BACK in 1993, legendary Hollywood director Steven Spielberg wowed audiences with his hit dinosaur movie, Jurassic Park.
Based on the best-selling Michael Crichton novel, the exciting sci-fi action adventure followed the exploits of paleontologist Dr Alan Grant (played by Sam Neill), paleobotanist Dr Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern) and mathematician Dr Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) as they try to survive after a wildlife park on a remote island populated with dinosaurs brought back to life by genetic engineering and cloning goes terribly awry.
Spawning two sequels, the franchise came back much later in a giant way with the Colin Trevorrow-directed Jurassic World in 2015, which was set 22 years after the events of Jurassic Park.
Viewers were introduced to another thrilling dinosaur theme park-gone-wrong scenario, this time with Navy veteran and animal behaviourist Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) and Jurassic World operations manager Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard) taking the lead.
Following the 2018 sequel Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, the new trilogy comes to a close with the latest installment, Jurassic World Dominion, also directed by Trevorrow.
The breathtaking new adventure that spans the globe takes place four years after the original park location of Isla Nublar has been destroyed.
Dinosaurs now live and hunt alongside humans all over the world and this fragile balance will reshape the future and determine, once and for all, whether human beings are to remain the apex predators on a planet they now share with history's most fearsome creatures.
A GENERATIONAL CAST
Trevorrow had the big task of uniting two generations for the first time for an epic conclusion featuring never-seen dinosaurs, breakneck action and astonishing new visual effects.
"I approached it from a place of respect and as fans, which is where I started, we tend to hold the things we love very close but we have to make sure to allow room for new discoveries to happen and for these characters to breathe.
"We hoped to set up a scenario that would feel organic and natural and hopefully believable that they would return.
"I just did a lot of listening and worked with Laura, Sam and Jeff to understand what they felt about their characters, where this should go and we crafted something that I know is from all of us," says Trevorrow during a recent press conference for the upcoming movie.
To find the balance between the story, characters and dinosaurs, the director adds that, "A lot of that was in the process of working with each of the actors to make sure that they felt they had a beginning, middle and an end to their story, which gave me a way to track that each of these characters had an arc that felt complete."
"I hope that when viewers see all of them lined up they feel that each one has been respected and represented and cared for over the course of the film," he says.
BACK IN THE SADDLE
Goldblum who returned for Jurassic World Dominion says that he was satisfied to be able to play the role again with Neill and Dern.
"Working with Steven, Laura and Sam back in 1993 was a creative landmark moment as well as a lifechanging experience.
"I was extremely excited to return on this one and even though it's been so many years, it felt like getting right back on a three-seat bicycle with Sam and Laura where we started peddling and singing a tune," he says.
Goldblum adds: "I remember the first day we got together, it was this scene where I was driving away from some prehistoric dangers and we were acting in this rig that rotated around to simulate the car tumbling off a cliff."
"We spun and Colin was encouraging us to improvise and it just felt like we had never left those characters in a way."
Talking about his character, Goldblum says that, "After all these years Ian feels more precious about life and is on an urgent mission to contribute to the scientific community and community at large to figure out how we can all, with global cooperation, live peacefully not only amongst ourselves but between us and all the other creatures on earth."
COVID CHALLENGE
The biggest challenge facing the production of Jurassic World Dominion was the Covid-19 pandemic.
"We started filming in February of 2020 and got shutdown in March but we were one of the earliest movies to resume production during the pandemic.
"So, there was a lot of concern but there was an excitement and gratitude that we could all work as well," says Howard.
Goldblum adds that, "The producers spearheaded and pioneered the protocols, they spent a lot of money on it and put in a tremendous amount of effort to keep us safe."
"We didn't know how it would go but they got us to the finish line and those same methods have been used by many other productions since and are still in use in some variation in shows right now in order to keep going," he says.
CHARACTER EVOLUTION
Pratt is glad that the movie is finally out to conclude the epic sage. "Nine years, three great films, it's truly a grand finale and a magnificent ending to two trilogies.
"We got to share the screen with legends and icons from the legacy cast so it really doesn't get better than that, it's exciting," he says.
The new movie also touches on family as Owen and Claire are now parents to their adoptive daughter Maisie Lockwood (Isabella Sermon) who was last seen in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, while the velociraptor Blue also has her own offspring to take care of.
"I think it was just a natural evolution to these characters. One thing that was important to Bryce and myself in reprising the roles again was that we not just repeat the same beats over again, so it never becomes hackneyed.
"The will-they-wont-they situation is now left to Sam and Laura's characters and they light up the screen with red hot chemistry, which is elegantly sentimental and beautiful.
"Our characters are now parents and we have a reason beyond just our love for one another to be devoted to a partnership for the betterment of our young child and so we carry the stakes of that with us through the story," says Pratt.
BONDING EFFECT
Aside from the sweeping storylines and new characters in the movie, viewers can expect some spectacular action scenes with the various pre-historic creatures.
"We have more animatronic (technique of making and operating lifelike robots) effects in this movie compared to the last two Jurassic World movies combined by a large factor.
"We did it because I'm fascinated by how real and textured they all feel so I wanted as much as possible and our technology allowed us to digitally extend the animatronics," says Trevorrow.
Talking about how he selected the dinosaurs, the director adds, "There's a part of me that's just a little kid in a sandbox picking up a carnivore and looking for the biggest one that could fight it."
"And there's another part of me who thinks about the human and animal relationship, that interpersonal connection that a lot of us have with our own animals like with dogs and horses.
"That's something that was new to our trilogy, the idea that a human and a dinosaur could have that kind of bond. It's partially a ridiculous idea and partially something we felt we could sell by connecting to those emotions we have with our animals.
"This was largely because of Chris Pratt and his soulfulness in the way he connected with Blue. I believe that audiences were convinced of what he brought to the role," he says.
LASTING APPEAL
After over two decades and six movies to the franchise the public's love for dinosaurs continues to endure.
"You can't underestimate the world's fascination with dinosaurs. There's something about them that is different from monsters, kaiju or any other kind of fantastical creature that people all around the world feel a real connection to.
"It must have something to do with our shared history on this planet, the fact that we know that they walked the earth and their bones are in the ground," says Trevorrow.
He adds: "There's something really meaningful about that and it's also very rare that with the diversity of our cultures all around the world, that there could be something like this that unites all of us that were all fascinated by."
"It's an extremely rare gift for a storyteller."
Jurassic World Dominion opens in cinemas nationwide on Wednesday (June 8).
