Truly great movies will always withstand the test of time. Regardless of technological advances made in movie making over the years, if you have a solid story, great performances and took great care in the way in which it was made, your film will never pale in comparison to newer films with less heart but more technical toys at their disposal. The Steven Spielberg directed 1993 blockbuster hit Jurassic Park is the perfect example of this. Even now 18 years later, this is one of the most exciting, fun adventures to watch. And now with the release to Blu-ray the picture, sound and overall quality of the film has never been better!

It’s amazing how well these special FX have stood up. I think it was the blend of animatronics and very basic early stages of CGI that make it work so well. That and the fact that Spielberg knew exactly how little of the dinosaurs he should initially be showing. It’s that build up to the big scenes with the T-Rex and the Raptors that really draws the audience in so that when they do pop out of nowhere and screech that horrible attack sound of theirs it’s hard not to jump back in your seat. I’ve seen this movie countless times over the years and yet somehow watching it just now it startled me at least two or three times. That’s brilliant filmmaking.

Sadly though the above statements do not in any way shape or form reflect the second film in this trilogy, The Lost World. On the contrary this film plays as incredibly dated. It’s a typical, ‘there-has-to-be-a-sequel-because-the-first-was-so-successful’ type of movie. It was clearly made for way less money as the special FX are not nearly as convincing as the first; largely because of the lack of animatronics which is what made the first films Dinosaurs so lifelike and believable. They padded The Lost World with impressive name actors like Julianne Moore, Pete Postlethwaite, Vince Vaughn and the return of Richard Attenborough but gave them such useless characters to inhabit in such a ridiculous situation that it didn’t make any difference. The only saving grace for this film are the many one liners that Jeff Goldblum gets off throughout and also some of the scenes with the animatronic T-Rex that they reused from the first film.

The first movie also dealt more with the arrogance and naïveté of scientists and wealthy entrepreneurs whereas this second film is about the baser instincts of man to be cruel, exploitative and downright despicable. It’s a harder film to watch especially given our current economic climate; but then again given that, watching these rich assholes being eaten and torn apart by Dinosaurs is pretty rewarding. If only life could actually imitate art.

The third, and so far final, installment of this series is Jurassic Park III and

is the first to not have Steven Spielberg at the helm. It does, however, mark the return of the original star Sam Neill and it does manage to get back to an overall feeling closer to that of the first. It doesn’t even approach the level of genius that its originator achieved but it does a decent job of entertaining the audience. The special FX are again more CGI than animatronic and so nothing looks as real as it should, but they are able to do much, much more this time around. Multiple T-Rex, Raptors, an even larger predator that cleans their clocks and the Taradactyls are finally able to play a significant role thanks to these advances in technology.

The new characters seem to blend into the story with greater ease than those in the sequel but still nothing can compare to the original.

The special features are very extensive as one would expect in a release like this, but more than that they are mostly worth watching. In particular Return to Jurassic Park; which is a behind-the-scenes featurette divided into three parts on the first disc highlighting the first film, then two on the second disc for Lost World and finally one last installment on the third disc. Each of them has all new interviews with the cast and crew and are extremely informative. They give a very interesting perspective on a film series that was growing as CGI technology started to become more and more useful and utilized. You could see the hesitation from some and the blind faith that others had in it. Sure today we look at CGI as the way to go but back then it was still rough and proving itself. But if films like the Jurassic Park movies hadn’t been made with what we now see as somewhat primitive CGI then the later movies like Avatar that did it so perfectly and convincingly would not have existed in quite the same way.

Each disc also has the features that were found on the previous DVD releases of the films including featurettes, deleted scenes, trailers, the works. So if you are someone who revels in special features and learning the secrets of movie making you will love these features just as much, if not more, than the films themselves.

There are also a ton of interactive features via BD live. So if you’re someone who gets into that there is a wealth of material to explore… To quote the film, “They spared no expense.”

Jurassic Park will always be one of the best films ever made and even though the sequels never quite lived up to the glory of that first project seeing them all back-to-back in amazing Blu-ray quality is quite the experience. Parents and kids alike will love watching and re-watching these movies so I’m going to

suggest buying this set rather than renting or Netflixing. For any true fan it’s a ‘no-brainer’ but even for a casual viewer who just loves action adventure movie making this set is well worth the purchase price!