'Jurassic Park 3' lots of hype, not much else

When the summer is about to begin, I always have a few movies in mind that must be seen in the theaters, no questions asked. And, with the summer mostly passed, the time has come and gone for many of those. "Pearl Harbor" and "The Fast and the Furious" have been long gone, seen months before in pure movie-going greatness. And while the always unexpected movie sneaks in the line of must-see summer fare -- "Shrek" comes to mind this summer -- there still remain one or two more that must be seen. The other night, I took care of one of those movies: "Jurassic Park 3."\nI admit, upon first hearing about the release of the third installment in this series, I was skeptical -- but after seeing the first couple trailers, I quickly became excited. After all, who doesn't like the original "Jurassic Park?" I was wondering what would go on, with no Michael Crichton book to adapt and without Steven Spielberg behind the camera as director. This movie was sure to be in a different direction than the previous two, but maybe that was what was needed, because of the poor job done in "The Lost World: Jurassic Park." Unfortunately, the lack of Crichton and Spielberg left something to be desired. \nSam Neill returns as Dr. Alan Grant, the paleontologist from the first movie. Two civilians, played by William H. Macy and Tea Leoni, hire Dr. Grant to tour the island and see the dinosaurs. Yet, upon reaching the island, he quickly learns the true reason of their arrival. They don't want to simply tour it; they want to find their son who is lost on the island (not worth your time here to explain). Upon their arrival on the island, things shockingly go wrong and the group is trapped on the island after their plane is destroyed. This half-hour of the movie, from the plane getting to the island up to a big dino battle, is the best part of the whole movie. \nFrom this point on, it's simply seeing how many new features they can work into the movie, whether it is new dinosaurs or improvements to other ones that had been seen before. It seems like the longer the movie goes, the worse it gets, culminating in a horrible ending, one that can't help but leave you with a bad taste in your mouth. It has been rumored that there were several problems with the script and a new ending had to be reshot before the film was done. It is easy to tell that there had to be some rewrites, because too much of the movie doesn't make sense. All in all, "Jurassic Park 3" leaves the viewer quite unsatisfied as they leave the theater. In fact, very few people even die in this one, and there is little suspense involved to boot. At least the last two had one or the other. Check this movie out at Blockbuster instead of the cinema -- save your money for this weekend's big blockbuster "Planet of the Apes." That one has to be good, right?