It's been almost two months since Jurassic World: The World After went out and the box-office has not finished tilting under the weight of the mastodon. On the verge of crossing the billion dollar mark generated on the globe, this third part of the saga World does not deplete. A figure that gives the vertigo -and nausea - for who still has a little respect for Jurassic Park (read our article on book by Nicolas Deneschau). Like the promises of the covid era on the supposed « World after » that we still wait and the gullibles who pushed the song « Never again. », Jurassic World Frightily responds to the same aplomb: Why revise such a lucrative recipe when this type of entertainment has long renounced to be intelligent? We'll explain why. Colin Trevorrow Check one by one the boxes of bad taste. As an echo of a cerebral specification where the haze and stupidity would prevail at all costs on the legacy of Spielberg.
Dinosaurs everywhere, Justice nowhere
No doubt aware of the gaping holes that strike the scenario sewn with white wire since the first Jurassic World, the film starts in the tone of a C-news report, Christine Kelly less. « Every confrontation tells us more about this frightening reality ». The facilitator, serious air, continues: « 37 dinosaur-related deaths last year », while a cell phone video shows us a triceratops accident on the local A31. Gulls for pteranodon snacks, compsognathus snacks: The World After is populated by uprooted upside down at every corner and the great damn of the population. 37 deaths for settlement on the entire planet, this is not much compared to the many cumulative deaths of the first parks. A whole symbol in the image of the sweetened character of Jurassic World.
Let us be forgiving and pass this unlikely sudden invasion for some escaped specimens of an isolated mansion. A funny aberration as the attic player and his companion explained very well in their critical. Dinosaurs and humans must now learn to live together, hand in foot to reconnect with Gaia. Like a certain District 9 of which he never marries the shadow of his quality, Jurassic World draws us a Manichean world where mercenaries live poaching and the prolos of a steak of gallimimus. All kinds of cattle traffic are in full swing. Luckily Claire Dearing formed a young team of volunteers at the Greenpeace To free the beasts of the wicked poachers. Well... especially this baby. trognineratops which will be very soon in the head of the ray gondola Toys "R" Us.
Poorness always finds its way
It's been barely five minutes since the fim started that we are already serving an unlikely race-prosecution coupled with a generous shooting, where the nice triceratops send the vehicles like bowls to the Saint John fair. Colin Trevorrow might have preferred to realize the next Fast and Furious given the number of scenes in vehicles in the film, each of which is perfectly interchangeable at leisure. Special mention debility in the streets of Malta where our trainer to do everything is even more comfortable than Daniel Craig On a bike. Indigestible and soulless, it would almost seem that dinos are extras added in post prod. No doubt the shooting was full of green screens.
In The World After, we run all the time, we chain the messy plans and we chat to explain to us what happens on the screen, as soon as we didn't understand that « too complex thought ». It is a permanent debunk of dinosaurs at each scene, as if it were necessary to saturate space even if it was necessary to completely decredivize the whole. It's a bit like the scriptwriters took the phrase of Ian Malcolm spoken in the Jurassic Park First of name: « Would you have planned to put dinosaurs in your dinosaur park ? ». « We're going to replenish you with a whole plaster. » Did they say benignly.
If the special effects have been achieved by John Nolan and its teams, having recently worked on the series Dark Crystal known for its animatronics, it feels how much Universal willingly wanted to overtly support the map kawai to the detriment of realism. The dinosaur offspring are too rogue and seem to come out of a magical universe. To systematically anthropomorphize dinosaurs, Jurassic World: The World After Also abuses the cross-eyed emotions between Owen and his company raptor, one would almost dare write. Same with Maisie and the baby raptor Beta. A duplicative reminder that too much emotion affects the audience's involvement.
Dinos are our friends, you must love them too
Human-Dinosaur relations are so forced that they distort the traits traditionally attributed to the lifestyles of reptiles, which are all the more fierce in their wilderness. Whether it is crocodilians or snakes, almost all reptilians have no parental relationship with their offspring or in a very episodic way. Once the nest has been built, the females leave and the young are barely taken out of the eggs and delivered to their instincts and to the joys of natural selection. But the scriptwriters Jurassic World preferred to represent their relationships as docile mammals. The domestication of dinosaurs is even more aggressive. The latter are trained by laser, when it is not the affection that guides them. You'd almost think you'd see the velociraptors shaking the tail like puppies when they meet. Or an irritated cat chasing the beam of a laser foolishly.
We touch the summum of ridicule when Owen initiates his adopted daughter (clone) and Alan Grant to the dressage of raptors. We are far from the perfect predator of the very first film. It's full of good feelings and it's cute when little Maisie addresses the baby straight into her eyes as if it were a Pokemon to tame at Safari Park. After all, did Owen not promise Blue himself that he would bring back his kid, captured by the bad boys local? Dupering a raptor from a simple roll? Again, too easy! In essence it is clearly the image of Pokemon Go which corresponds best to the World after.
Dinos everywhere and with whom it is composed willingly at the canisite of the neighborhood, at the market or during the Sunday promenade. While the first film played on the rarity of apparitions to generate suspense, Dominion use and abuse dinoses in each plan up to indigestion and total dispersal of stress. It is an amusement park without amusement park. An idiotic and unbelievable paradox. Even diplodocus are used as line horses. An idea far from being stupid on paper but which fishes here by an absolute lack of coherence and narrative guidance. Universal violates shamefully our collective imagination to sell some more stuffed to the next Black Friday.
Clone me if you can...
As for Maisie's character, he introduces a narrative arc worthy of the most guignolesque scenarios of the films Resident Evil (read our test of the latest Netflix adaptation and the episodes with Milla Jovovich). Colin Trevorrow is not afraid of ridicule and it is therefore a case of cloned child who should solve a crisis of giant grasshoppers (and flame retarded which is more). And yes, for if the world is on the brink of chaos, it is still because of the great Capital, whose criticism is systematically bypassed. When science derails, nothing like a good old scientific remedy. A whole picture that fits perfectly with our times. Climate change? Let's inject suffering into the atmosphere rather than reduce our footprint. The mutant locusts? Nothing like a good old GMO cocktail.
Colin prefers dedicated villains rather than criticizing a real economic predation system. Cherry on the cake, the latter lack charisma and some identity with a replica of bad Asian white veil to seduce the Chinese market and ridiculous poachers. The secondary characters probably enjoyed the same care with one main feature per protagonist so as not to heat our brains. One of the most aberrant scenes is that of the black market which turns into a pugilate between dinos and humans before ending up in muscular interrogation with guests a baby triceratops and a young allosaurus or similar. « Are there still writers on the set? ? » When Owen turns his back on the victim and his executioners to make a phone call as if nothing had happened. The same Owen who later made the keys to the dilophosaurus... Damn Owen!
Me, ugly and mean
Other pitfalls, not least, Jurassic World is an action film that has forgotten horror. The scenes are fast-paced without flavour or a quest for consistency. It is the mechanics of the permanent auction that prevails at every moment with a flood of blind blinks. One imagines the wealth of brainstorming where each of the ideas would have come out of a hat for the simple benefit of the artistic lottery. From the fan service down the forehead seeks to pay homage to the cult moments of the series but one always friezes self-caricature. Malcolm as Saviour rock, Grant grimed in Indiana Jones pre-retired, cupids punished by good old Dilophosaurs, nerd Repentant, the fallen scientist, Ellie who reproaches herself for having brought Alan into this merry mess: all stereotypes pass there with so many figures seen and reviewed with much more accuracy and panache elsewhere. We are considered so much prunes that even the heroes of the first film are dressed almost as at the time, as soon as they are confused with decors or dinosaurs.
Derrière ces images artificielles, le néant. Pire encore, l’usage abusif des CGI couplé à une écriture hors sol participent à un sentiment de glissement vers le gag permanent. On reste médusé devant certaines répliques invraisemblables : « What’s your story ? » demande l’un des vilains avant de se faire dévorer. Même quand un Giganotosaurus, un Tyrannosaure et un Therizinosaurus s’affrontent, on a l’impression d’assister à un mauvais King Kong à moins qu’il ne s’agisse d’une baston d’ivrognes ou d’un Pierre-Feuille-Ciseaux à la kermesse du village. Personne n’y croit, pas même les personnages qui restent plantés au milieu du ring. Un match de catch où tout semble factice du début à la fin. Les décors sonnent faux, la photographie est pauvre et même les mouvements des dinosaures sont trop souvent artificiels, en plus de comportements plus que sujets à caution pour des prédateurs aguerris. Avec Trevorrow, on comprend mieux pourquoi les dinosaures se sont éteints finalement…
Mon petit poney
C’est simple, Jurassic World s’interdit mordicus tout frisson. Le spectateur est invité à manger son popcorn sans anicroche, le transit doit être facile et le message aussi lisse que possible. On flatte l’orgueil des fans avec quelques comptines ressassées depuis des lustres et qu’on nous vomit droit dans les yeux, comme une insulte à notre intelligence et un échec à demi avoué : The World After n’invente rien. Il mime un ersatz des figures de James Bond, voire de Star Wars avec son Faucon Millenium tout en lorgnant sans scrupule du côté d’Indiana Jones, sans jamais égaler les plus mauvais films de ces sagas. Prévisible, mal réalisé et scénarisé avec une boussole de Twister, Jurassic World est l’archétype d’une industrie qui ne sait plus rien faire d’autre que se singer elle-même.
En réunissant les vieux briscards de Jurassic Park et les nouvelles recrues de la saga World, The World after a tout d’un mauvais repas de famille. Long et résolument barbant, on nous arrose pour mieux nous faire oublier combien les mets servis viennent du Picard du coin. Fades et sans saveur. Comme une recette ratée de Marmiton, Colin Trevorrow confond l’huile avec le vinaigre, l’élégance avec la bâfrerie. Jusqu’à l’épilogue dégoulinant d’amour où tricératops et pachydermes, mosasaures et cétacés vivent une harmonie retrouvée sous un splendide coucher de soleil, Jurassic World tire systématiquement à côté. Un rodéo de 2H27 d’ennui, une prouesse boulimique qui confine au nanar, sinon à l’indigestion selon votre intolérance à la médiocrité. Étant donné le plébiscite mondial inversement proportionnel aux critiques, la saga a encore de beaux jours devant elle avant Jurassic Universe qui réunira les marmots du premier avec toutes les autres mascottes décrépies par les années. Et le vieux gosse qui sommeille en moi finira par abdiquer : « Et si on laissait enfin les dinosaures reposer en paix ? ». Un film à voir (très) alcoolisé pour mieux l’oublier.
Bande-annonce de Jurassic World Dominion
Merci pour cet article qui a fini de me convaincre de ne pas voir ce film (au cinéma en tout cas).
Deux remarques :
– “Le film se permet aussi de nombreuses licences avec le comportement des dinosaures.” : “libertés” plutôt que “licences” ?
– “Un film à voir (très) alcoolisé pour mieux l’oublier” : c’est pas bien d’inciter à la consommation excessive d’alcool 😁
Merci pour ton commentaire Gui iom ! J’ai corrigé pour licences, tu as raison. C’est vrai que c’est l’un des aspects du film qui est le moins réussi. Il y a une débauche d’images de synthèse mais les mouvements sonnent parfois faux. On a l’impression qu’ils sont tout de suite à plein vitesse quand ils se mettent à courir. Paradoxalement les animatroniques sont trop kawaï aussi.
Les dinos ont parfois des mouvements très saccadés et voir un bébé raptor sautiller de joie quand il retrouve sa mère, je n’étais pas au jurassique mais ça me semble hautement improbable. ^^
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