I have been a fan of Jurassic Park since before the first film, when I checked the book out. I didn't become a really big fan until the movie though. Jurassic Park and The Lost World are two of my favorite movies.

And so, I saw Jurassic Park 3 as soon as I could. Sadly, I thought it was incredibly lame. Jurassic Park 3 is a popcorn movie, a movie that has a lot of action and special effects, but very little story, and even less thought. As a popcorn movie, this isn't such a bad movie. There are far worse popcorn movies… but it isn’t great either. As a thinking movie, it didn’t even try.

Many people are going to say to me... "Jurassic Park has always been a popcorn movie!" I whole-heartedly disagree. I never saw the first two as popcorn movies. The first was very unpopcorn, with whole scenes devoted to characters talking, debating, thinking. It had an overall theme of "Don't Mess With Nature" and Chaos Theory subtext. It told its story well, was well directed, and pretty well acted. This is why it's one of the most popular films, even today.

The Lost World is given a lot of flack because it's not like the first film. It's given a lot of flack over it's ending... and I guess that's why Jurassic Park 3 was made how it was. To those who say Lost World has no plot, nothing is further from the truth. Lost World had a story, it had a theme, and it had the same message as the first film, along with a new spin of Hunters vs. Gatherers, or Pacifism vs. Militarism, instead of the first's Chaos Theory subtext. Even though many think that the story and theme in Lost World was not well done, they'll admit that it is there.

The first two movies have thought in them, Jurassic Park 3 doesn't. The thought was a "This is how you play god" line, and "You're as bad as the people who made this place!" line. The "Don't Mess With Nature" which was huge in the first two movies is reduced to a couple of lines like that. This movie consisted of people running around being chased, with no thought process in it.

Jurassic Park's fan base consists of many young children, and I would lay money on the fact they're going to take Jurassic Park 3 over Lost World. If they don't, it'll probably be solely for stupid reasons like how the T-Rex should have won the fight. Maybe when they're older, and possibly grow to appreciate substance over style, they'll change their mind. They're allowed to have their own opinions though. Many people only like Jurassic Park for it's action in the first place, and so they're not going to care if Jurassic Park 3 has no plot. That's fine, but I'm not like that.

Even on it's own terms as a popcorn movie, Jurassic Park 3 was a lesser movie then the first two. The direction was ok, but much too fast paced for me... and the ending was also far too abrupt, I normally like Joe Johnson's direction in his other films, so I found this odd. Another problem was the story featured several total copies from the first two, such as running with a heard of dinos, Grant saying he's to busy to leave his dig then getting bought out, sorting through dino dung for laughs, and flying too and from the island on a helicopter with the theme music blaring.

I didn't care much for the Spinosaurus, and though I've not researched dinosaurs in a long while, I seem to remember Spinosaurus as a medium sized dinosaur with weak jaws that probably ate fish. And why did the raptors change so drastically in such a short amount of time? Granted, dinosaur accuracy was never Jurassic Park's strongest point, but it was never this bad, and it accepted it's own rules.

Half the people were killed off in the first attack, and then the final person in the next attack. After that I knew everyone would live, where's the tension after this? Even in a popcorn movie you need better then that. There are also lame things like the boat going into some mist, and then being destroyed, having a gory body in the parachute harness, or the Raptor staying still in the lap. This was far too horror film. The first two movies had some things like that (the spitter in the jeep in Jurassic Park, the creek and water fall turning red with blood in Lost World) but these, in my opinion, were done much much better.

The divorced parent angle was overdone, stupid, and has been done many times before. I guess it will appeal to a lot of the kids seeing this movie though. It could have been worse.

What the hell was up with all the things they brought up, then forgot about? First off, the biggest hole in the entire movie was the fact that the plane was warned not to land on the island. The person doing the warning, had an american accent, and so was probably from the US Coastguard, or a special group set up by the US military to watch Site B, as Costa Rica does not have a military. Why did the people who are supposed to be protecting the island from intruders allowing people to land? Next, what exactly killed the people on that boat? the movie implied that the pteranodons were all locked away (though in TLW they were free) what else could it be? Bad writing, that’s what. Another thing was that it looked clear to me that the big gun used to blow up scrap was foreshadowed, and then never used. As was the Rex urine, which attracted the Spino. And what was the point of having Eric go "Oh No! Compys!" and then have a shot of the outside with compys? In the next scene they were out of the tanker! I could go on to talk about how the kid wouldn't know the term compy, but that's beside the point. Another thing, why bring up the fact that the Spinosaurus was not on the Ingen list if you're just going to have the characters go "Ok" and move on?

There are good parts, and some good lines. The humor, for the most part, was clever, and I found it funny. The pilots saying they know the Kirbys through their church was great. The fact they didn't know there was two islands was funny (Grant saying he's never been on this island was perfect.) Ellie's son being distracted by Barney was very clever too; the kid did a good job there. The Spinosaurus breaking through the fence after everyone has celebrated escape was good as well, though that fence should have been wood, metal is far too unrealistic. Grant's dream and the megaphone joke were pretty damn unfunny though, in my opinion. I also enjoyed the Tick Tock parallels with the Sat Phone; at least this was not such a rehash from the past Jurassic Park films. Even though it was very unrealistic it could be heard. A better approach would have been having it in a piece of clothing stuck on the Spinosaur's teeth, then having it come unstuck later.

The special effects, while good in parts, disappointed me in others. The CG for a lot of the herd animals seemed to take a step backwards, it wasn't half as good as it was in Lost World, and not much better than in the first movie. I also thought the fighting dinosaurs looked like toys. They jiggled too much. The score was ok. Nothing much was new, a few new notes in the main theme, and then a militaristic version in the end was all I really noticed. It was pretty much Don Davis plays Jurassic Park. The Lost World had an entirely new sub theme.

Overall, I found this movie disappointing beyond words. The forth movie will probably be about why the hell a Spinosaur was on that Island, as Ingen never made them. Unless that was just a throw away line. Anyways, I predict that it will have something to do with Biosyn (the people who hired Nedry to get the embryos for their research in the first film.) They're on the island and have been making their own dinos, or whatnot.

I would like that if it was done well, with some thought to it please...