Keanu Reeves in Jurassic Park. Now wait a minute – that’s not Keanu Reeves, nor is it Jurassic Park. That’s Adam Driver, and he plays Mills, an earthling-like non-earthling who crash-lands on Earth when his spaceship gets hit by an asteroid 65 million years ago… when dinosaurs ruled.
When the words “Prior to the advent of humanity” appeared superimposed on a space backdrop when 65 began, I knew that the filmmakers of this man (or whatever Mills is) vs. nature story would be taking their schoolboy subject matter too seriously.
Certainly, the film has its faults, starting with a basic and cliched plot: an underdeveloped hero goes on a two-year mission to earn enough to pay for his ailing daughter’s medication. He crashes and then undertakes a journey to find a vessel that will get him home.
Then there’s this fact (in case the reader hasn’t caught on): for an individual traveling to Earth from a planet 65 million years ago, Mills acts remarkably like a modern-day American. You’d think he’d have unfamiliar emotions and ways of approaching things.
After the crash, Mills discovers one survivor among the cryogenically preserved passengers on his craft. Unfortunately, the girl Koa doesn’t speak English. He tells her that her dead parents are still alive and tricks her into attempting to climb a mountain to get to the escape craft.
The film’s greatest strength is the rapport that Mills and Koa build as they navigate the dangerous terrain. There are even moments of levity between the two. As a father, Mills knows how to build trust, and this knowledge will pay off for him more than once. Also impressive are the prehistoric threats that keep one-upping each other: just as creature A closes in, creature B storms onto the scene and attempts to tear apart Mills and/or Koa.
Near the film’s conclusion, Mills discovers a threat much more menacing than dinosaurs. I won’t give away the threat, but I will state that the threat would have caused more tension had it been more apparent to the viewer from the film’s beginning.
Although the filmmakers could have made the same film with a less talented actor than Driver, I enjoyed seeing him repeatedly sustain painful injuries only to rise and continue pursuing his objective. Douglas J. Ogurek ***
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