A look back at 'Jurassic Park' 25 years later
Today, June 11, marks the 25th anniversary of the release of Steven Spielberg's "Jurassic Park."
Adapted from the bestselling book by the late Michael Crichton, the movie centered on an eccentric tycoon named Hammond, played by director-actor Richard Attenborough, who funds a team of scientists to use DNA-based technology to revive dinosaurs to populate a one-of-a-kind theme park.
Before the new park opens, Hammond invites experts in various disciplines -- Sam Neill as paleontologist Dr. Alan Grant, Laura Dern as a botanist, and Jeff Goldblum as a skeptical mathematician -- to kick the tires, so to speak. Also along for the preview ride are Hammond's two grandchildren.
The tour goes sideways in a massive way, however, when a park employee -- played by a pre-"Seinfeld" Wayne Knight -- shuts down security systems as part of a plot to steal dinosaur embryos. The park's live main attractions soon slip their pens, and wreak havoc on the humans stranded there. All this is set to an epic John Williams score.
The movie famously made use of cutting-edge, computer-generated effects from the wizards at George Lucas' special effects house, Industrial Light, and Magic, as well as the late Stan Winston and his team, who supplied stunning, full-sized dinos for close-ups -- including the now-iconic scene that saw a T-Rex getting up close and personal with a couple of kids, with only a toppled SUV's window between them.
Both special-effects teams won Oscars for their respective efforts. The film also won a third trophy, for best sound effects editing.
The movie, described by some as "'Jaws' with claws," went on to gross more than $1 billion at the global box office, and spawned a pair of sequels, 1997's "The Lost World," and "Jurassic Park III" in 2001.
The franchise got a billion-dollar boost with a 2015 reboot, "Jurassic World," with star Chris Pratt playing a veteran-turned-velociraptor trainer, alongside his on-screen boss, played by Bryce Dallas Howard. A sequel, "Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom," hits theaters June 22.
