The
Jurassic Park franchise is a series of
books, films, comics, and
videos
centering on a disastrous attempt to create a
theme park of
cloned dinosaurs.
It began in 1990 when
Universal Studios bought the rights to the
novel by
Michael Crichton before it was even published.
The book was successful, as was the
1993 film adaptation which led to two
sequels, although the last was not based on a novel, as the previous
films were. The software developers
Ocean Software,
BlueSky Software,
Sega of America and
Telltale Games have had the rights to developing video games
since the 1993 film, and numerous games have been produced.
Currently a
fourth
feature film is in the works, but it has been lingering in "
development hell" since a year after the
third film. There have been numerous rumors about the
project since it was first reported, many of them relating to plot,
script ideas and new logos.
The
Jurassic Park Ultimate Trilogy was released on
Blu-ray and
DVD on October
25, 2011 in North
America.Jurassic Park
film series
Development
Michael Crichton originally conceived a
screenplay around a
pterosaur being cloned from fossil DNA. After
wrestling with this idea for a while, he came up with
Jurassic Park.
[1]
Steven Spielberg learned of the novel in October 1989
while he and Crichton were discussing a screenplay that would become the
TV series
ER. Before the book was published,
Crichton put up a non-negotiable fee for $1.5 million as well as a
substantial percentage of the gross.
Warner
Bros. and
Tim Burton,
Sony Columbia Pictures and
Richard Donner, and
20th Century Fox and
Joe
Dante also bid for the rights,
[2]
Universal further paid Crichton $500,000 to adapt his own novel,
[3]
but in May 1990, Universal eventually decided on Spielberg making the
adaption.
[2]
Universal desperately needed money to keep their company alive, and
partially succeeded with
Jurassic Park, as it became a critical
[4]
and commercial
[5]
success.
After Jurassic Park was released to home video, Crichton was
pressured from many sources for a sequel novel. Crichton declined all
offers until Spielberg himself told him that he would be keen to direct a
movie adaptation of the sequel, if one were written. Crichton began
work almost immediately. After the novel was published in 1995,
The Lost World: Jurassic Park
began production in September 1996.
[6]
Before the production of the second film,
Joe
Johnston approached
Steven Spielberg about directing the project. While
Spielberg wanted to direct the first sequel, he agreed that if there was
ever a third film, Johnston could direct.
[7]
Production began on August 30, 2000.
[8]
