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All About Dinosaurs
By Brishti Bandyopadhyay; Illustrations by Sudheer Nath
November 4, 2000: The "dino" passion that the 1993 film 'Jurassic Park' ignited among children and adults does not show any signs of abating even in today's world of ever-shortening attention spans.
In the few years since Hollywood director Steven Spielberg made his blockbuster film, an industry has sprung up around the dinosaur theme, with dino caps, bags, theme parks, books and of course, films, milking to their heart's content, the public's never-ending fascination for the gigantic creatures that roamed the earth in prehistoric times.
'The most authentic dino film ever made'And now Disney, the world's leading movie company in children's films, has made its own animated dino movie, called simply 'Dinosaur'. Announced as Disney's most expensive and complex animated venture till date (it cost $200 million to make), the film is said to have used every trick available in the latest computer graphics.
So, what have they done?
Instead of portraying dinosaurs as monsters (as 'Jurassic Park' has done), 'Dinosaur' shows them as thinking and feeling creatures that protect one another, say the filmmakers.
While the creatures have been totally created on computer, exotic locations in Hawaii and Florida in the United States, and in the wilds of Venezuela and Australia, have been added to give a touch of "reality".
The film's "hero" is an iguanadon, a kindly horse-like dinosaur, one of roughly 30 types of dinosaurs, says a report in 'The Hindu' newspaper.
"This movie is special in all kinds of ways because it continues the legacy of dinosaur movies….that have always had an important place in film history," says the producer Pam Marsden. "It has all the elements of reptiles and action that people love - but it takes advantage of all this great new technology….the camera can look right in the eye and you can see a realistic face with muscles and blinking eyes".
"Jurassic Park was certainly spectacular, but it wasn't an accurate portrayal of dinosaur life," says the series producer of "Walking with Dinosaurs", a six-part documentary serial made by Discovery Channel and the British Broadcasting Corporation.
To achieve realism and scientific accuracy, the makers placed the dinosaurs in actual locations, and sifted through many conflicting theories about them.
The Mother of all Dinosaur Films What was 'Jurassic Park' all about? Written by best-selling American writer, Michael Crichton, 'Jurassic Park' has a straightforward plot. A scientific breakthrough (in which dinosaurs are recreated from DNA fragments encased in amber), brings dinosaurs back to life after 65 million years.
A businessman John Hammond, the man behind the experiment, starts a company which places the genetically engineered dinosaurs in a theme park on an island in Costa Rica. But the park systems break down shortly before it can open, the dinosaurs get free, wreak complete havoc, and have to be destroyed and the island closed to the public.
Recognising the potential of the dinosaur-craze, Spielberg made a sequel 'The Lost World', which brought back the dinos to life yet again, and showed them making more mayhem before being destroyed once more.
Other Dino Films 'Jurassic Park' wasn't the first movie about dinosaurs, however. 'One Million Years BC', made as early as 1940 in Hollywood, showed papier mache dinosaurs! Similarly, 'Dinosaurs' is not Disney's first film about the creatures. Its 'Baby…Secret of the Lost Legend', was a film made in 1985 about the discovery of a baby dinosaur. Spielberg reworked the theme and made the dinosaur theme a big hit.
