Mistakes.
65. The end
of the fence.
You don’t
have to build an entire fence if you wish to make the audience believe that
there is a fence. However, you shouldn’t show the end of the fence on screen if
you can help it.
64.
‘Helping’ the raptor.
The
dinosaurs of Jurassic Park came to be through a mixture or ‘real’ animatronic
puppets and CGI. The raptors entering the kitchen are puppets. How can I tell?
Because a crewmember is holding its tail to steady it.
63. The
sudden gorge.
One a lot
of people noticed the first time ‘round. The T-rex breaks free from his paddock
and attacks the children. Then, when Alan Grant and the children seek refuge in
the paddock there’s a sudden gorge there. Can a T-rex climb a tree? Really,
with those little arms?
62. Knowing
when the phone call ends.
The one I
noticed the first time ‘round. When Dennis Nedry is talking to his helper on
the dock he is clearly talking to a playing video. An amazing bit of sci-fi
technology here: a videophone that knows when your call is going to end.
61. Nedry’s
bag.
A cheap
shot, these happen all the time in movies, but a fun one to notice. Nedry has
and hasn’t got his bag in two following shots when talking to Dodgson.
60.
Disappearing raptor.
Why this
happened? No idea. Maybe one of the computer graphics guys was on sick-leave.
But when the raptor attacks the T-rex in the big finale he suddenly disappears
for a singular frame.
59. Where
did the T-rex come from?
During the
climactic finale the T-rex saves the day by killing the raptors. But how could
he have entered the building? This is often considered a mistake. But the only
mistake here is that the audience never gets to see the big hole in the wall
behind him. If you look closely at the background in various scenes you’ll
notice that the visitor centre isn’t completed yet. So the T-rex could easily
have fitted in. Now why nobody heard this big girl arrive? That is indeed a
good question.
58.
Spell-check.
In the
embryo freezing chamber, Tyrannosaurus rex is spelled with only one
"N" instead of two. Also, Stegosaurus is spelled
"Stegasaurus". (I’m such a notorious bad speller that I copy pasted
this one directly from IMDB.com)
57. Changing towel.
During
the introduction of John Hammond his tea towel changes in color.
56. A potted plant?
When
the T-rex spins the car around you can spot a potted plant and a stage light.
Foreshadowing and explanations
55. The
belt buckles.
’All
dinosaurs are females’ Dr. Henry Wu explains. So they wouldn’t be able to mate
to create offspring. During the movie Grant comes across evidence that ‘life
has found a way’. But this was foreshadowed scenes before when he tied two
‘female’ belt buckles together.
54. The
fake flea circus and the dinosaurs.
Richard
Hammond tells Ellie Sattler about his early day as a manager of a flea circus.
All the little acts in this circus where mechanical. There weren’t any real
trained flees – but people pretended there were.
Now
consider the fact that the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park aren’t real dinosaurs.
They are a concoction of real dinosaur DNA and frog DNA to fill in the gabs in
the genetic code. So just as fake as the flea circus.
53. The
fridge.
It always
seemed a bit convenient that the fridge door was open in the famous kitchen
scene. But it wasn’t. Several scenes
before –during the power outage- Hammond is seen eating ice-cream because, as
he said it, “they were all melting”. Which is understandable if there is no
electricity to power the fridge? So he took the ice-cream and left the fridge
door open. Then when the power returned the water on the floor started to
freeze again. So now Timmy could run towards the open fridge, slip and slide
his way out and trap the raptor.
52. Chekhov’s gun: the ride.
During the
ride the narrator in the car tells the guests all about the various dangerous
skills the dinosaurs posses. For instance, the Dilophosaurus’s skill to spits a
venomous substance at its prey.
Naturally,
all these things explained happen later on to poor Nedry.
51. ‘Spared
no expense.’
Be wary of
people who say things like ‘spared no expense’ or ‘I don’t care about how much
it costs’. They are usually cheapskates. Hammond only hired Dennis Nedry to
write the massive bulk of code that keeps Jurassic Park functioning and then
refused to pay him more.
50. He
doesn’t want kids.
Alan Grant
doesn’t want children at the beginning of the movie. In the end, with Tim and
Lex sleeping on his shoulders he looks at his girlfriend with a look that tells
her: “yeah, alright, some like these would be fine.” This was reused and gender switched in Jurassic
World.
49. The
logo.
When the
guests first arrive in Jurassic Park a jeep stops at the heliport and the
camera focuses on the sparkly clean logo on the car door. When the survivors
leave the logo is muddied.
Also, with
some creative reading it reads: “UR ASS PARK,” as in “you’re lucky to get out
with your ass in one piece.”
48. The
vegetarian curse.
Lex is a
vegetarian. Of course the minute a person says something like this nature has
to throw a severed goat leg towards her.
47. Dinosaurs
evolved into birds.
The most
obvious one but it should be mentioned. The bird flying past the helicopter in
the end.
46. Black
and white.
There is a
reason Malcolm wears all black and Hammond all white: It symbolizes how
diametrically opposed the two characters are. Also Malcolm hurts his leg whilst
Hammond leaves the island unscratched.
45. Man
versus nature.
Jurassic
Park’s message that ‘man cannot control nature’ is underlined by using a
tropical storm as one of the elements of the park’s failure.
44. InGen.
The company
name InGen means ‘Nobody’ in Norwegian.
43. Exit-speech.
The
directions Ian Malcolm gives Ellie Sattler after he snatches the radio from
Hammond are his last lines of dialog in the entire movie.
42. Look
after your kids.
Each time
Lex and Tim are left by an adult they are attacked by a dinosaur.
41. ACGT.
At one point,
during the finale, a raptor is illuminated by a computer screen repeating the
letters ‘ACGT’ over and over again. These letters are the acronym for Adenine,
Cytosine, Guanine and Thymine, the DNA's base pair.
40. Alice
in Wonderland.
There are
several references to Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland. ‘The white
rabbit’-codeword than Nedry uses to cover his track is the most obvious one.
But then there’s also the character Lewis Dodgson whose name seems to be a
combination of Lewis Carroll and (Lewis Carroll’s birth name) Charles Dodgson.
39. Dinosaur
versus humans.
Not a
single dinosaur is directly killed by a human being (though being locked up in
a freezer is possibly deadly for a raptor).
38. Nature’s
beings.
Each and
every moment in which the hunting dinosaurs are out of their element (=not in
nature) they lose the fight with the humans/the humans escaping.
37. Mr.
Smokealot.
In every
scene Ray Arnold appears there is a cigarette present.
Fun of the internet.
 |
| 36. Dammit Phil. |
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| 35. For the love of the Goldblum. |
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| 34. Long live memes. |
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| 33. Funny when it’s gif-ed (1). |
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| 32. Funny when it’s gif-ed (2). |
Production trivia.
31. Hurricane.
During
production Hawaii (where the movie was shot) was struck by one of the most
powerful storms ever: Hurricane Iniki.
30. Familiar
pilot.
The
helicopter pilot who rescued the cast and crew during this hurricane was a man
called: Fred Sorenson. The same man who plays the pilot in the beginning of
Spielberg’s Raiders of the lost ark.
29. Attenborough unbothered.
When the
hurricane hit Richard Attenborough stayed in his hotel room and slept through
the event. When he was later asked how he did it he replied: “My dear boy, I
survived the blitz!"
28. Back in
the game.
The role of
John Hammond was Richard Attenborough’s first acting role for fourteen years.
27. A smart
fix.
When Lex
falls through the ceiling the stunt woman who did the stunt accidentally looked
up into the camera. In post production her face was replaced with that of the
actress.
26. The
start of the CGI revolution.
Originally
all the dinosaurs were supposed to be puppets. But when Spielberg saw the
potential of CGI he opted for a combination of the two techniques.
25. Don’t
you mean…
Ian
Malcom’s line: “Don’t you mean extinct?”. Comes from Phil Tippett when he saw
how CGI bettered the clunky animatronics.
24. Product
placement.
There is a
lot of product placement in this movie (especially visible during the ‘flea
circus’-scene). All of which could be bought at the time (and are now collectors’
items).
23. News
clippings.
Alan and
Ellie have several articles about UFO’s in their trailer. (like "Space
Aliens Stole My Face" and "Dinosaurs On Mars!") A big nod to Close encounters of the third kind and E.T.
22. Humor
sign.
Alan and
Ellie have a sign that says “No animal released without paperwork completely
filled out” hanging in their trailer.
21. Real
fear.
When the
T-rex breaks the roof of the car the screams of the children are genuine. The
robot wasn’t supposed to break the Plexiglas roof.
20. Spooky
T-rex.
Due to the
wet surroundings the animatronic T-rex would often short-circuit during its introduction
scene. However, every once in a while it would come alive on its own accord and
scare the yips out of people.
19. Set
accident.
Sam Neill
burned himself on the flare. According to him: “It dropped some burning
phosphorous on me and got under my watch and took a chunk of my arm out.”
18. Audition
luck.
Joseph
Mazzello (or Joe as he calls himself nowadays), who played Tim Murphy,
originally auditioned for Spielberg’s Hook. Even though he was turned down
Spielberg promised him to cast him in his next movie.
17. Flipped
characters.
Because
Joseph Mazzello was so young the Jurassic Park script flipped the ages of the
children. In the original book the boy is the oldest.
16. Jaws.
The first
time Dennis Nedry is seen at his work station on of the monitors is playing
Spielberg’s Jaws.
15. Very
few dinosaurs for a dinosaur movie.
There are
only 15 minutes of actual dinosaur footage in the film: 9 minutes are Stan
Winston's animatronics, 6 minutes of it is ILM's CGI.
14. Super
Size Start.
As a
fast-food tie in dino-sized meals could be ordered. So basically Jurassic Park
started the super-sized frenzy.
13. Pirates.
When
Jurassic Park was released people flocked to cinemas. Well, except the people
in the Ural city of Yekaterinburg who watched a pirated version of the movie aired
on television.
Cut scenes
12. River
run.
An early
draft of the screenplay had the T-rex attacking Grant and the children while
they ride down a river and through a waterfall. These ideas were later used for
The lost world and Jurassic Park 3.
11. Ellie’s
leaf.
The leaf
Ellie examines was originally taken en route. The moment she does is still in
the trailer – but left out of the final film.
10. Riding
a triceratops.
Originally
Lex and Tim would encounter a baby Triceratops to ride (there was even an
animatronic made).
09. Alternative
ending.
The
original ending had Grant shoot one raptor and kill the second one with the
T-rex skeleton’s ribcage. Spielberg later decided that the T-rex should make a
return to ‘save the day’, as it were.
08. The
book versus the movie
There are quite a few differences between the original book and the movie:
There are quite a few differences between the original book and the movie:
- In the book Timmy is the older sibling and both a computer and dinosaur enthusiast.
- In the book Lex is more a sports enthusiast.
- In the book Hammond isn’t the nice grandfatherly type. He’s quite a d*ck to be exact.
- Hammond, in the book, dies by being eaten by Compsognathus (or Compos). This death was later used for Peter Stormare’s character in Jurassic Park: the lost world.
- In the book Dr. Henry Wu dies when a raptor jumps him.
- In the novel writer Michael Crichton explains why the triceratops is sick. Namely, toxic berries.
- Donald Gennaro and Robert Muldoon both survive the book. Moreover, Gennaro is far less of a coward than he is in the movie.
- It is strongly suggested that Ian Malcolm dies in the book (but then the author resurrected him for the sequel). Moreover, in the book Malcolm runs away from the T-rex without trying to help Grant and the children.
- In the book Tim and Lex’ parents are going through a messy divorce. A plot element that was later used for Jurassic World.
07. Richard Kiley.
In the book
the audio tour the characters take is narrated by Richard Kiley. Spielberg,
therefore, decided to hire Richard Kiley to provide the voice in the movie.
The legacy
06. Artist
future.
Ariana
Richards has become quite the artist. I actually like her paintings.
05. The
cancelled cartoon.
There were
plans for a cartoon series.
04. Long
lost colleagues.
According
to Jeff Goldblum in an interview in 2016 he and Sam Neill haven't crossed paths
again for years (make it happen!).
03. Strange
questions and requests.
Jeff Goldblum posed for a T-rex-themed wedding photo.
“Are you the lady that stuck her hand in dinosaur poop?” is the question Laura Dern hears the most.
Could be worse when I think about Jason Biggs.
“Are you the lady that stuck her hand in dinosaur poop?” is the question Laura Dern hears the most.
Could be worse when I think about Jason Biggs.
02. Is it a
good thing or a bad thing?
Jurassic
Park convinced George Lucas to use CGI for his Star Wars Prequels.
01. A good
thing.
Study of
dinosaurs (paleontology) skyrocketed after this movie.
00. One
unofficial bit of trivia.
A popular
fan theory states that the boy who gets frightened by Grant at the beginning of
the film is a young Owen Grady from Jurassic World.
