Director: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Jeff Goldblum, Julianne Moore, Vince Vaughn, Richard Schiff*
Have I Seen It Before?: I was there opening weekend with everybody else. I remember the film mainly as the first film to feature the “bright colors” Universal logo, after several years of my favorite Universal logo, which was first introduced in Back to the Future Part III (1990). Yes, I have a favorite Universal Pictures logo. Wanna fight about it?
Did I like it?: Spielberg has made dozens of films, some of them are bound to not be especially good, right? And, really, I don’t think there is anything particularly wrong with the film. It is a prime example of big-budget spectacle of the era. The performances are good, with Jeff Goldblum taking on the chore of Jeff Goldbluming in a film the way no one else can. Several of the shots are quite dynamic and interesting. The final act of the film is legitimately thrilling. Some at the time of the films release said the film had superior special effects, but watching it on my television twenty-plus years later, I would say the CGI looks a little less rendered and the animatronics look a little more like puppets.
And yet, there’s not really anything there, is there? The plot ambles along (pun not intended, but accepted) and by the time everything is over, I’ve enjoyed some popcorn. Had almost any other filmmaker directed the film, I think both the contemporary reaction and history would have been much more favorable. Maybe Spielberg was too focused on perfecting Amistad (1997) or he had truly exorcised the last of his spectacle-based instincts with the first Jurassic Park (1993), but there’s no way to view this film other than through the context that Spielberg’s heart just wasn’t in the proceedings. To borrow and modify a phrase from Ian Malcolm (Goldblum), this is just a lot of running and, um, screaming. There’s just not a lot of “ooh” and “ahh.” Spileberg is one of cinemas greatest magicians, but he’s never been terribly good at repeating the same trick twice. Except for Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984). That movie is terrific, and I’ll have words with anyone who says otherwise. Including Spielberg.
*He gets like nineteenth billing, but if Richard Schiff appears in something, I’m giving him as high a billing as I can.