Jurassic World Rebirth is heading to theaters on July 2, where it will join an exciting lineup of new movies. But if you’re in the mood for another great dinosaur-focused movie, I’ve got just the thing.
While the Jurassic franchise dominates the dinosaur movie genre and continues to be the most popular, one of my favorite movies, Dinosaur, is streaming on Disney+, and I really recommend it.
Originally released in 2000, the movie is now 25 years old and may feel a little dated in places, but it’s a welcome dose of nostalgia whenever I need one. Check out the trailer below.
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Why I recommend Dinosaur on Disney+
Even though Dinosaur falls just short of our best Disney+ movies list, with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 65%, it’s still considered Fresh by the critics.
Childhood nostalgia aside, I do think this is a movie that has stood the test of time. Anyone, young or old, can have a great time with it, and it’s a perfect family movie too.
Dinosaur follows a young Iguanodon who was adopted and raised by a family of lemurs. But they’re forced to find a new home thanks to a catastrophic meteor impact, joining a herd of dinosaurs along the way.
While there, they have to deal with the group’s stern leader as well as threats and predators they hadn’t encountered before. While it’s a PG and suitable for most audiences, there are definitely some intense scenes!
The computer animation is stunning, especially for the time, and focuses on a gritty story, something I’ve always loved about it. While Jurassic Park does lean into dark topics too, there’s something so anxiety-inducing about Dinosaur, and how it taps into real fears about settling down and finding a home in a community that might not want you.
Some critics weren’t impressed by the decision to make the dinosaurs talk, something that sets it apart from Jurassic Park and subsequent films, but I think it added to the vulnerability and made us gravitate towards certain characters and feel annoyed at others.
I’d highly encourage you to watch Dinosaur this weekend, and maybe you’ll like it as much as I did. And if, like me, you remember watching it years ago and you want to revisit it, then you definitely should.
