Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)
Director: Philip Kaufman
Screenwriter: W. D. Richter
Starring: Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Veronica Cartwright, Jeff Goldblum, Leonard Nimoy

This film is about aliens. Technically. But also, it isn’t.

This is the second adaptation of “The Body Snatchers” by Jack Finney (following the 1956 Don Siegel adaptation, also titled Invasion of the Body Snatchers). It follows roughly the same plot, where strange, plant-based life forms come to Earth after travelling across the stars, where they grow replicas of human beings in huge pods, each identical save for the removing of emotion (and so no war, no pain, no love). Their infiltration of the community they find themselves in is the scene of paranoia, of the discovery of a conspiracy, of the terror of realising that your family members may look and sound the same, but that they aren’t actually them. A small band of survivors must battle the odds when the system has been infiltrated and turned against them. The novel and original film, taking place in the midst of 1950s Red Scare McCartheyism, is as thinly veiled an allegory for America’s fear of communism as you can get, though Finney denied this throughout his life (movies such as The Thing From Another World and It Came From Outer Space also follow the trend). Both of those texts are also seminal sci-fi horror reading/viewing. The question, therefore, is how does this version stack up?

Part of the genius of this interpretation is the decision to move the action from the small town of Santa Mira (in the film)/Mill County (in the book) to downtown San Francisco. The added chaos of urban life gives a sense of menace to the spreading contamination. The allegory here is of corporations turning people into shells of their former selves, and of the destruction of the natural world – a kind of capitalist updating of the red weed from H. G. Wells’ “The War of the Worlds”. Roger Ebert commented that it might also be influenced by the Watergate scandal, with tapped phones and wires. Whilst this is a possibility, those features were always elements in the novel and the first film. What is certain, is that by putting this viral personality takeover in the middle of a city, the danger is far more immediate. With the first film, if it gets out of the small town, there’s still a chance. There’s a larger civilisation out there to help. Here, if you’re dead in the city, with all that manpower and all those connections, with all that modernity, there’s not much chance that anywhere else is going to last. Along with this updating, the pod-people in their growing stage are much more organic, more tissue-like, adding to the ecological themes. It isn’t as strong a body-horror shift, but perhaps comparable to the way in which the 1958 version of The Fly (starring Vincent Price) was updated for modern audiences: a reimagining rather than a remake, as directed by David Cronenberg in 1986 (ironically, also starring Jeff Goldblum).

The air of being hemmed in is all around. The buildings impose, the close proximity that everyone is to each other (and in some sequences having several of the characters together in every shot one after the other), makes the idea that the people next to you aren’t who they say they are even worse. The main cast is terrific, bringing sufficient weight and drama to a terror slowly building up as the horrific realisation of what is going on dawns on them. The little things occurring in the background add to that paranoia, and is something Edgar Wright specifically mentions as an influence on the background details for Shaun of the Dead in his DVD commentary (ironically, Wright’s body-snatching film The World’s End actually has the ending of the original novel, in which the invading force realises humanity will never be converted, which is something no actual novel adaptation has kept). The occasional shots of the garbage compactors crushing the husks of used pods comes back time and time again unmentioned but always there, and when you realise what they are, by then it’s all too late. Everything’s already over.

Speaking of endings, Kevin McCarthy (who played Dr Miles in the first film) has a cameo in this one, playing very much a similar character (but not the same), slamming on Donald Sutherland’s car and screaming ‘You’re next!’, much like his famous ending to the first film. Even if it’s not Dr Miles, it gives the impression that Miles has been wandering for years warning us of the oncoming apocalypse. It’s so iconic an original ending that one wonders how this film could possibly one-up it. And yet it does, in an ending reveal burned into the public consciousness with just sound. Sound that has drained from the world as the film runs on, with characters fleeing through the streets, their feet slamming against the road. Somehow that’s the most disturbing thing of all. The takeover of the pod people, with their uniformity, has reduced the need for talk, for going anywhere unplanned, for noise. Despite their horrifying screech, the emptiness of the sound of the world is what truly scares. The naturalness of the world has faded. Now it is simply a factory of the pods, a greenhouse for empty husks.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers has everything you could want. A great cast, direction that mostly stands up (there are unfortunately some parts when Kaufman decides to go for some egregious camera movements which betray the camp B-movie roots and lodge in the cinematic throat), an all-consuming tone, and some of the most iconic scenes of all science-fiction and horror. It has to be seen to be believed, and, even with the odd misstep, remains an all-time classic.

Score: 20/24

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10. Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)

Starring the incredible Aubrey Plaza, and loveable goofs Mark Duplass and Jake Johnson, Safety Not Guaranteed is a heart-warming time travel jape. While it has big names attached – including director Colin Trevorrow, who went on to steer the wheel of the Jurassic World franchise, it has a real indie charm.

It begins with an intriguing want-ad in a local Washington newspaper. Jeff (Jake Johnson), a journalist at a different paper, assembles a motley crew to investigate. While everything is set up for us to believe Kenneth (Mark Duplass) is a weirdo, and delusional at the very least, he isn’t and the film’s beauty lies in how deftly it draws the viewer to his side.

It has heart, humour and Jake Johnson. I’m not sure you need much else in a film.

9. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse Review

As a rule, I don’t do superheroes. DC, Marvel, I don’t really care, they’re all the same, aren’t they?

I grew up in a strange era where Val Kilmer was Batman and Lois Lane was a Desperate Housewife and the genre just never really hooked me. Then along came Miles Morales and I fell hard. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is a visually stunning and standout offering in (what I and seemingly I alone feel is) a saturated market.

The Spider-verse animation is just incredible – unusual and unique. The film is brimming with detail and flashes of brilliance. I could watch it 100 times (100 more times) and notice something new with each viewing. The characters are larger than life yet somehow completely grounded and believable, and who knew the match up of Nicholas Cage and John Mulaney is what we needed in our lives? The soundtrack is perfect and the message behind it is so important.

The first time my kid saw it, she said, ‘oh so I could be spiderman’ and for that reason alone it deserves a mention in my Best Films of All Time.

Recommended for you: Spider-Man Movies Ranked

Jurassic Park (1993)
Director: Steven Spielberg
Screenwriters: Michael Crichton, David Koepp
Starring: Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough, Ariana Richards, Joseph Mazzello, Wayne Knight, Samuel L. Jackson

Jurassic Park stomped onto the big screen thirty years ago and became an instant classic, loved by adults and children alike. It was the highest-grossing film of all time until Titanic cruised into the top spot four years later. Jurassic Park’s setting, humour, John Williams score, all-star cast, and larger-than-life characters made it an unforgettable story. One that boasts the rare accolade of being better than the book it’s based on.

John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) has built a wildlife park with a difference. Its inhabitants are bona fide dinosaurs. After an incident with a park ‘attraction’, Hammond needs the safety of the park verified. So, before its grand public opening, he invites respected experts in the field, Dr Alan Grant (Sam Neill), Dr Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), and Dr Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) to have a look around. Oh, and his grandchildren naturally. Immediately, things go wrong. It turns out you can control a T-rex about as well as you can a hurricane.

Casting the much-beloved Richard Attenborough as John Hammond was an inspired choice. Hammond is a man seemingly passionate about furthering science and it’s easy to believe that this is his only goal when you look into the kind, open face of the iconic actor. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that Hammond is obsessed rather than passionate, to the degree that he would risk his own grandchildren’s lives. He is a man so full of ego and the idea of his own legacy that he is blind to his failings.

The three experts, Drs Grant, Sattler, and Malcolm, are the driving force of the plot. Their childlike wonder reflecting our same reactions. Grant’s interactions with the children (Ariana Richards and Joseph Mazzello) is where a lot of the humour comes from, and Malcolm’s complete incredulity at what is happening is the injection of scepticism that pushes Hammond and the scientists into making more ridiculous decisions. Ellie Sattler is an icon. Whip smart, defending feminism, rocking sensible hiking boots, and willing to go elbow deep in triceratops turd in the pursuit of answers. An icon.

Jurassic Park is not a film about dinosaurs, it’s about these characters and what they come to represent thematically. It is a film about human hubris, about our species’ need to conquer and control. Then it is a film about resolve and humility in the face of mistake and human error. It is a film where nature’s awesome power wins as all the humans can do is retreat hastily into the sunset.

While the T-rex is a formidable foe, and the iconic logo of the franchise, the velociraptors are also worthy adversaries for this ensemble of plucky human characters. A herd of clever girls, if you will. The intrigue lay so heavily with these animals that it is the raptors who play major parts in four of the five subsequent films. Director Steven Spielberg and author Michael Crichton weren’t so interested in an accurate depiction of a velociraptor – Jurassic Park’s popularity means that the cultural version of them seems so much more likely than the feathery death turkeys they most probably were.

Given how iconic such creatures remain after three decades, it remains noteworthy to acknowledge how dinosaurs are only seen on screen for fourteen minutes of Jurassic Park’s runtime. This is a suspense-building technique that director Steven Spielberg perfected in Jaws. The dinos are always waiting just off screen, which adds a delicious level of anticipation and one hell of a punch when they do take centre stage. Furthering this impact is how the animatronics and CGI have aged just as well as the core message. Those one-hundred and thirteen dinosaur-free minutes also help the film adhere to the PG rating that allowed it to become a family favourite.

While Jurassic Park birthed some pretty terrible films, the original remains a must-see. It left a generation of viewers certain that they could explain chaos theory with a drip of water and confident that if they stood perfectly still, they would never be eaten by a T-rex*. In today’s climate when human action is causing catastrophic ripples through the natural world, and billionaires play fast and loose with the planet’s resources, there are many themes in Jurassic Park that continue to resonate as clearly as a metal ladle clanging on the tiled floor of a velociraptor-strewn kitchen.

Jurassic Park’s descendants lack the magic of the original, which is a cliché-avoiding, character-driven, genre-defining rampage. It is iconic moment after iconic moment.

Score: 24/24

*Tyrannosaurs actually had impeccable eyesight so official advice for bumping into a T-rex is to run. Fast.

Cronenberg’s allegiance to the creative industry is burrowed within his veins, with his mother being a musician and his father being a writer/editor. His first instances of being fascinated by the craft were through watching Un Chien Andalou (1912), Vampyr (1932), and Performance (1970) at an early age, as well as reading the entire catalogue of EC horror comics. The passion that Cronenberg gained developed into a burgeoning desire to create monumental films himself. 

When David Cronenberg was at university, he was introduced to filmmaking, making Transfer (1966) and From the Drain (1966), two short 16mm films whose eerie charisma combines with grainy realism to create grim terrains and ‘unique’ characters. Cronenberg’s tenacious touch with lucid realities was always evident, even in the early days. 

This is when he took the leap to becoming a full-time filmmaker, forging abnormal works that would change the course of experimental cinema and lay the ground for eccentricity to thrive. His third film, Shivers (1975), paved the way for his iconic body horror status to seep into his filmic modus operandi, resulting in studios commissioning further gnarly works including Rabid (1975), The Brood (1979), and Scanners (1981). The late 1970s to early 1980s saw the wrath of Cronenberg’s unorthodox cinema, dripping in idiosyncratic worlds, become a core part of genre cinema.

This monumental director has taught filmmakers to embrace the uncommon and explore the peculiar, encouraging cinemagoers the world over to pursue their passion of making films even when their filmic visions do not suit the blockbuster climate of their time. This advantageous filmmaker is an icon within his field, with his surname even becoming an adjective to explain twisted body horror films. In honour of this quintessential director, The Film Magazine explores exactly Where to Start with David Cronenberg.

Read more guides on prominent filmmakers.

1. The Fly (1986)

The Fly defines what Cronenbergian horror stands for. It’s a morbidly absurd piece of cinema that leaves a damning mark on the viewer’s filmic sanity, with the grotesque but glorious practical effects and the film’s roots of psychological disarray establishing a more than memorable, truly stellar offering. 

Jeff Goldblum portrays Seth, a scientist who slowly transforms into a human sized fly after a science experiment goes wrong. The Fly takes a rather archetypal premise of humans interfering with ‘alien’ technology and completely desecrates it, ripping apart the borders of predictability to create a film of visual excellence. Seth’s metamorphosis into a winged insect is nothing less than nightmare fuel; even the sternest of viewers is challenged in their attempt to maintain composure amidst all of the fantastic gore and lurid body horror that aided in creating Cronenberg’s masterly reputation. 

Cronenberg worked closely with Chris Walas and Stephan Dupris from the effects team, to engulf Seth with pus-ridden, gaping wounds, decaying swallowed flesh, and oil-soaked hair. Essentially, the ambitious scientist had mutated into a gigantic vermin-like beast who had been stripped of both moral and physical dignity. These effects were done all by hand. One particular scene in the final act shows Seth at his worst. In the original DVD extras for The Fly, it was revealed that Goldblum was briefly replaced by a giant puppet that had to be ventriloquised by invisible string and metal rigs, meaning that every single movement took hours to film. 

2. Crash (1996)

As most of his filmography establishes, David Cronenberg works with contentious matters to both confront and perplex the spectator. If anyone were to not feel completely emotionally obliterated after a Cronenberg screening, then something must have gone wrong. To phrase it lightly, Crash is the most daring entry amongst Cronenberg’s twenty-two feature films. 

Crash explores the world of symphorophiliacs (those who seek titillation from disaster, often automobile incidents) through the narrative of a film producer (James Spader) who, after surviving a near-fatal car accident, becomes involved in a dangerously erotic community. The film is a feast for the senses. It displays such intensity amidst a colloquially immoral landscape, leading each of us to become voyeurs in events that are far from ordinary; it’s an escapist, delusionally hedonistic piece of cinema. 

The film’s message has a deliberate lack of subtly, with Cronenberg emphasising the strange allure of horror, the odd appeal of witnessing something that general audiences deem taboo and forbidden. In its most primal form, Cronenberg soaks every frame in shock value to inflict a nihilistic, macabre commentary on ultimate liberation. 

Crash received an almighty torrent of backlash upon its initial release. The hysteria from censors and the public ruminated the video nasty panic back into the media in the mid-1990s, with Westminster Council banning the film from being screened anywhere in central London due to the media’s smear campaigns against the film. This hybrid horror and erotic thriller drove the mainstream media to their cinematic borders, intruding on the boundaries of ‘the norm’. And if there is one lesson to take away from the canon of Cronenberg’s work, it’s that he is a defiant director who aims to shed light on the unutterable. 

3. Crimes of the Future (2022)

David Cronenberg’s career stretches across five decades. And, amongst those years, his auteurship has adapted and evolved. When comparing The Brood (1979) with eXistenZ (1999), a film twenty years its senior, Cronenberg’s methodology certainly differs, with his early filmmaking days in the 1970s surrounding the significance of body invasion rather than the threat of modern tech narratives that advanced in the late 1990s. However, one aspect that has not differed in the slightest throughout his entire filmography is the matter of effect. 

Cronenberg’s latest feature, and Palme d’Or contender, Crimes of the Future, was based on an independent film he made in 1970, chronicling a terrifying future where live surgeries are performed as art. Starring an outstanding line-up including Kristen Stewart, Viggo Mortensen, and Léa Seydoux, Crimes of the Future is a film that can not only be described as disturbingly horrifying, but rather beautiful. 

Crimes of the Future sheds a harsh light on human evolution, with Cronenberg enacting visceral imagery such as ripped flesh and bruised body modifications to highlight how pain is crucial to the makeup of humanity. The film makes clear that the participants in these live surgeries lack pain. Their receptors are barren, leading to the exploitation of their own numbing powers. However, whilst the dystopian society lives vicariously through the dedication to art and bodily freedom, a rooted understanding of compassion and body autonomy is lost. Crimes of the Future diligently commends the hysteria, panic, and pain that comes from being alive. It may not feel soothing to the soul at first, but without the exhausting agonies that come with being alive, there is nothing to strive for. 

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David Cronenberg’s message is extremely abhorrent and cruel, even painful in its display of misanthropy. But this is precisely why Cronenberg has maintained a tight hold on audiences for decades. His work is confronting, unpleasant, and far from calm. And more importantly, his filmography is unforgettable.

We followed Thor as he returned to Asgard to find his long-lost warmongering sister Hela (Cate Blanchett) making a bid for the throne, the prophesied Viking apocalypse Ragnarok on the horizon. De-powered and enslaved to fight aliens for sport on the planet Sakaar, Thor was tasked with winning his freedom and gathering allies (both willing and reluctant) to take back his home realm.

Primarily known as a director of comedies, Waititi imbued his distinctive sense of humour into his Marvel Cinematic Universe debut in a lot of the oddball dialogue exchanges, but Ragnarok was also pretty boldly iconoclastic: it fully embraced Jack Kirby’s wild comic book designs, and even snuck a fair number of big emotional beats and some weighty subtext into the film as well.

In this Movie List from The Film Magazine, we are counting down the very best moments from Taika Waititi’s first foray into superhero movies. These are the 10 Best Moments from Thor: Ragnarok.

Follow @thefilmagazine on Twitter.

10. Strange House Call

While searching for their missing father Odin (Anthony Hopkins), who Loki (Tom Hiddleston) had hypnotised and dumped in a now demolished retirement home on Earth, Thor and his trickster brother get called to the Sanctum Sanctorum at 177A Bleeker Street for an audience with Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch).

Midgard’s mightiest magician proceeds to flummox and bewilder his demigod visitors by shifting reality around the brothers, teleporting the bothersome Loki into a bottomless pit and serving Thor a bottomless beer as they talk. He eventually offers them the information they are seeking and conjures a portal to take them to Norway, but not before Loki tries to stick a dagger through him out of indignation as he had “been falling for 30 minutes!”.

9. RIP Mjolnir

Almost immediately after Odin Allfather says goodbye to his sons and passes on to Valhalla, his hitherto unknown first-born Hela (the Goddess of Death) escapes her prison, faces off with the other offspring of Odin (to Thor: “You don’t look like him” / to Loki: “You sound like him”) and puts her plot to reclaim her birth right into motion.

Her first act is to completely emasculate the overconfident Thor and essentially send him right back to his unworthy starting position by catching and crushing one-handed his unstoppable magic hammer Mjolnir (he takes this badly). Then, while they flee her in the Bifrost to Asgard, Hela easily dispatches both brothers in two hits and sends them hurtling off to the junk planet of Sakaar.

Recommended for you: Thor: Ragnarok (2017) Review

Universal’s crown jewel, which includes three Jurassic Park movies and a further three Jurassic World films, has left an indelible imprint on cinema and has become a box office and merchandising phenomenon, earning around $10billion in revenue to date. Perhaps more impressively, it has forever changed our culture, its visual representations of dinosaurs coming to define their very image for the past thirty years (whether that image is factually correct or not).

Initially released as a Steven Spielberg-directed adaptation of respected author Michael Crichton’s novel of the same name, the Jurassic franchise has mixed themes of environmentalism, the ethics of cloning, and astute commentary on conglomerated big business, with the blockbuster tropes of thrilling action, sharp comedy and wondrous special effects – the work of visual effects house Industrial Light & Magic has redefined visual effects techniques forever, ensuring the franchise’s indelible mark on the industry as a whole.

In this edition of Ranked, we at The Film Magazine are revisiting every film from the Jurassic franchise – all three Jurassic Park films and the further three Jurassic World releases – in order to decipher which of the Jurassic Park / World movies is the worst and which is the best in terms of artistic merit, enjoyability, purpose, meaning and message. These are the Jurassic Park / World Movies Ranked.

Follow @thefilmagazine on Twitter.

6. Jurassic Park III (2001)

When Joe Johnston took over from Steven Spielberg at the helm of the Jurassic Park franchise following success with his mid-90s family hit Jumanji, he seemed like the most natural fit to continue the franchise’s legacy. The director, who would go on to helm Captain America: The First Avenger among other notable films, was a long-term understudy to Spielberg throughout the 1980s (even acting as director of visual effects on Raiders of the Lost Ark) and was stepping into the franchise just as Spielberg had seemed to lose his passion for it. Unfortunately, Jurassic Park III turned out to be a cursed production, its spot at the bottom of this list due in no small part to the shoot beginning before a script was ever even finished.

Jurassic Park star Sam Neill returned to his role as Alan Grant from the 1993 release 8 years prior, his character a continual reminder of the better film many at the time could catch on TV or home video. Here, his respected palaeontologist is conned into heading to the island of the 2nd movie, The Lost World, to rescue a teenager stranded there as the result of a holiday mishap. Tonally, Jurassic Park III is all over the place – supporting characters as annoying as they are stereotypical, inappropriate jokes made to cover cracks in the narrative, inspired horror elements side-by-side with poop jokes – and it never really gets going like every other Jurassic film does, the pace picking up just once beyond the threshold of the narrative’s inciting incident.

Of all the Jurassic movies, Jurassic Park III is simply the most forgettable. And, while there are moments of genuine inspiration (most notably the bird cage sequence) and points of tension here and there, the film’s lack of awareness as regards its own cheesiness and silliness (both massive steps away from the more earnest Spielberg outings), made this the only franchise entry worthy of being mocked on the internet: a Velociraptor talking directly to Alan Grant is cheesy, cheap and not even played for laughs.

Jurassic Park III is likely the result of “too many chefs in the kitchen”, a situation in which the director, screenwriters, producers and studio all had distinctly different visions of what should have been another mega-hit franchise entry. The result is poor to mediocre, and certainly more boring and unpleasant than the other franchise entries. Jurassic Park III is the film that would end the franchise for some 14 years, and that should be proof enough that it is deserving of the number 6 spot on this list.

5. The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)

Thrusting Jeff Goldblum into the lead role of The Lost World: Jurassic Park after a film-stealing performance in the original film seemed about as logical as Dr Ian Malcolm himself, but tacking on familial interests and a strange romantic angle seemed to remove the mystery surrounding him, watering down his cool-factor in the process. In revisiting his role as the prophet of doom, The Lost World: Jurassic Park became eternally bonded to the character’s cynicism through focusing so much of its narrative on his journey, the movie losing touch of the awe and majesty of the 1993 original as seen through Richard Attenborough’s wide-eyed John Hammond and Sam Neill’s more pure and (reluctantly) kind-hearted Dr. Alan Grant.

Not only was The Lost World: Jurassic Park missing that cool character we’d all come to love as a part of the original’s ensemble of strong, instantly recognisable icons of the screen, but Ian Malcolm was now a father having an existential crisis about his girlfriend going missing while navigating issues of divorce; The Lost World was simply more cynical than any other Jurassic movie.

In the decades since the release of this Jurassic Park sequel, many have placed The Lost World in the lower echelons of Steven Spielberg’s filmography, this 1997 movie marking a point at the height of Spielberg’s fame in which the director seemed much less interested in money-making ventures than he was by passion projects such as Amistad (released the same year) and Saving Private Ryan (released the year following, 1998).

While Spielberg’s legendary blockbuster-leading trademarks are still present in The Lost World (elevating a relatively mediocre script), the bedrock of this Jurassic Park sequel seems to reverse the original film’s stance on armed intervention and mass governmental control by film’s end, and this weak structural base simply fails to provide enough of a springboard for a less-than fully motivated director (even one as great as Spielberg) to overcome. There are glimpses of greatness here – the cracking glass over the edge of the cliff being one particular highlight – but The Lost World is missing the intention and politics of the four films to come, its on-the-nose efforts futile in the face of the deeper realisations of the Jurassic World movies and the original Jurassic Park.

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We are living in a world of CGI dreamscapes, the kind of place where the randomness of any mistake can be “corrected in post” by a team of hundreds of artists and technicians working to bring every last element of the filmmaking process to life, whether it be on a Marvel movie or a David Fincher film. If Tom Holland’s fringe accidentally falls too close to his eye, there’ll be a team of people ready and willing to remove it. If David Fincher wants the perfect house but doesn’t have the time nor budget to build one as Bong Joon-ho did for Parasite, there’s a team of people ready and willing to create it.

Despite them being often maligned by cinephiles and critics, computer generated images have improved some aspects of cinema. An artist like the aforementioned David Fincher can construct the most accurate vision he hopes to construct, whilst Marvel can offer galaxy-spanning warfare on a level most could only ever have dreamt of in the past. CGI is in many ways encouraging fantastical creations, bringing the realms of imagination and reality closer together. If cinema was ever the “dream factory”, those of a particular stance could argue that Hollywood cinema is more about dreams than it ever has been. This is one key reason that the fantasy genre, through the medium of comic book adaptations, has exploded in the 21st century.

One filmmaker inexorably linked to the development of the current era’s rich palette of CGI-driven material is Steven Spielberg. A close friend of Industrial Light & Magic founder George Lucas (Star Wars), and a frequent collaborator with Lucas’ film studio Lucasfilm, Spielberg was quick to show off the quality of modern technology as early as his third theatrically released feature Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). That year, Close Encounters and Star Wars would be the only nominees for the Oscars’ Visual Effects category, Lucas’ revolutionary space opera taking home the award. From there, Spielberg and Lucas would partner on Indiana Jones, a series that relied more on computer generated images as each film was released, and Spielberg would heavily lean on CGI for his most fantastical moments in the decade to follow, particularly those found in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) and Hook (1991).

“I think I’m extinct.”

In 1993, Steven Spielberg oversaw what is widely recognised to be one of the most important and influential real-world developments to CGI in history, the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park.

Universal and Spielberg’s Amblin partnered with George Lucas’ Industrial Light & Magic to put together CGI so astounding that it has become the stuff of legend. Followers of Jurassic Park, or the wider developments of cinema, will be able to tell you that upon seeing the CGI in action, iconic practical effects supervisor Phil Tippett famously declared “I think I’m extinct” (a line that was later worked into the film).

The sequence with the T-Rex in the rain is as close to photorealistic as we can still feasibly imagine, and as a result the creature’s impact has become one as closely tied to our cultural memory of cinema as Charles Chaplin’s The Tramp or Lucas’ Darth Vader; it is iconic. Without computer generated imagery, the T-Rex would not have been able to so convincingly chase down Dr Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), nor would it have looked quite so menacing as it did when it came rushing into shot during the film’s conclusive velociraptor hunt.

And still, these effects were pre-Titanic, pre-Pixar, before Spider-Man, years ahead of The Matrix. There had been some outstanding visual effects work in the decades prior to Jurassic Park – not least in the works of Ridley Scott and James Cameron – but Jurassic Park remains almost untouchable, the T-Rex as perfect a cinematic construction as any CGI concoction in history. The reason for its continued dominance isn’t because the technology has failed to develop, or the teams of people working on the CGI have grown worse at their jobs, it’s because the computer generated imagery was presented through the lens of the world’s greatest effects-driven director at the absolute height of his powers.

Originally, director Steven Spielberg had intended to put Jurassic Park together with as many practical effects as possible. By today’s standards you could argue that he succeeded, but in 1993 it was unheard of to balance a $60million-plus movie on the back of what was barely tested computer software, and almost every scene that captured the dinosaurs in full was reliant upon this technology and the few people who could accurately predict its effectiveness. Despite studio concerns, Spielberg’s utter amazement at his first glance at this technology is said to have inspired his stance, but heeding the advice of those above him and taking all his knowledge and inspiration from the practically staged films of prior eras (not least the Westerns of John Ford), the director embraced every element he could and moulded them to the filmmaking language of the greats.

He didn’t necessarily present the most detailed and rich CGI of all time, but Jurassic Park remains the gold standard of visual effects because Steven Spielberg made us do that which all filmmakers strive to do… believe.

There is so much to be said for the interest that Spielberg creates through the use of blocking (the movement of people and objects within a shot) in what is a surprisingly static movie for one so expensive and widely acknowledged to be a blockbuster. He uses it so effectively in small scenes of exposition or sequences aimed at enriching each of the characters, but it’s in the moments with the dinosaurs themselves that his expertise in this realm come to the fore, his sensational use of space in both the T-Rex and velociraptor hunts being iconic because of how he makes their presences entirely believable.

In the very first act, we see an animatronic velociraptor be born from its egg, Richard Attenborough’s John Hammond picking a broken piece of shell from the dinosaur’s head as it breaks free. Another director might have chosen to side on narrative logic in this instance, putting Hammond and company behind a glass case so as to not infect the dinosaur or disrupt the birth, but Spielberg chooses the greater truth: the truth of the viewer.

The above scene, and the one that comes soon after in which Sam Neill’s Alan Grant lays his body weight on a felled triceratops, are so strikingly realistic that you can’t help but to feel the awe that Grant and company are feeling themselves. These scenes are realistic partly because of the visual effects, yes, but more so because the characters themselves are interacting with them. These dinosaurs are a part of the same world that they are.

This, of course, comes to a crescendo when the tyrannosaurus rex breaks free of its cage.

The T-Rex here is presented via animatronic head in close-up, and via full CGI in wide shots, and it’s Spielberg’s dedication to detail that truly elevates this incredible debut to the highest of heights. First we see that the goat it has been fed is now missing, then we see the T-Rex’s claw pushing against the electric fence – we instantly recognise the very real impact that this gruesome dinosaur has had and seems destined to have. The setting has been so well designed, and Spielberg has so impressively got us acquainted with the space by going back-and-forth to conversations in each car, that when the T-Rex breaks free of its cage the resulting mesh of wire and concrete provides a lasting change to the environment – one that is ultimately the centrepiece of this sequence’s conclusion when Alan Grant, Lex (Ariana Richards) and Tim (Joseph Mazzello) are thrown down it. As the T-Rex moves, water begins to shake, not only effectively increasing the anticipation for what is a uniquely horror-adjacent blockbuster villain, but also reinforcing that this is a very real creature about to have very real consequences on the people we have so far become acquainted with. In the resulting carnage, the dinosaur eats one of the characters and nearly kills several more, but the genius of Spielberg’s work here comes in ensuring that the dinosaur can not only be heard and seen, but that the effects of its presence are felt within the movement of objects in the scene.

The pupil of the T-Rex’s eye constricts when light is shone in it, and the rain soaks it as it prowls around the car of the children. When it eventually goes mouth first into the sunroof of the vehicle, the two children are shown holding the plexiglass between their limbs and the ginormous teeth of the animatronic head. As the scene evolves, the T-Rex begins to spin one of the cars around when Tim has been trapped beneath it, leading to Alan and Lex having to repel down a cliff face. Then, the resulting chase of Doctor Ian Malcolm sees the dinosaur crush a tree branch that has fell onto the road.

We, as cinemagoers, know that the reality we’re being presented with isn’t real – that’s why we call the watching of a film “the suspension of disbelief” – but what Spielberg does better than anybody is acquaint you with the rules of the universe he’s presenting in the most entertaining and ultimately effective way possible. Jurassic Park is, like Jaws, a blockbuster horror film. The T-Rex is a monstrous villain of the ilk of Frankenstein’s Monster, while the velociraptors are Freddie Krueger-like psychopaths complete with gut-splitting apparatus. The dinosaurs therefore need to offer threat to the human characters, and to do so they must be a believable presence in their world. The ripples in the water, the constriction of the pupil, the spinning of the car, all help to enrich the believability of these creatures and their impact on the characters we have so far associated ourselves with.  Every interaction these dinosaurs have leads to more believability, to more impressive visual effects.

Later in Jurassic Park, Wayne Knight’s Dennis Nedry is poisoned and eaten by a smaller dinosaur, the presence of this creature again not only being seen but being presented as having very real effects on the parts of the film’s world we can’t even question the reality of: the car and the human being. In the film’s conclusion, the velociraptor creates condensation when it breathes onto a window, it crashes head first into a shiny kitchen cabinet, and Spielberg focuses almost meticulously on these creatures being able to open doors, because a door handle is about as real and relatable to anyone watching this film as anything else it presents. Having a velociraptor be able to enter your bedroom in the dead of night is a terrifying thought, and in Jurassic Park it is an almighty mortal threat to our heroes.

At no point in Jurassic Park can you find a character not interacting with someone or something. Spielberg understands the need for tangible reality to be created from the very first scene, and he brings out the heights of his creativity for some of the greatest cinematic moments of all time. Even when Alan Grant and company are introduced to the dinosaurs for the first time – a moment which looks significantly more dated than the T-Rex or velociraptor chases when judged in isolation – the director’s understanding of Grant as his audience’s surrogate elevates the spectacle and awe to another level. We don’t simply see the dinosaurs walking around, nor is there a swoop to a wide shot. Spielberg instead enacts his classic “reaction shot – shot” (a reversal of the usual), so that we see Grant react with utter shock and awe for over thirty seconds before we are ever shown the dinosaur itself. When we are, the camera pans from left to right, and from down to up – from car length to dinosaur length, car height to dinosaur height – and as such the sheer size of the creature is reinforced by this movement. The dinosaur then reaches up to take a bite from a nearby tree, once again reinforcing its tangible presence within the film’s universe, before slamming back to the floor to once again emphasise the spectacle and impact of this almighty creature.

Whether it be John Hammond’s helicopter covering unearthed dinosaur skeletons with desert dust, Lex shaking as she holds a spoon full of jelly, or an almighty dinosaur eating the leaves from a branch held by Alan Grant, Jurassic Park is filled to the brim with actions that interact with the world and thus reinforce its tangibility. The CGI is impressive in Jurassic Park, yes, but the reality is that the visual effects (VFX) remain so astoundingly modern and impressive to look at because director Steven Spielberg used every opportunity to reinforce the things that would make that CGI feel real.

Cinema never makes history for one simple thing or another. Shrek isn’t remembered for revolutionising rain effects in 3D animation despite how it very much did, nor is Monsters Inc remembered for being the film that first illustrated Pixar’s abilities to render thousands of hair fibres at once. But Jurassic Park, like those two films, took a big financial and creative risk on developing technology to revolutionise the way films would be made for the rest of time. It remains, even after three decades of technological advancements and ever-increasing audience expectations, the Gold Standard for VFX in Hollywood, and it is director Steven Spielberg and the many choices he perfected that can be thanked for that. Jurassic Park is a timeless classic of the silver screen that can be enjoyed by all, but for VFX teams and modern directors it should be used as a bible.

Recommended for you: Jurassic Park / World Movies Ranked

Isle of Dogs (2018)
Director: Wes Anderson
Screenwriters: Wes Anderson, Roman Coppola
Starring: Bryan Cranston, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Murray, Tilda Swinton, Harvey Keitel, Greta Gerwig, Yoko Ono

Following on from the critical and public smash that was The Grand Budapest Hotel, Wes Anderson returned to screens after a break of four years with 2018’s Isle of Dogs. The film was Anderson’s second foray into the world of stop-motion animation after 2009’s Fantastic Mr Fox. As with all Anderson projects, the ensemble cast proved to be one of the main draws, on this occasion led by the voice of ‘Breaking Bad’ star Bryan Cranston and Anderson regulars Bill Murray and Jeff Goldblum, each of whom played members of a group of dogs exiled to Trash Island by the infamous Kenji Kobayashi, mayor of Megasaki, whose family was proven to have a generations-deep hatred of canines.

Upon release, Isle of Dogs earned rave reviews and received nominations throughout awards season for Best Animated Feature. Writing in The Guardian, leading British film critic Mark Kermode noted that “Isle of Dogs is a delight: funny, touching and full of heartfelt warmth and wit”. This certainly wasn’t the only outpouring of love for the film, with many noting how well Anderson’s style suited the animation, praising the film’s quirkiness and humour. There have been some detractors who have criticised the way it depicts Japanese culture, with accusations of cultural appropriation, but the overarching consensus is that Isle of Dogs turned out to be one of Anderson’s stronger films.

The core narrative of Isle of Dogs centres on Mayor Kobayashi’s nephew Atari (Koyu Rankin) who sets off to Trash Island to recover his guard dog spots (voiced by Liev Schreiber). Along the way Atari encounters Chief (Cranston), Duke (Goldblum), Rex (Edward Norton), Boss (Murray) and King (Bob Balaban), and together they form a ragtag crew of exiled dogs, all of whom are slightly world-weary and struggling to survive in their newfound world separated from humanity.

The story focuses on both the situation on the island itself and the developing issues on the mainland, where we follow efforts from the government to cover up the fake disease that was used as the reason to exile the dogs. We also follow US foreign exchange student Tracy Walker (voiced by Lady Bird and Little Women director Greta Gerwig) in her efforts to expose the mayor’s lies.

The voice cast is one of the film’s clearest strengths, with Bryan Cranston suitably gruff and grizzled as Chief, a dog whose relationship with Atari and his fellow dogs form the film’s core. Jeff Goldblum’s Duke acts more as comic relief, while there is a fun smaller part for Tilda Swinton as Oracle, a seemingly wise dog.

While the film zips along as many of Anderson’s other films do, it still has a strong sense of heart and intimacy, and the way the relationship between Atari and Chief develops is especially indicative of this.

The score from Anderson regular Alexandre Desplat is another of the film’s high points. Incorporating traditional Japanese soundscapes and built around taiko drums with flourishes of woodwind, the score acts as a nice contrast to Desplat’s previous Anderson compositions – there are even nods to the works of Akira Kurosawa and glimpses of Prokofiev’s “Lieutenant Kijé” throughout the film. In between the more typically Japanese sounds of the score, Desplat and Anderson leave room for spots of popular music as has become customary of Anderson’s filmography, in this case focusing mainly on the eerie tones of The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band.

Isle of Dogs is a loving tale of canine and human friendship, recreating the culture of Japan in a heartfelt manner that illustrates Anderson’s appreciation for Japanese culture and the nation’s people. As with other Anderson films, the offbeat nature may prove to be off-putting to newcomers, but Anderson purists are in for a treat filled with familiar voices who blend into their surroundings meticulously.

Isle of Dogs once again illustrated Wes Anderson’s versatility as a director and was a bold move away from the trappings of The Grand Budapest Hotel which had earned such acclaim. With a filmography that only looks set to grow, one can only hope that Anderson makes further trips into the world of animation.

20/24

The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
Director: Wes Anderson
Screenwriter: Wes Anderson
Starring: Ralph Fiennes, Tony Revolori, Adrien Brody, Willem Dafoe, Tilda Swinton, Bill Murray, Edward Norton, Saoirse Ronan, Harvey Keitel, Jeff Goldblum, Mathieu Amalric, Owen Wilson, Léa Seydoux, Jude Law, Tom Wilkinson, F. Murray Abraham

Following the release of the acclaimed Moonrise Kingdom in 2012, Wes Anderson would make perhaps one of the defining films of the 2010s and one of the most praised in his storied filmography. 2014’s The Grand Budapest Hotel has proven to be a gargantuan success in the seven years since its release, earning the joint most nominations at the 2015 Oscars with 9 (equal with Birdman), and featuring on the BBC’s 2016 list of the Best Films of the 21^st Century, a list that also featured Anderson’s The Royal Tenenbaums and Moonrise Kingdom.

The Grand Budapest Hotel was immediately acclaimed in reviews from most major sources, with Empire publishing, “For those willing to check in without prejudice, this may well be among Anderson’s better films, one of the few that repay repeated viewings”. The Grand Budapest Hotel seems to be a film that even some of Anderson’s detractors have found various levels of enjoyment in. While it is too soon to say if this is his most universally praised film, the sheer levels of fandom it has created indicate it is in contention to be one of his most beloved.

This colourful 2014 release follows a lowly lobby boy named Zero (Tony Revolori) as he starts his life working at the eponymous establishment in the fictional nation of Zubrowka. Following a series of flashbacks through various decades, the bulk of the story occupies the space between the two World Wars, acting somewhat as a musing on the rise of Fascism in Central and Eastern Europe in the 1930s. Zero works under the tutelage of the eccentric Monsieur M Gustave (Ralph Fiennes), the hotel’s concierge who has had a number of affairs with elderly wealthy women including the mysterious Madame D (Tilda Swinton). Following Madame D’s death, Gustave and Zero are embroiled in a series of escapades relating to Madame D’s will and the grievances of her family, finding themselves at odds with local law enforcement.

Perhaps the film’s biggest strength is its tone, Anderson fully committing to his trademarked quirky dialogue and humour which on paper is at odds with the time period in which the story is set. The balance between humour and darkness at times walks a fine line, but Ralph Fiennes’ Gustave is never short of a quip or two and this often offsets some of the darker moments. This is arguably one of Anderson’s most outright funny films, and whether or not it would be classed as a comedy certainly leans heavily on the comedic chops of its leads, with Fiennes excelling in a role worlds away from most of his work to this point and earning some of the best reviews in his own storied career.

Alexandre Desplat’s score is one of his finest – featuring notable Russian folk undertones – and rightly won the Oscar for Original Score. The score is complementary of the film’s setting and period, and works wonderfully in contrast to Anderson’s more pop and rock heavy soundtracks present in the filmmaker’s previous films.

While all of Anderson’s films are ensemble affairs to differing extents, The Grand Budapest Hotel features one of his finest, with each of the cast getting their moments to shine, be it Willem Dafoe as a mercenary, Jeff Goldblum as a show-stealing lawyer, Adrien Brody, Edward Norton or Saoirse Ronan. While the film does well to allow its large cast of supporting characters to have moments in the spotlight, the film undoubtedly belongs to the duo of Ralph Fiennes and Tony Revolori.

It’s not hard to see why The Grand Budapest Hotel has gleaned such love over the past seven years. It is a perfect encapsulation of the best of Anderson’s works, with its fast-paced dialogue and candy coloured visual palette. Anchored by an eccentric Ralph Fiennes offering some of the finest work of his career, the tone is balanced to perfection, its absurdity meeting deeper moments in a seamless and wholly enjoyable fashion. There are few films that can boast such a complete authorial vision as The Grand Budapest Hotel, a film that sets the high marker for Wes Anderson’s acclaimed career.

23/24

Last year I watched Die Hard for the first time and it is now my favourite Christmas film ever. That’s why I thought I’d finally take a look at one of my other cinematic blind spots: Steven Spielberg’s 1993 dinosaur-based classic Jurassic Park.

For the first time in this miniature series, expectations were high. The opening did not disappoint.

Could Jurassic Park have the most intense opening scene in any blockbuster ever?

I thought this was a nice film that had some dinosaurs in, but a man is eaten in the first scene! Is this not for children?

After the dinosaur is fed, we meet our team.

First we have John Hammond played by Richard Attenborough – it appears that overall I have very few issues with this film, but one of them is Attenborough’s accent; is he supposed to be Scottish? – who is a wealthy businessman who has managed to clone dinosaurs and wants to create a theme park to help others share in his awe. But first he needs the help of a merry band of experts to sign off on his science and give their blessing to the park being opened.

Our band consists of: stuffy lawyer Gennaro (Ferrero); mathematician, chaos theorist and sex symbol Dr. Ian Malcom (Goldblum); Palaeontologist Dr. Alan Grant (Neill); and Palaeobotanist and bad ass Dr. Ellie Sattle (Dern). Samuel L. Jackson appears later constantly smoking, even when talking. What an absolute dream cast.

Jurassic Park is a strong movie from the opening credits, but the reveal of the dinosaur is something else. It’s pure Marty-approved cinema.

We see the characters react before we see the reveal, Spielberg tightening in on how overawed each of them are as they react like dominoes one after another, increasing expectations and the film’s child-like wonder all at once.

They even react as you’d believe each character would – Dr Sattler is so impressed by the plant life that she does not see the giant dinosaurs next to her; Dr Grant exclaims ‘It’s a dinosaur!’ and falls to the ground; Ian Malcom is impressed stating ‘You did it. You crazy son of a bitch you did it’; whereas our lawyer is, well… a lawyer: ‘We’re going to make a fortune with this place’.

Hammond says ‘Welcome to Jurassic Park’ – and honestly, what could possibly go wrong?!

The “Welcome to Jurassic Park” song begins, and that John Williams really knows how to make an emotive score, huh? Now I wish I had seen this in the cinema, full surround sound blasting it into my soul. Have no doubt, this is a soundtrack I will be listening to forever and ever.

I was 100% convinced that Hammond was evil 25 minutes in. Not pure evil, like leaving his grandchildren to be eaten by dinosaurs, but more like he gets a God complex and thinks he is above everyone else – needless to say I was not impressed by the way that he imprints Twilight-style onto the baby dinosaurs. It actually turns out that his character is evil in the novel, but because he was played by the lovable Richard Attenborough it turned out he couldn’t possibly be evil in the movie.

In general, I love the way that Spielberg frames the narrative – we are at the theme park with the characters. We go on the tour with them, we even learn about DNA with them. If only we could actually get in the cars.

Spielberg also masterfully builds anticipation for that first major T-Rex reveal by promising us two other dinosaurs on the tour and then disappointing us with their failed appearances, subsequently hitting us square in the face with the impressive and later scary presence of the T-Rex.

How did this film come out in 1993? This dinosaur is genuinely impressive – it still stands up!

Here comes the film’s sudden turn – a man is eaten by a dinosaur while on the toilet, there are cars in trees and children in mortal danger.

Jurassic Park actually uses fear in a really interesting way. Dinosaurs are of course scary, but we know they aren’t a genuine threat to our everyday lives, which is why it’s so important and genuinely harrowing to see the characters not only have to navigate these monstrous pre-historic creatures but also very normal dangers such as heights and electrical fences. It’s so very, very clever.

With this in mind, our young friend Tim seems to have 9 lives! The car he’s in gets crushed and pushed over a hill into a tree, then he gets electrocuted by 10,000 volts in a very tense scene, and he even survives being hunted for food by the smartest of all the dinosaurs, the Velociraptor.

I think we ought to dub him: Big Tim – Human Piece of Toast!

Recommended for you: Jurassic Park / World Movies Ranked

The most surprising and definitely my favourite part of Jurassic Park was its very real sense of girl power.

For 1993, Jurassic Park is very progressive – the dinosaurs are all females and still manage to pro-create because we don’t need no man, while Laura Dern is the hero and saves the day.

While Goldblum is injured early on and spends the rest of the film laying down looking pretty, and Sam Neill is the one left looking after the children for almost the entire second and third acts, Dern is kicking ass and saving the day.

More of this please.

Overall, I absolutely loved Jurassic Park. I don’t really know why I have only just seen this for the first time – it has everything you want in a family friendly movie, and it all comes with (pardon the pun)… a bite!

This surprisingly feminist tale is one that baby Annice would have appreciated; definitely a new Sunday morning favourite.