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The Lost World: Jurassic Park
Collector's Edition
(Dolby Digital, Full Screen)
review by Zach B.
Click above to purchase "The Lost World: Collector's Edition
(Full Screen, Dolby Digital)" at amazon.com
Rated PG-13
Studio: Universal
Running Time: 129 minutes
Starring: Jeff Goldblum, Julianne Moore,
Based on the novel by Michael Crichton
Adapted by David Koepp
Directed by Steven Spielberg
Retail Price: $26.99
Features: "Making The Lost World" Documentary, Deleted
Scenes, Still Galleries, Dinosaur Encyclopedia, Production
Notes, Cast & Crew Bios, Theatrical Trailers, DVD-ROM
Specs: 1.33:1 Full Screen, 5.1 Dolby Digital English,
2.0 Dolby Surround French, English Subtitles, Spanish
Subtitles, Chapter Search (2 Chapters)
Right along with
Jurassic
Park, Spielberg's mega sequel to the smash hit film has
been another anticipated DVD title. Though the film is not
as popular as the first, it still has a huge audience and
people can't resist and have to own both films on DVD. Like
so many other anticipated titles, "The Lost World" is
finally out and we can all rejoice.
The film smashed opening weekend records when it released
during Memorial Day 1997, however, it quickly died down and
only went on to gross 226 million domestically. That is
indeed a lot, but compared to the 365 million the original
"Jurassic Park" did, it kind of makes you wonder about word
of mouth.
I was really disappointed with "The Lost World". I went
to a screening for the film way before it opened.
Spielberg's direction is good here again, and a ton of the
effects are amazing, and there are some pretty memorable and
nice scenes, but David Koepp's choppy script, and the fact
only Jeff Goldblum is the major character returning (despite
some cameos from Attenborough as well as Ariana Richards and
Joseph Mazzello), I found that pretty disappointing (I guess
the book was like that, which I never read). I just didn't
find it so enthralling, a lot of the characters are not
developed so well, and I never got excited or so interested.
It does get boring, and some characters are plain pointless.
It's not the worst film ever, but it's not as engaging as it
could have been. But as far as sequels go, this ranks as one
of the bad ones.
However, the DVD does have a good amount of features and
some booming video and audio.
For a film that's three years old, it's not as good as I
expected. A lot of the problems are minor, but they do add
up. I noticed some minor artifactin, as well as some grain
and debris on the print. Also, images do appear pretty soft
at points throughout the film (especially toward the
beginning). Still, the picture is nice with great color
hues, solid black and good detail. This is the full screen
version for those prefer to see the film that way. While I
always like widescreen, this is perfectly fine for those who
do not.
Reference quality. The Dolby Digital 5.1 is excellent,
and a whole soundstage comes to life through it. The
beginning is a wonderful example. The baby dinos, the music,
the screaming, just makes great use. John Williams score is
put to nice use hear, and I was pretty impressed with the
Stegasauruses which occurs about 23 minutes into the film...
it's a big more aggressive than the original Jurassic Park
track, and I loved every minute of it. A French 2.0 Surround
is included, and so are English and Spanish subtitles. The
subtitles are inputed creatively at where the characters are
posistioned and whatnot, and I found that it could get
annoying and distract from viewing.
Features... features... again, like the first film's
disc, nothing revolutionary, but there is a good amount of
stuff.
The Making Of The Lost World Documentary last one
hour, and offers a really good amount of behind the scenes
footage, interviews and insights on the making of it. A
really good watch to see how it was all done.
Two Deleted Scenes are in non-anamorphic
widescreen, and look pretty bad with a lot of scratches and
grain, and it's clear why they were cut. They don't move the
story at all, though the second scene presented adds on a
little developted to the Trembo character, but in all, I
didn't really enjoy them.
Image Galleries are included on the disc, so if
you like your pictures, you'll definently enjoy these.
"Storyboards," "Production Photographs," "Illustrations And
Conceptual Drawings," "Models," "The World Of Jurassic
Park," "The Magic Of ILM" and "Promotion And Toys." are all
included, so knock yourself out. The "Promotion and Toys"
gallery is big, with a lot of concept poster art. There are
only a few snapshots of the toys, but what annoyed me with
the posters is that they have every concept poster and the
regular posters, but there was this "3-D" one with the logo
and then a T-Rex head that pops out at you when you look
another way. Of course, it's not included... also, Universal
assumes you know to work your stills and your player... no
instructions are given on how to turn foward or back.
Rounding out the disc is what was inlcluded on Jurassic
Park, there's the fantastic Dinosaur Encyclopedia,
which gives some great info and pictures about Dinosaurs and
the eras they lived in, so it's a good brush up on their
history and certain dinosaurs (and to help the kiddies study
in school!). Very detailed and well put together
Production Notes, as well as Cast and Crew
Bios. There are also Three Trailers. One is for
Jurassic Park and appears a bit grainy (and there were two
trailers for Jurassic Park, and the disc only has one. This
is the semi-teaser), the other for The Lost World which
looks nice and the other a horrible, incredibly stupid for
the upcoming, Joe Johnston directed Jurassic Park III. It
appears to be video like, and is good for a laugh.
Some DVD-ROM features have been included, such as
Weblinks, a Newsletter, website and a
few more goodies...
One last note, the Menus are exact opposites with
Jurassic
Park. While this has the pushed up footprint, the other
film has a dino mud mark and things are located on opposite
sides mostly. Just to let you know.
While I did enjoy some parts to the movie, this sequel
was a big disappointment. The DVD has decent picture (though
I expected much better), reference sound and nice
supplements. If you love Jurassic Park, there's no doubt you
have or will pick this mediocre sequel up.
 (2.5/5, NOT included in
final score)
 (3.5/5)
 (5/5)
 (3/5)
(3.5/5, NOT an average)
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