Jurassic Park

Jurassic Park is a 1990 novel by Michael Crichton, in which a theme park containing genetically engineered dinosaurs goes badly wrong. In 1993 it was turned into a feature film direct by Steven Speilberg, which became the 13th highest-grossing film ever in North America.^[1]

Plot[edit]

The InGen corporation, led by entrepreneur John Hammond, uses advanced genetic engineering techniques with DNA recovered from mosquitoes preserved for millions of years in amber, to breed long dead plants and animals, and plans to use them as the basis for a theme park on the Costa Rican island Ilsa Nublar. During the park's construction a worker is killed, and in order to reassure backers Hammond invites a small number of experts to visit the islands and give it their seal of approval.

During these experts' visits the security systems confining the dinosaurs break down due to the actions of a disgruntled employee, and the dinosaurs escape from their enclosures. A number of the experts are killed and the rest have several near misses. In the end the experts escape, Hammond is killed by his own creations (in the book, though not in the movie), and the Costa Rican government uses nerve gas to destroy the dinosaurs and cover up the incident. In the end of the book it is implied that some of the dinosaurs survived and escaped to the mainland.

Themes[edit]

Jurassic park is a cautionary tale similar to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, dealing with themes including scientific ethics, the limits of technology, and chaos theory. It has a strong conservative message that humans should not attempt to "play God." The scientific discussion is framed in a way that promotes an old Earth. That being said, the book does hint at an anti-Capitalist agenda due to Hammond being depicted in a very negative light (although the film significantly downplays this by instead making Hammond a more heroic character).

Film Sequels[edit]

• The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
• Jurassic Park III (2001)
• Jurassic World (2015)
• Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018)
• Jurassic World: Dominion (2022); production delayed due to coronavirus pandemic

References[edit]