname, but filmed in Thailand) to extract dinosaur blood for apparently good reasons, hiring “security” Zora (Johansson), boat captain Duncan (Ali) and palaeontologist Dr Loomis (Bailey).

Director Edwards (‘Rogue One’) knows how to make it look good, but the pacing is still off a fair bit of the time. After the Snickers intro, there’s about 25min where not much happens at all – and the whole explanation for dinosaurs only being around the equator because of more oxygen and the public losing interest is ridiculous. Dinosaurs not existing in the cooler climates makes sense, but it feels like they missed a trick not exploring the spread of dinosaurs after ‘Fallen Kingdom’. There’s a whole subplot here with a civilian family of 4, and while fine, they don’t add too much to the story and often split the narrative. There’s 3 others who we don’t really even learn the names of – wonder what happens to them?

The best scene still involves a T Rex – and is taken straight from ‘The Lost World’ novel. Shows when the right amount of tension, fear and relief are executed well, it can still be great. Weird to say, but the 3 big stars – Johansson, Bailey & Ali – don’t actually feel like they have that much to do, and any character development is too forced. They’re all passable, but they’re kind of just there. It’s just over 2 hours long, and there’s some good set pieces, but it definitely doesn’t feel like that much happens or that there’s enough dinosaurs. Always tough, as the original set such a high bar. There’s just enough good moments and just enough dinosaurs to give a 3.

Overall: Maybe if this was the first film of the ‘Jurassic’ series you were seeing as a kid, you’d like it much more.

Gav’s Rating: 3 stars