23 Facts About Jurassic Park That You Didn’t Know

The New Jurassic thingy is out. Hooray! Dinosaurs etc…

We’re sure you remember the previous Jurassic exploits but we’re not sure you’ll know these crazy facts about the first film…
1.

The dinosaurs were, in fact, not real. Yet the humans were! Just joking… here are the actual facts: 1. Sure the T-Rex looked scary on screen, but apparently things were pretty similar during filming. Because to the rain, the animatronic T-Rex would frequently short circuit and ‘come alive’! Producer Kathleen Kennedy has said: “We’d be, like, eating lunch, and all of a sudden a T-Rex would come alive. At first we didn’t know what was happening, and then we realized it was the rain. You’d hear people start screaming.”
2. Alan and Ellie have a sign that says “No animal released without paperwork completely filled out” hanging in their trailer.
3. The noise used for the velociraptors talking to each other was conveyed by the sound of tortoises having sex. Rydstrom spent months recording animal noises, winning him two Academy Awards.
4. Sam Neill was injured when using a flare to distract the T-rex. According to Neill, “It dropped some burning phosphorous on me and got under my watch and took a chunk of my arm out.”
5. Jurassic World (the new one), was nearly a completely different film. Before production was dropped and the idea shelved many years ago, a script was written that involved genetically altered dinosaurs bred for war that could carry weapons for battle.
6. The reason the triceratops is so ill is explained in the original book. Like a bird, the dinosaur lacks suitable teeth for chewing and so would swallow rocks and use them to grind food in its digestive tract. After six weeks, the rocks would become too smooth to be useful, and would then be regurgitated. When finding new rocks to use, the Triceratops also swallowed toxic berries.
7. The crazy-scary dilophosaurus from the film is one of the most memorable characters. So it may come as a shock to know that it’s main features are pure fabrication! Michael Crichton, author of the original novel, invented the dinosaur’s deadly venom-spitting ability, and Spielberg added the neck-frill.
8. Jaws is playing on one of the computers.
9. It’s no coincidence that Ian Malcolm wears mainly black throughout the film where Hammond sticks to white. This is done to convey that the two are very opposed idealistically.

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10. If there is a way to clone dinos, we don’t yet have the technology. If you took petrified DNA it would still be too degraded. And there is no equivalent to a dinosaur egg in which to incubate the embryos. The paleontologist, Jack Horner, said he thought it might be possible to genetically modify a chicken embryo to activate dormant genes for dinosaur-like traits. But that would still make no dinosaur.
11. David Koepp, screenwriter, said this on the creation of Mr DNA: “I remember Steven [Spielberg] and I were wrestling with that very issue, about the DNA, and one of us said, ‘What are we supposed to do? Have a little animated character called Mr. DNA?’ And the other one said, ‘Yes! That’s exactly what we’re going to do!’”
12. The raptors were done in godzilla-style, with puppeteers in lizard suits. The velociraptors in the film were much bigger than the real species, but shortly before the movie’s release, palaeontologists discovered a larger related species, the Utahraptor. Stan Winston, special effects creator, joked, “We made it, then they discovered it.”
13. Juliette Binoche and Robin Wright were first offered the role of Dr. Ellie Sattler, which ended up going to Laura Dern. Jodie Foster, Joan Cusack, Julia Roberts, Linda Hamilton, Sandra Bullock, Julianne Moore and Sarah Jessica Parkert all tested for the role.
14. In the dining room, we see slides saying that Jurassic park will overtake sports and zoos in popularity.
15. Spielberg famously lured acclaimed British director Sir Richard Attenborough out of a 14-year acting retirement and cast him as John Hammond. But Jurassic Park was actually the third film Spielberg had asked him to appear in.
16. Initially, Jurassic Park was supposed to end with Grant shooting one of the raptors dead whilst killing the other with the mechanical T-rex skeleton. However, Spielberg decided that the T-rex needed one last send-off and so included it in to save everyone.
17. A lot of work went into making the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park look at realistic as possible. Which makes it surprising that the dinos only got 15 minutes of screen-time in a 127 minute long film…
18. The T-Rex was a combination of an elephant trumpeting and, weirdly, penguin mating sounds, along with dog, tiger and alligator noises.
19. Both William Hurt and Harrison Ford were offered the role of Dr. Alan Grant, which Sam Neill would eventually land. Richard Dreyfuss was also considered.
20. The iconic rippling water scene was inspired by the mirror shaking in Spielberg’s car while he was listening to Earth, Wind, and Fire. The effect was created by placing the glass of water on a vibrating guitar.
21. In the final scene, the Jurassic Park logo on the jeep is covered in mud and spells out “UR ASS PARK,” a subtle joke that “you’re lucky to get out with your ass in one piece.”
22. The screams in this scene are genuine — the animatronic T. rex was not supposed to break the glass.
23. Phil Tippett did a god-awful job.
So now you’re all ready for the shiny-new Jurassic World! … Although the likelihood of any of this coming into play in the new film is fairly unlikely. Also we’re pretty sure that the only reason they called the new one Jurassic World was so no one could make a Jurassic Parks and Recreation joke, but whatever… Enjoy!
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