....

"If at first you do succeed, movie goers will come again".  Seems to be an overused motto in Movie Land.   Though it pains me to say that no genre milks itself for all it's worth, and still keeps going even when the milk has run dry, moreso than the horror genre :)

With 2 box office smash hit dino moofies under his belt, Speilberg was keen to do a third, but this time, he wasn't going to direct (maybe he'll be back for #4...who knows :)  Long time Speilberg collaborator joe Johnson took the helm for Dino Venture #3, which also sees the return of Sam Neill as Dr. Alan (I can forsee the outcome so just call me, Cassandra) Grant.

With the islands of the living dinosaurs well known to the world by now, you'd think that A) they'd have been nuked, or B) People would be smart enough to realise they should be nuked, and so there'd be NO WAY IN HELL that anyone would dare step anywhere near the island of people eatters.  but nooo, us STUPID humans beings are so damn nosey and just HAVE to know everyone elses business that we are now taking joy rides in aeroplanes, hang gliders and paracutes over said island. 

And What's worse than a stupid human being?  A stupid human being with money..... that said, Dr Grant is  "convinced" to play tourguide to a rich couple (William H Macy and Tea Leoni).  Dr Grant, with his young assistant (Alessandro Nivola), the rich couple and their heavies fly over the "2nd" island off the coast of Costa Richo.  "Much to Dr Grant's protest" the plane lands on the island and before you can say. "the-movie-may-not-be-as-good-but-thecgi-effects-surely-kiss-ass" the humans (both stupid and rich) are in the running for dino food.

Hands up those who begrudgingly sat thru JP2?  Tell me about it!  Well the good news is, JP3 is muuuuch better..not as good as JP1 but certainly a step or two up from JP2.  Most of the characters here are quite likeable, and not quite as stupid as they were in number 2...i mean PLEASE who the hell would continue wearing a blood soaked jacket on an island full of hungry dinosaurs?  jeez!

JP 3 is nothing more than popcorn entertainment..sure the premise had pretty much run it's course, but it's always fun to see people being eatting by big animals......especially actors :)

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VIDEO
As a brand new movie, (and one with a pretty hefty budget to boot), one would expect a first rate transfer on DVD, and it's close, but not quite. 

The main problem with this transfer is an ever so slight lack of sharpness, with some scenes having something of a defused appearance.  Looking at the picture I couldn't help but think..."juuuuust a little bit more and it's be spot on".  Even so, the level of detail is still quite revealing and image depth pretty good good.
Colour Saturation looks fine, and while not showing off a high level of richness, offers a a very nice colour palette for what is primarily set in a jungle of greens :)
There is a smattering of very low level MPEG artifacting throughout.  This is mainly noticable (and really only even so if your trying hard to find it) in large background areas.

Spread over two layers of an RSDL DVD, the very well placed layer change occurs at.   74:52, a relatively static shot of Eric as he's sitting down....nice.

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AUDIO
You Gotta Love Speilberg for pushing new technologies in film.  Though ironically, the man who was first out the gate with the original Jurassic Park in DTS is also now a big promoter of Dolby's new Surround EX sound format.  Granted he wasn't the man who directed JP3, but it certain had his mark all over it :)

For it's Theatrical release, JP3 was mixed for Dolby Surround EX, and given the nature of EX, the same audio mix has been ported to DVD, so the Surround EX information has been carried through to be on this DVDs Dolby Digital 5.1 track AND the DTS 5.1 track.

Neither are "flagged for EX or ES" but will decode perfectly in either format for "6.1 playback".  Also, Univeral have seen fit to match the sound levels of the Dolby and DTS tracks so there's no need to change the volume if you switch tracks (the audio tracks are selectable on the fly as well...)

And the winner is..... the DTS track of course :)  direct comparisons reveal the DTS track to show improvements in smoothness, detail and depth.   The Dolby track tends to steer sounds closer to the location of the actual speakers rather than around and away from them, which the DTS track does better and very nicely.
Musically the DTS track offers a fuller and much richer sound.  It really does give the impression there are more string instruments during some of the John Williams based grandiose scoring. 

As for the added surround back channel, the DTS track is a fraction more revealing in this area.  Both are first rate Surround EX based mixes, but there's just that little bit more information coming out of the DTS's surround back channel (as well as all other channels) to strengthen the surround sound field. 
Interestingly the surround channels aren't active all the time during the movie.   Even so, they are used to great effect and all three channels are ulitised equally when engaged.  The end result is a cracker surround sound field that compliments the on screen action perfectly.

Interestingly, the Dolby's Bass track is stronger than the DTS.  However I found the the DTS track's bass attack to blend in better with its other "6" channels of sound.

...

EXTRAS
i think all i need to say is...LOADED TO THE HILT!

• Audio Commentary. Unlike the previous 2 JP films, this is the FIRST one to offer an audio commentary.  This is your typical "technical audio commentary" with voices lent by several of the Tech gurus, Stan Winston, John Rosengrant, Dan Tasker, and Michael Lanterri.  (they've a good sense of humour to)
• Making Of Jurassic Park III runs a good 22 minutes and offers a good amount of movie tidbits
• The New Dinosaurs of Jurassic Park III .  if you find yourself experiencing a case of deja' vu while watching this featurette, it's safe to assume you've already watched the making off....runs a good 8 minutes runs a good 8 minutes
• Tour of Stan Winston Studio - essentially a collection of behind the scenes snippets backed with music.
• A Visit to ILM - anyone who loves their sub menus will love this.. and the many who don't will find it a pain (my hands up)   content wise it's excellent with copious amounts of information on ILM's involvement with the JP films.  With near 20 mini-featurettes, it would have been nice to include maybe just a few "play all" buttons to cut down on the finger pressing...jeez
• Montana : Finding New Dinosaurs . Throughout the commentary there is mention of a fella named Jack Horner (no, not THAT one).  this featurette is all about said dinosaur expert and his diggings.
• Behind the Scenes.  3 movie sequences and "how they did it"
• Storyboard to Final Feature Comparison. Aah i like these.  this one takes another 3 sequences and give you a direct A/B comparision between the storyboard and the final shot footage..nice
• Photo Galleries. Two are on offer with the first being a montage of publicity stills, etc backed with a few nice JP music themes.   The 2nd is a collection of proposed movie posters for JP3.. I just which they'd gone with the "subname" of the movie as a few of teh posters reveal...some WHACKED out ideas as well for what should be on the poster...
• Dinosaur Turntables .  a selection of 3D models in various forms of the "players" in JP3
• Trailers - a nice variety of trailers here.   JP1 (in Dolby 5.1), JP2 (with a KILLER 5.1 mix), JP3 (DD5.1) ET (in poor 'ol DD2.0) and last, but CERTAINLY not least... a trailer for the upcoming Back to the Future DVDs...sweeeet
• DVD-ROM Extras. While a step up from the usual lame "click here for the web link", this one uses Interactive Player with some snazzy looking Flash based menus.  you can demo a few JP games, try out some JP Trivia, read bios, production notes and the like.. not too bad, but nothing too exciting either

all up JP3 has been delivered on a very nice DVD.  The Piccy's quite nice, the sound is awesome (FINALLY we get a region 4 Jurassic moofy with a DTS track PLUS "6.1"), and the extras round things off nicely indeed.