‘Jurassic World: Rebirth’ Roars Back As Familiar Formula Thrill Ride

‘Jurassic World: Rebirth’ Roars Back As Familiar Formula Thrill Ride

By Lynn Venhaus

With nostalgic nods to “Jaws,” “Alien” and the 32-year-old peerless original, the thunderous roar of the dinosaurs returns in “Jurassic World: Rebirth,” a super-deluxe summer blockbuster that gets the franchise’s thrills back on track.

With its cartoonish “Jurassic World” theme park trilogy concluded, this new direction means the Jurassic series can endure with fresh faces and a new reason to get near the vicious hulking beasts that have terrorized moviegoers since Steven Spielberg’s classic “Jurassic Park” in 1993.

Still the best of the seven, the equally majestic and macabre original has influenced this latest chapter in large and small ways. For one, screenwriter David Koepp, who adapted Michael Crichton’s brilliant bestselling novel and his sequel “The Lost World” for the films, has returned. This retake is an improvement but still has some clunky storytelling by virtue of the genre formula.

Five years after the events in “Jurassic World: Dominion” (2022), an expedition heads to isolated equatorial regions to extract DNA from three massive prehistoric creatures in water, land and sky for a groundbreaking medical breakthrough, financed by Big Pharma.

Koepp, who wrote the first “Mission Impossible” film in 1996, two of the “Indiana Jones” sequels, and the recent whip smart “Black Bag,” has remarkably made us almost forget the ludicrous “Dominion” and the ridiculous “Fallen Kingdom.”

Philippine Velge dangling off the boat while a Mosaurus snaps.

The only thing we need to recall is that dinosaurs became part of daily life on the planet again, after millions of years of extinction, but their novelty lost its appeal, and they were banished to islands near the Equator to not further imbalance the ecosystem. Travel there is forbidden. Well, then!

That’s where our fearless crew is headed, well-funded by the big bad Big Pharma guys who want enough DNA samples to concoct a heart disease drug that could extend lives. What’s a few run-ins with carnivores?

Rupert Friend is Martin Krebs, the callous company man overseeing the expedition, and makes this haughty executive an easy guy to dislike. Ye olde greed cliches abound.

The theme remains “It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.” And boy do they here.  As in all the films, being anywhere near hungry predators remains a dicey proposition, only now they’ve ramped up the peril by having genetically modified hybrid dinosaurs roam, hatched at a now-destroyed research lab on the tropical island Ile Saint-Hubert in the Atlantic Ocean.

This is blamed on InGen’s insatiable need to give the short-attention-span public new exhibits at the theme parks. So, you know exactly where this is headed.

Jonathan Bailey, Scarlett Johansson

In intense “Black Widow” mode, Scarlett Johansson is resourceful Zora Bennett, a special ops mercenary enticed by the promise of a big payday, no strings attached.

Both appealing performers, she works well with Jonathan Bailey as Dr. Henry Loomis, a brainy paleontologist who is used to being in a museum, not in the field. They make a formidable team without a hint of romance to distract. They have jobs to do!

Bailey is a longtime stage actor who excels in all his high-profile screen roles ever since his breakout as Anthony in “Bridgerton” in 2020. He smoothly delivers the scientific knowledge and rattles off dinosaur statistics for much of the story’s exposition. He also states he studied under Dr. Alan Grant, a bow to Sam Neill’s character.

Two-time Oscar winner Mahershala Ali appears in his first blockbuster franchise as Suriname-based boat captain Duncan Kincaid, who shares a past with Zora. While he makes every movie better, there is little character development here. Only little snippets of backstories emerge.

After all, the dinosaurs are the stars. A secondary plot involves a dad Reuben Delgado (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo), his two daughters – Luna Blaise as 18-year-old Teresa and Audrina Miranda as 11-year-old Isabella, and Teresa’s slacker boyfriend Xavier (David Iacono). They are traveling by boat for a family vacation but shipwrecked by a terrorizing colossal Mosasaurus. Talk about a Sharknado situation!

Audrina Miranda, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Luna Blaise and David Iacono.

Meant to inject humor and heart into the proceedings, this group is rescued by the others, and thus, a strange alliance forms as they wind up on the island instead of headed back to civilization. Philippine Velge and Bechir Sylvain are part of Duncan’s crew, and Ed Skrein is a security chief on the dino-hunter team.

After a treacherous ocean journey, surviving in the jungle is one of close calls and hidden dangers lurking, and yes, it gets repetitive. We’ve been trained to accept this premise, especially characters being chomped in gruesome ways and children in peril that heightens our anxiety and fear. If you go, you know this – no surprises.

Among the frightening creatures are the semi-aquatic Spinosaurus, Pteranodon with 12-18 feet wingspans, the truly scary mutant Distortus Rex (D-Rex), who is a major antagonist, and these large flying creatures called Quetzalcoatlus. Dilophosaurus and Velociraptors return for brief aggravation.

There are some moments of sweetness, however. Bella adopts a baby Aquilops, a herbivore she named Dolores. Loomis and Zora come across a field of Titanosaurus with extra-long tails that is reminiscent of the original scene in “Jurassic Park” when Grant, Ellie Sattler and Ian Malcolm first see a Brachiosaurus, complete with swelling John Williams’ score.

Rupert Friend, Mahershala Ali, Bechir Sylvain.

Composer Alexander Desplat incorporates Williams’ memorable score throughout here.

Director Gareth Edwards, a CGI-effects specialist who helmed a “Godzilla” in 2014 and “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” in 2016, is in his wheelhouse here, crafting stunning visuals and delivering thrills with a familiar story. People who’ve worked with him before return to do their magic – cinematographer John Mathieson and editor Jabez Olssen. The stunt work is also exemplary.

Certain to be a crowd-pleaser, strongly recommend leave children under 8 at home, even if they “like” dinosaurs. This movie features grisly deaths and scary life-threatening scenarios.

It is what it is. “Jurassic World: Rebirth” is fan service and a finely assembled action-adventure engineered to entertain.

 “Jurassic World: Rebirth” is a 2025 sci-fi action-adventure directed by Gareth Edwards and starring Scarlett Johansson, Mahershala Ali, Jonathan Bailey, Rupert Friend, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Luna Blaise, David Iacono, Audrina Miranda, Philippine Velge, Bechir Sylvain, and Ed Skrein. Its run-time is 2 hours, 14 minutes and rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence/action, bloody images, some suggestive references, language and a drug reference. It opened in theatres July 2. Lynn’s grade: B.

Soderbergh Delivers a First-Rate Spy Drama in ‘Black Bag’

Soderbergh Delivers a First-Rate Spy Drama in ‘Black Bag’

By Alex McPherson

Efficient, well-acted, and sleek as hell, director Steven Soderbergh’s “Black Bag” is pure escapist fun, weaving a tale of messy interpersonal drama into a spy yarn whose dense plotting yields ample rewards.

British intelligence officer George Woodhouse (Michael Fassbender) is a cold, calculating, and loyal specialist who can’t stand liars but takes a certain amount of pleasure in rooting them out. He’s told by his superior, Philip Meacham (Gustaf Skarsgard), that a top-secret software program called Severus has been leaked, and  he’s got to “find the rat” in a week’s time or millions of people will die.

Seems like an easy enough task for George who, when he was 37 years old, investigated his own father (once working at the same institution himself) for having an affair.

The only catch is that Meacham reveals that George’s beautiful and enigmatic wife who also works at the agency, Kathryn St. Jean (Cate Blanchett), is one of the five suspects. This troubles George; he and Kathryn share a deep, intimate bond, based on unwavering trust and loyalty to each other.  Why would she betray him and his country?

George invites the other four individuals — who also happen to be couples — over for dinner and drinks (which include truth serum) hoping to shake loose who leaked Severus. There’s the satellite imagery specialist Clarissa Dubose (Marisa Abela) and her trouble-making boyfriend and managing agent Freddie Smalls (Tom Burke); and wry agency shrink Dr. Zoe Vaughan (Naomie Harris) and her vain partner, the recently-promoted Col. James Stokes (Regé-Jean Page).

This group of horny, mentally troubled spies becomes quickly undone thanks to George’s truth serum: a betrayal is revealed, and a hand is promptly stabbed with a knife. But George’s mission isn’t accomplished, and as the plot thickens — especially when the agency’s haughty and slick-haired boss Arthur Stieglitz (Pierce Brosnan, chewing copious scenery) comes onto the scene — a story of double-crosses, insecurities, and life-or-death stakes reveals itself. Most importantly, though, can George and Kathryn’s marriage survive in a job where the code-word “black bag” conceals all secrets?

Indeed, “Black Bag” uses familiar trappings of the spy genre to tell a story about human connections, both frayed and resilient, delivered with smooth style and an ensemble flaunting their star power in entertainingly self-aware fashion. Soderbergh’s film (his second this year after the thrillingly experimental “Presence”)  is a no-frills endeavor, moving at a fast clip as the twists stack up and remain so damn fun to watch. 

Fassbender shines particularly brightly within the star-studded cast, adding another notch to his “malfunctioning robot” characters, which was most recently personified in David Fincher’s “The Killer.” George is charismatic yet socially stunted, moving with a smooth, often darkly funny determination toward conclusions that might terrify him. His stone-cold façade erodes as he evaluates how much Kathryn ultimately means to him, and the lengths he’s willing to go to protect her.

Blanchett exudes effortless coolness as Kathryn, remaining mysterious yet right at home with George. David Koepp’s script portrays their connection with just enough mystery and ambiguity to keep us on our toes as to Kathryn’s ultimate intentions, testing whether we believe in their enduring bond as surrounding characters’ personal and professional lives fall apart, sometimes spectacularly.

The entire ensemble is excellent, with Abela and Brosnan the clear standouts. Abela makes a meal of Koepp’s crackly, quip-filled script; her Clarissa, unsure how to navigate romance within the spy world along with her own insecurities, is feisty and impulsive. She remains compelled to act for what she considers the greater good. Brosnan, in a seemingly anti-James-Bond role, makes a strong impression despite limited screen time, oscillating between confident and increasingly uncomfortable as the plot spirals further out of control.

The ensemble’s talent carries “Black Bag” a long way, but, even with a lesser cast, there’s still much to appreciate from a stylistic perspective. David Holmes’s electronic score pulses in sync with each new revelation; percussive beats amid jazzy themes symbolically tie into the characters’ eroding disguises.

Scenes are lit with a warm, hazy glow, and Soderbergh — who also handled cinematography and editing — opts for finely-tuned precision, not wasting any time as the labyrinthine plot progresses. The aforementioned dinner scene and a polygraph test later in the film are particular standouts, with Koepp’s script and Soderbergh’s editing working in perfect, tension-filled harmony.

It’s refreshing to see a film like “Black Bag” that trusts viewers to follow along with the characters’ lingo and technology without talking down. The (disquietingly current) geopolitics take a backseat to the characters’ interpersonal happenings.

In its own heightened, somewhat soapy way, “Black Bag” has much to say about romantic relationships and the trust necessary to keep them afloat, even in the treacherous terrain of spy craft. Admittedly, “poignancy” is somewhat sidelined in service of keeping the film’s infectiously enjoyable momentum.    

Clocking in at 93 minutes, “Black Bag” flies by and remains prime for future rewatches — a confident, intelligent, sexy spy story that signals one of the year’s first great films.

“Black Bag” is a spy thriller directed by Steven Soderbergh and starring Michael Fassbender, Cate Blanchett, Rege-Jean Page, Pierce Brosnan, Naomie Harris, Tom Burke, Marisa Abela and Gustaf Skarsgard. It is rated R for language including some sexual references, and some violence, and the runtime is 1 hour, 33 minutes. It opened in theaters March 14. Alex’s Grade: A