Jurassic Park (1993)
Jurassic Park‘s origin starts with author Michael Crichton in 1981. While Crichton attended a museum dinosaur exhibit. he observed a young child calling out species of dinosaurs during a slideshow presentation. Realizing their universal appeal, Crichton determined to write a screenplay about dinosaurs, recalling his then-unpublished 1974 novel called “Dragon Teeth”, about paleontologists searching for dinosaur fossils in the 19th Century.
Crichton’s screenplay idea concerned a med-school graduate student subversively cloning a pterodactyl from fossil DNA. Feeling it should climax with the pterodactyl running amok, Crichton struggled in explaining why the student wanted a pterodactyl, how he’d feed it or keep it hidden. Thinking it more silly than terrifying, the screenplay lay dormant until 1985, when reports surfaced that the scientific community was exploring the possibility of cloning endangered or extinct animals for zoos. Crichton imagined a zoo could clone dinosaurs, but who could fund such an undertaking? There would also be dangers: computerized containment systems were glitchy, and criminals might poach the dinos for exploitation. He returned to his screenplay idea exploring new scenarios, one where dinosaur clones run amok after escaping a laboratory, another resembling “Dragon Teeth” about time-traveling dinosaur collectors. However, he continued to hit similar obstacles of implausibility.
In 1988, Crichton learned of paleontologist George Poinar Jr.’s DNA studies at Berkeley. In 1982, Poinar examined a 40-million-year-old air-tight chunk of amber containing a female fungus gnat so well-preserved that its DNA was speculatively viable. Poinar hypothesized that biting insects like mosquitoes similarly encased could hold DNA from long-extinct species. Crichton brainstormed a new cautionary tale where scientists were hastily exploring cloning possibilities from prehistoric mosquitos, driven by financial considerations over ethics. Thinking about how this might be funded, Crichton hit on the missing plausibility element: an eccentric billionaire might fund the research as a massive zoo theme park attraction. Crichton was hesitant, given he risked comparisons to his prior theme-park-run-amok story, Westworld, but he couldn’t imagine another rationale. Incorporating elements of Arthur Conan Doyle’s “The Lost World”, Crichton reimagined it as a science-based adventure novel titled, “Jurassic Park”.
Crichton’s first draft featured a young boy witnessing the dinosaurs in captivity escape. However, Crichton’s circle of literary confidantes despised the child abuse implications and couldn’t relate to a child’s perspective. Over the next several drafts, Crichton tried to replicate the child’s sense of wonder from an adult. Each revision tried a new main character, while prior characters became supporting players. Crichton submitted his final manuscript in May of 1990.
After this, Crichton was in script meetings with longtime filmmaker friend Steven Spielberg on ideas for revising his long-gestating screenplay concept formerly called “Code Blue,” a day-in-the-life Chicago emergency ward concept based on his experiences while interning at Massachusetts General Hospital. (Later repurposed as a TV show under its new title, “E.R.”.) In conversation, Spielberg asked Crichton what else he was working on. Crichton wanted to keep it secret, only dropping that it was a dinosaur and DNA story. That was enough for Spielberg, whose obsession with dinosaurs began as a boy in Haddon Township, NJ, near the excavation site of the most complete dinosaur skeleton, visiting dinosaur museum displays at Philadelphia’s Franklin Institute.He wouldn’t let it go, hounding Crichton for weeks for information. When Crichton finally revealed the full premise, Spielberg’s mind was blown, begging to read the galleys. Once finished, Spielberg called it the most brilliant combination of science and imagination ever conceived, assuring Crichton that a major bidding war would ensue, Spielberg among them.
Crichton was reticent on selling film rights to just anyone, bitter that 20th Century Fox acquired rights for his novel “Congo” and shelved it (Paramount finally made it in 1995). Crichton wanted “Jurassic Park” made by a proven director for a studio intent to make it straight away. Spielberg preferably, if he promised to direct and not just produce. Spielberg promised he would. However, Crichton’s agency revealed they’d already shopped it to six studios. Seeking to control its destination, Crichton wanted the agency to limit the bid only to studios that could offer $1.5 million and a proven director/producer package. Pitching their ideas to Crichton with a phone conversation, Universal and Spielberg won out over packages by Warner’s Tim/Burton/Joel Silver, 20th Century Fox’s Joe Dante/Sandollar Productions, and Columbia/TriStar’s Richard Donner/Guber-Peters production. Paul Verhoeven, who had recently failed to get his own Disney-produced dinosaur film off the ground, was interested but never made an offer, while James Cameron, who envisioned an R-rated ultraviolent take, missed out on the submission deadline by a few hours. Crichton’s agreement included a screenplay adaptation for $500,000 and a profit percentage.
Considering it a spiritual sequel to Jaws, Spielberg wanted Jurassic Park to be a roller-coaster experience beginning with a T-Rex escape halfway through. Seeking to avoid rehashing the backlash he received from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, he tempered Crichton’s gruesome deaths by keeping deaths off-screen. To save time and money, the number of dinosaurs was reduced in half and storyboard work began prior to a completed script around several action setpieces. Some sequences grew so elaborate that others were cut, such as pterosaurs in the aviary and a river raft escape.
Production designer Rick Carter, who designed all forty-four episodes of Spielberg’s “Amazing Stories” TV show and the Back to the Future sequels, had a two-year head start while Spielberg directed Hook. The storyboards created became the reference “Bible” no one could deviate from without Spielberg’s permission. Spielberg wanted realism, but after seeing the mundanity of a real-life science lab, he felt his fantasies of what cutting-edge laboratories looked like worked better.
While Crichton made dinosaur cloning believable, Spielberg had to additionally make the dinosaurs convincing as living, breathing creatures. After seeing the sophisticated King Kong ride, “Kongfrontation”, at Universal Studios Florida, Spielberg wanted full-scale, ambulatory animatronic dinosaurs. However, after meeting with “Kongfrontation” designer Robert Gurr and robotics experts, Spielberg realized full-scale ambulatory dinosaurs were a bar too high.
Stuck with traditional approaches, Spielberg pulled in Stan Winston and his design team to make realistic dinosaurs that behaved like animals – no one was allowed to refer to the dinosaurs as monsters or creatures. Artistic license crept in when Spielberg ordered velociraptors twice as tall as the humans, but during pre-production, a twelve-foot raptor fossil was found in Utah, which kept dinosaur experts mum. Jack Horner, who served as a dinosaur consultant on the film, mentioned that the raptors were bird-like and should have colorful feathers, but Spielberg opted to keep them reptilian to make them scarier.
Trusting his production team to solve technical hurdles, Spielberg worked closely with Crichton on characterizations, wardrobe, and motivations. Once completed, Crichton’s 140-page first screenplay draft was unanimously disliked, even by Crichton, who admitted fatigue writing the same story for the umpteenth time. Spielberg requested a revision that started slower and no more than 110 pages to allow time for action sequences. This time, Crichton wrote the revision in chunks, adjusting each section to Spielberg’s desires before proceeding to the next.
Filming took place on Hawaii’s Kauai Island, where Spielberg filmed the opening scenes to Raiders of the Lost Ark. Hawaii was chosen over Central or South America for ease of access, better political atmosphere, and Spielberg’s desire for nearby hotels and food that wouldn’t give him dysentery. Interiors and jungle scenes were filmed later on Universal soundstages.
Phil Tippett was hired for go-motion puppet work based on Winston’s designs due to his prior work with dinosaurs. However, after Spielberg considered removing a scene of stampeding Hadrosaurs unconvincing results with puppets, effects-guru Dennis Muren suggested his team at Industrial Light & Magic, who were hired to add artifice-concealing blur to the stop-motion effects, try computer-generated visual effects to simulate a stampeding herd without building more than one expensive maquette. Muren changed the silly-looking duckbilled Hadrosaurs to Gallimimuses because they’d be much swifter and more exciting. The results blew Spielberg away. Testing further, they scanned Stan Winston’s T-Rex model to animate in wire-frame for the jungle foreground. Everyone leaped to their feet. After learning that CG would cost $10 million less, Spielberg scaled back full-scale animatronic dinosaurs while eliminating go-motion puppet dinos almost entirely in favor of CG.
Tippett was devastated, feeling he’d produced his best work for Jurassic Park. When Tippett saw the crisper and more fluid CG dinos than he could make, he muttered, “I’m extinct” – a line Spielberg used in the film for paleontologists upon discovering living dinosaurs. Spielberg asked Tippett to take a step sideways. His expertise in dinosaur movement could guide computer animators toward realistic representations. Tippett initially resisted but eventually accepted a new role. He watched nature documentaries to study birds and visited zoos, recording various animals, then hired Leonard Pitt, a professional mime, to train the animators to simulate the motions for Tippett’s newly invented motion capture armature, the “Dinosaur Input Device”. Spielberg wanted distinct personalities for dinosaurs, requiring sound designer Gary Rydstrom to craft unique dinosaurs languages from sound recordings of several dozen different animals played at different speeds, tones, and frequencies. A 20-foot tall mechanical T-Rex model was created, though it malfunctioned often due to the constant rain effects soaking its exterior and putting its weight out of balance.
After Crichton’s drafts, Spielberg wanted richer character work. Screenwriter Malia Scotch Marmo, who’d worked with Spielberg on Hook, was spotted reading Crichton’s book by producer Kathleen Kennedy. When Kennedy mentioned they were currently adapting it, Marmo expressed interest and Spielberg hired her. Marmo borrowed Spielberg’s annotated copy of Crichton’s book for ideas, changing entrepreneur John Hammond away from Crichton’s “evil, greedy version of Walt Disney” to a misguided but benevolent showman who, not unlike Spielberg, invested in technology to create awe-inspiring spectacles for the public to believe the impossible. Hammond would remain alive for sequel purposes rather than Crichton’s ending where he’s shredded by a velociraptor in the Visitors Center Control Room. Marmo nixed Ian Malcolm’s character by injecting his science-crusader traits into Grant.
Spielberg wasn’t feeling Marmo’s attempts, parting ways. Next came David Koepp, just off Death Becomes Her. Spielberg told Koepp he could ignore prior scripts but must adhere to current storyboards and set designs. Koepp wanted to open with a globe-hopping adventure before settling into the fictional island of Isla Nublar. Like Marmo, Koepp contemplated removing Ian Malcolm for being uninteresting and burdensome. He made Grant and Ellie romantic partners with a story arc involving Grant’s resistance, then acceptance, of fatherhood through exposure to Hammond’s grandchildren. The irony that Spielberg’s creating dinosaurs for profit reflected the film’s plot wasn’t lost on Koepp, who struggled to villainize greedy people exploiting dinosaurs to make theme park attractions and sell merchandise because it’s the reason the film was made. He decided to keep Hammond alive, sensing that the billionaire mournful of his mistakes was more powerful than being killed by the Frankenstein he created.
Koepp struggled to explain DNA extraction and cloning in a simple and interesting way. Spielberg, recalling the Frank Baxter films he saw as a kid, suggested a two-minute instructional cartoon presentation resembling videos shown prior to Disney theme park rides. Bob Kurtz provided the animation starring the cartoon character Mr. DNA, who explains how prehistoric mosquitoes drew dinosaur blood before getting preserved in amber that allows scientists to extract its DNA tens of millions of years later. Hammond interacts with the animation on the screen in homage to animator Winsor McCay, who interacted live on stage with Gertie the Brontosaurus, the first film dinosaur.
Spielberg had Marmo review Koepp’s draft, who provided notes that Koepp incorporated for revisions. Although Spielberg wanted deeper characterizations, Koepp winnowed discussions of their personal lives in favor of longer action set pieces. Koepp had received a letter from a young boy begging him not to begin the movie with boring stuff that doesn’t tie in with the dinosaur island. Spielberg read the letter and realized times have changed; what worked for Jaws wouldn’t for 1990s audiences, who wanted fewer characterizations, more action. Spielberg approved Koepp’s fast-food approach to deliver a snappy page-turner without lengthy exposition.
Harrison Ford turned down the Alan Grant role thinking the premise too fantastical, like “going to Mars.”. Kurt Russell and Richard Dreyfuss were too pricey, as was Sean Connery for John Hammond and Kevin Costner for Ian Malcolm. Spielberg decided to stop searching for major stars and invest more toward the technical side, feeling the dinosaurs were the true stars. He wanted actors who seemed smart enough to deliver technical dialogue convincingly. After failing to catch William Hurt’s interest, Spielberg hired Sam Neill for Grant, someone he admired in 1989’s Dead Calm. Neill hadn’t read the script but couldn’t say no to starring in a Spielberg film about dinosaurs. Neill worked on an American accent, but Spielberg told him to disregard it. After reverting to his native New Zealand dialect, Spielberg changed his mind and told him not to try something different. Neill settled on an American accent with hits of Australian, rationalizing that Grant spent much time in Australia on digs.
For Hammond, Spielberg pursued actor-turned-filmmaker Richard Attenborough, whose Gandhi bested Spielberg’s E.T. for the 1982’s Best Picture Oscar (Attenborough admits E.T. should have won), Attenborough had declined acting offers for two prior Spielberg films but agreed to Jurassic Park if Spielberg allowed him time for post-production on Chaplin, which he did through three-week rotations.
After Chaplin‘s completion, Spielberg asked Attenborough to direct Schindler’s List for two weeks while he edited Jurassic Park. Attenborough was unavailable, so George Lucas helped edit Jurassic Park at Skywalker Ranch with Kathleen Kennedy overseeing music while Spielberg flew to Krakow to film crucial snowy exterior scenes. Spielberg stayed in constant communication through separate audio and video satellite transmissions to a Polish TV station. Spielberg experienced toxic shock from the whiplash between the two films’ tones. He habitually called Robin Williams for “care packages”, impromptu stand-up monologues to cheer him up.
After Robin Wright Penn and Juliette Binoche declined the Ellie Sattler role, they auditioned many others, including Sandra Bullock, Helen Hunt, and Gwyneth Paltrow, before landing indie-film darling Laura Dern, who Spielberg admired since her appearance in 1985’s Smooth Talk. Dern hesitated but was talked into it by her Wild at Heart co-star Nicolas Cage who dreamed of being in a dinosaur movie his whole life.
For Ian Malcolm, Jeff Goldblum bested Jim Carrey and Cameron Thor, who was cast as Dodgson. The Malcolm contenders were told that Malcolm might be cut and elements incorporated into Grant. They liked Goldblum’s comedic oddball approach so much that Spielberg compelled Koepp to keep Malcolm. Goldblum added his own character touches, viewing Malcolm like a scientific rock star, sporting a leather jacket and cool glasses. But a flawed person with prior marriages and kids. Malcolm’s flirtations with Sattler had real-world implications: Goldblum started a relationship with Dern during filming. Goldblum divorced Geena Davis while Dern divorced director Renny Harlin to get engaged before parting two years later. In a twist of fate, Davis and Harlin got together and eventually married.
For young Tim, Spielberg wanted Joey Mazzello. who’d auditioned for Robin Williams’ son in Hook. Spielberg reversed the ages of the novel’s siblings, making Lex his older sister who took on the computer expert role, feeling audiences wouldn’t accept a five-year-old girl attacked by dinosaurs. Spielberg spotted Ariana Richards while channel-surfing and invited her to audition. Spielberg watched audition tapes of young actresses (including Christina Ricci) screaming in fear. Spielberg knew Richards was the one when wife Kate Capshaw woke from her deep sleep on the couch and ran into his room worried she was in real fear.
Prior to injecting CG dinosaurs, the actors reacted to nothing except a tennis ball or drawing of a dinosaur on fifty-foot poles to set their eye lines, while Spielberg would run after them roaring into a megaphone.
Creative shortcuts reduced the speculative budget in half. Pricey elements were removed, including a scene of Lex riding a baby triceratops that was designed for a year for being cloyingly Disney-like. Making the park a work in progress also curbed the need for fully realized sets.
Filming was suspended for the last scheduled day of shooting in Kauai due to Hurricane Iniki as the 160mph winds forced them to huddle in the hotel’s grand ballroom. Being a film crew gave them the advantage of generators for electricity, plus craft services. A Victoria’s Secret catalog entertained the adults while Spielberg distracted the kids by celebrating Ariana Richards’ 13th birthday with scary ghost stories. Attenborough, a survivor of the bombing of London, slept through most of it. After the storm passed, with the phone lines down and roads blocked, Kathleen Kennedy jogged to the nearby airport to see the jet she’d requested from Universal was there. The airport was too damaged, but Kennedy secured a ride on a small airplane dropping off volunteers. She arrived at Honolulu International Airport, where she ran into Fred Sorenson, the man who played Jock, the pilot from the opening to Raiders of the Lost Ark. Sorenson, a Hawaiian Airlines pilot, was loading a cargo plane full of medical personnel bound for Kauai. Universal arranged for trips with the National Guard and Hawaiian Airlines to fly out the cast, crew, and other equipment after they flew in with medical personnel and supplies. Everyone was evacuated within 48 hours.
The film deviates from the book’s ending where the island gets firebombed; Spielberg wanted sequel possibilities, keeping the dinos alive. A raptor attack in the climax in the industrial kitchen of the Visitors Center was built as an homage to Stanly Kubrick’s 1980 film, The Shining, with modern steel cabinets, a raptor locked in a food container, and children hiding in the cupboards. One early script ending had Hammond blowing up a velociraptor with a rocket launcher. This changed to Grant using a platform crane to manipulate the museum T-rex skeleton like a marionette that skewers a velociraptor raptor with a rib then crushing the last raptor with its jaws. When his technical advisors derided this ending, Spielberg came up with a better idea. Thanks to ILM’s CG advancements, they’d bring back the T-Rex to battle to the death with the last raptor. A banner falls to the floor reading, “When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth”, an homage to the 1970 Hammer classic that further cements Jurassic Park as doubling as a film about our love of dinosaur movies.
Jurassic Park broke the record for biggest opening weekend box-office performance and the most worldwide gross ($913 million), surpassing the record set by Spielberg’s own E.T. Spielberg’s deal paid him half of Universal’s box-office take plus video sales, and merchandising, including 20% of gross then half of all profits after breaking even. Overall, Spielberg personally earned $294 million, shattering the record for most money made by one person for a single piece of entertainment. It earned Oscars for visual effects, sound effects, and sound editing.
Jurassic Park is a masterpiece of special effects and a fascinating premise for a movie. It becomes that theme-park attraction in movie theaters providing a memorably captivating experience tin witnessing very lifelike dinosaurs come to life through state-of-the-art computer graphics. The T-Rex attacking the tour cars sequence is a show-stopper.
- A 3-D version was released in 2013.
Qwipster’s rating: A
MPAA Rated: PG-13 for intense science fiction terror
Running Time: 127 min.
Cast: Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough, Bob Peck, Martin Ferrero, Wayne Knight
Director: Steven Spielberg
Screenplay: David Koepp, Michael Crichton (based on his novel)