nando820

^wasn't u the guy who loved "Old School" ?

Boba Fett

Lost World. Spielberg was really full of himself on that one and took a wonderful adventure film and turned into a bloated, boring "escape" film full of melodrama and a tacked on hamfisted attempt at becoming THE American Godzilla.

Jurassic Park III is not as good as the original, but at least it's fun and was a pure adventure movie.

whoopdido

I don't get the Lost World hate either. Tons of T-Rex scenes which is a huge plus. The trailer/cliff scene was awesome. As was the raptors in the grass scene. Ok, the gymnast scnene was idiotic, but what was it...3 seconds long. 3 seconds can really ruin an entire movie? The San Diego stuff was a little odd, but again, it's a frickin T-Rex running around...how bad can it be. The first movie, the vast majority of the second movie and all of the third movie showed dinosaurs on a tropical island. I think 10 minutes of dinosaurs in the city is pretty damn cool.

But anyway, the third one is the worst by far in my opinion. However, if they hadn't blown their load and killed off the T-Rex in the first part of the movie, maybe it could have been salvaged. Why kill off the face of the franchise in the first couple minutes of the movie?

The movie ended so abruptly too. The dude shows up on the beach with the army and everybody is saved. Another 5 minutes could have been really cool. They get to the beach and the spinosaurus comes out for one last attack scene and maybe as an homage to the first movie, the T-Rex (either another T-Rex or the first one survived) comes bursting out of the bushes and saves the day. Then instead of showing some stupid big birds out the helicopter window, the camera could have panned over the beach from above and showed the two dinosaurs fighting it out as the helicopter flies away. We wouldn't have to know who won.

That would have been a pretty cool ending and possibly could have salvaged the film.

Sessa17

Yeah, over 10 years ago when I was a kid that had only seen Vince Vaughn in one movie. I have also not since Old School since which I have explained elsewhere.

GoldenJCJ

I reserve judgment until I see the second half of JP3. For some reason the copy I saw in the theater and on DVD had the last 30 minutes cut out...

gmanca

I think the Lost World was stupid in that it waited too long to get to the San Diego portion which was what the intent behind the new InGen people's safari raid. And when they did, it should have been that the San Diego park failed and that's how the T-Rex got loose as opposed to the stupid ghost ship bit. Is he really expecting us to believe that everyone decided to walk in front of the caged T-Rex area?

Shazam

Part 1. It set the bar so high that the sequels didn't have a chance.

mdc3000

I love the whole trilogy but would pick part 3 as the 'worst', but it's still very good IMO. The only reason it gets dumped to the bottom is the lack of a third act.

Strevlac

This.

Parts of The Lost World are great. The first shot of Jeff Goldblum in the film (the subway) was fantastic. That's the kind of artistic, creative filmmaking I love. The cut, the juxtoposition of Goldblum in front of the banner advert and the quaility of the photography are clearly the stuff of expert artists. The trailer scene is crackerjack in its construction and building of suspense. The rest of the film however is phoned in and boring, unfortunately.

3 is fun because it's a skillfull little escapist adventure film, completely unpretentious. I can appreciate it on that level and think it's pretty fun.

devilshalo

Explain to me how the T-rex was able to wreak so much havok on a ship, yet a disembodied hand can some how trap the damn thing back into the hold and close the doors.... before the ship crashes into the dock? And no one on board radios for help during the attack on the ship?

If Kathy Bates brief full frontal scene can scar me for life, so can gymkata girl.

whoopdido

Actually I forgot about that whole ghost ship thing. I've never understood that. Spielberg eventually explained the missing dialogue in Jaws. Maybe one day he'll explain exactly what happened on that ship.

Wazootyman

I specifically avoided JP3 because I so disliked Lost World (Gymkata!). I figured if Spielberg could go so far astray, Joe Johnston had no chance. Maybe I should check it out. I do like Macy and Neill

Michael Corvin

I don't think LW failed miserably or is a terrible film, but I do agree that Spielberg tried to hard to capture the magic of the first and failed. Like Strevlac points out, there are moments of pure artistry to be found in LW, but they are few.

brayzie

I didn't like The Lost World that much. I found it pretty stupid, even for being a popcorn flick.

By the time it came out, I was already tired of certain cliches in summer blockbuster films. I thought it killed the sense of danger when everyone was dangling from the trailer with the T-Rex about to kill them and their cracking jokes about getting a cheeseburger with fries while close to dying.

Then the hippie guy lets the poor dinosaurs out of their cages so they could be free. I understand the message of that scene, but I would think it would be worse to let dinosaurs out of their cages because someone might get killed in the ensuing stampede.

I remember the scene where Spider-man's soon to be girlfriend was hiding in the kitchen in JP 1, from the velociraptors and it was a very tense, and scary scene.

The threat of velocirapoters was ruined when Jeff Goldblum's daughter did a gymnastics kick and killed it.

I strongly disliked mostly all of the characters in that film and their idiotic actions.

I liked JP3 because they brought back Sam Neil, and the Pterodactyl cage scene was pretty good.

arminius

That was the girl from Tremors not Spiderman. And all the bad stuff that happened was all the hippy guys fault. He got everyone killed including the people in San Diego.

SmackDaddy

Lost World by far for me. I remember how pumped up I was when I saw the first teaser for it. Saw it in one of the theaters that was enhanced with special lighting that went off like lightning during the trailer (it was the only THX certified theater in Houston at the time).

Then, the movie came out....ugh...little girl>raptor, stupid "godzilla" attempt. Aside from the T-Rex/trailer scene I didn't really enjoy it at all.

JP3, on the other hand, Is probably my most rewatched version (one is my favorite) due to it's fast pace and pretty much non-stop action. Yeah, the ending feels truncated, but still a better overall movie than Lost World IMO.

Roybq

I thought the original Jurassic Park was the best, but all Lost World and Jurrasic Park III had going for them were some great set pieces and actors. Since I've discovered that I actually watched Jurrasic Park III more than Lost World, I'll have to pick Lost World as the worst of the three. The switch to San Diego seemed like an afterthought and an entirely different movie.

brayzie

Wow, I can't believe all these years I thought it was Kirsten Dunst.

islandclaws

The Lost World.

It's a poor retread of the first film, and I can't stand Jeff Goldblum's daughter. JP3 felt like a low-budget dino romp, and I was ok with that. It was more fun.

tylergfoster

I like all three to varying degrees. I think ultimately I don't hold the original in as high regard as others because I didn't see it in theaters, and I read the book first. It's good, but it has that "Hollywood adaptation" gloss, and a light amount of "PG-13 kid gloves" that detract from the experience for me just a little.

I saw The Lost World in theaters and actually think it's fun, even if it's pretty silly that the T-rex gets back to land. All of the very Spielbergian things that bug other people bug me less because the tone is pretty goofy and popcorn-movie (the hamburger frying joke in Minority Report, for instance, is much more annoying to me because as a viewer I'm trying to take that movie much more seriously than this).

As for Jurassic Park III, I remember not liking it in theaters and finding the ending very abrupt, but when I watched it on DVD years ago I had a better reaction to it. Still, that was a long time ago, and I don't remember it well enough to say if I truly liked it or not. My strongest memory is of the cinematography, which is cool; for some reason the look of the abandoned island and science labs is very appealing to me.

In the end, all three basically struck me as fun movies, and I don't know which one is the worst.

Michael Corvin

What I find amusing is that this thread is basically the exact opposite of the JPIII thread when it came out. I seem to recall damn near universal hate for the film.

I guess with time people have come to terms with the type of movie it set out to be.

SuckaMC

I literally finished reading The Lost World while waiting in line to see the movie. I wanted to rip my eyeballs out after watching it... I really liked JP3.

arminius

I remember here in NYC they had the Mercedes SUVs in character convoying around town. What a let down that movie was.
JPIII was a "not so serious" fun movie. The amatuer mercs, the bickering couple and the cell phone ring. Even the end with the pterosaurs was fitting.

JTH182

It's been a while since I read the book so maybe someone can help me out, but I think it was explained that raptors had made it onto the boat and hunted down the entire crew. I could be wrong though.

foofighters7

I actually voted for JP3 but for some reason thought the Gymnastic girl Vs. Velociraptor scene was in it.

My mistake, I take back my vote for JP3 and put it on The Lost World. That single scene was such a 'jump the shark' moment it ruined everything in the film. In fact, it left a bad taste in my mouth for the whole franchise and Spielberg as a whole.

He must have been high as a kite to even remotely think that was a good idea.

I think I actually let out a "Ohhh, come on!" When that happened.