REMIXED & RESTORED: Jurassic Park

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

REMIXED & RESTORED: Jurassic Park

 

 

Quick links:

 

1. Opening Titles/Incident at Isla Nublar

2. The Encased Mosquito

3. Entrance of Mr. Hammond *

4. Journey to the Island

5. Stalling Around **

6. Hatching Baby Raptor

7. You Bred Raptors?
8. The History Lesson

9. Jurassic Park Gate **

10. Goat Bait *

11. The Saboteur *

12. Ailing Triceratops *

13. The Coming Storm

14. Dennis Steals the Embryo

15. Race to the Dock

16. The Falling Car and The T-Rex Chase *

17. A Tree for My Bed

18. Petticoat Lane **/My Friend the Brachiosaurus **

19. Life Finds a Way *

20. System Ready *

21. To the Maintenance Shed **/High-Wire Stunts */Hungry Raptor *

22. The Raptor Attack *

23. T-Rex Rescue and Finale *

24. Welcome to Jurassic Park (film version) **

25. Welcome to Jurassic Park (album version) *

 

Bonus tracks from the 2022 remaster:

4a. Journey to the Island (film version)

14a. Dennis Steals the Embryo (film version)

 

* contains unused music
** micro-edited in the film

 

 

More REMIXED & RESTORED:

The Lost World: Jurassic Park

 

 

Introduction

In 1993, Steven Spielberg unleashed dinosaurs upon the world. Jurassic Park, one of those perfect popcorn blockbusters and a revolution in computer graphics, bringing dinosaurs back to life in a way no one had ever seen before, dominated the summer box office.

 

In Jurassic Park, billionaire John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) and his company InGen have found a way to recreate dinosaurs. Ever the entrepreneur, Hammond decides to build a theme park around his creation. After one of the animals kills a worker, Hammond’s investors call for an investigation into the park. He recruits paleontologists Alan Grant (Sam Neill) and Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern) to inspect the island. Also along for the ride are Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), a charismatic but skeptical mathematician, Hammond’s lawyer Donald Gennarro (Martin Ferrero) and Hammond’s grandkids (Joseph Mazzello and Ariana Richards).

 

But despite Hammond’s repeated claims that he has "spared no expense" on his dazzling theme park, there is still one disgruntled employee (Wayne Knight), who is willing to spy for a rival company, steal a bunch of dinosaur embryos and cause a whole lot of mayhem in the process. What looked like stunning achievement soon turns out to be an uncontrollable danger, calling into question the range of control man has over nature and putting everyone’s lives in the balance…

 

An expertly made film, Jurassic Park grew a large fanbase and spawned a franchise that - although long dormant at the start of the 21st century - is still going today. Jurassic Park also gave us - like 11 out of the 12 preceding theatrical releases directed by Spielberg - a brand new John Williams score. One that would - like many of Williams' most famous works - join the ranks of seminal adventure blockbuster scores. In several places, Jurassic Park is also a thriller score, amping up the tension created by the corporate espionage subplot running through the first half of the film that finally causes the park to unravel.

 

John Williams’ Jurassic Park is the composer in full-on blockbuster adventure mode. In fact, I’d argue Jurassic Park - particularly on album - feels like a John Williams compilation. It features both a slow, majestic theme that mirrors the awe of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and a rousing, bombastic adventure theme that can sit snugly beside material from the Indiana Jones series. It has some ethereal music for the young and vulnerable dinosaurs that sounds like a precursor to Williams’ work on A.I. eight years later, pensive material slightly reminiscent of Home Alone and a tense conspiratorial cue that sounds like an adaptation of material from JFK.

 

Indeed, to many John Williams fans Jurassic Park is a seminal score and album. A gateway into the work of a man who has defined the Hollywood blockbuster sound for several generations.

The original soundtrack album presents the music not in chronological order, but rather clustered around the various ideas and sounds running throughout the score. Many tracks feature a pairing of cues that are spread out in the film but are thematically or texturally similar.

 

Now, with La La Land’s wonderful recent complete release in our players, we are able to enjoy the entire score in chronological order and get an exact idea of what music was dropped or replaced.

 

Because as with most films, the presentation of the score in the final film differs slightly from what was recorded. One interesting recurring decision you’ll find when lining up the score to the finished picture is that the carnivore motif that is first heard in the opening titles, features almost exclusively in passages that were dropped from the film. It is given several loud plays that were cut in favor of Gary Rydstrom’s stellar sound design or replaced with other music.

 

Over the coming weeks, we’ll be looking at each of the pieces written for the film, what music was dropped, how that would have played in the picture and discuss how these editing decisions change the shape of the final film. The idea for these videos is not to provide an isolated score track or to function as a fan mix that replace the original mix. Instead, I aim to bring the score into the foreground while keeping most of the dialogue and effects intact wherever possible. Jurassic Park has a very well-designed soundscape, where music and effects often go hand in hand and I wanted to honor that. It also works well when restoring unused music. When we get to stuff like Goat Bait, you'll get to hear how the music interacts with the dialogue, while still keeping the music in the foreground of the mix.

 

Once I'm done with Jurassic Park, expect to see something similar for The Lost World, which is a veritable treasure trove of unused material!

 

But first, let’s start right at the beginning.

 

 

 

1. Opening Titles/Incident at Isla Nublar

1mA Opening Titles
1m1 Incident at Isla Nublar

As the movie starts with the reveal of the Universal logo, there is no music. The quiet of the theatre is broken only by sounds of the jungle. A deep drumbeat disrupts the jungle sounds and opens the film and the score. Along with choir and the first iteration of the carnivore motif, it sets a tone of danger right off the bat.

After the credits, we open the film proper on moving tree branches and the faces of tense Jurassic Park workers. After a brief moment of sound design, it is revealed something mechanical is moving the trees. Williams’ score kicks in again right as we cut to ROBERT MULDOON, whose commanding presence will lead the following scene and who will return for a large role later in the film.

Williams starts the cue with a synthesizer baseline, strings and metallic sounds. Right away, the synthetic and the organic are intertwined with ominous results. This builds until the dinosaur crate is opened and all hell breaks loose. The frenetic style of action music that will be heard during more of the dinosaur attacks later in the film is heard for the first time, this time also accompanied by an ominous low choir. As the cue ends, we hear for the first time how well music and sound design are integrated in the final film. The cue fizzles out a bit on the complete score album, but in the film the echoing gunshots take over from Williams’ frantic action scoring and take us into the contrasting serenity of the Dominican Republic’s jungle.

Both these cues are played in the film in their entirety.

 

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,445]

Excellent! Ricard should link this on the main page!

[Incanus 5,818]

Good job Marc! This is fascinating and very illuminating and I can't wait to see you finish this piece!  

[JohnnyD 1,330]

Cool! I cannot wait to see how the unused music plays out. I myself have done it before, but it is nice to be able to sit down, see and hear all the unused cues in the respective scenes without my having to play the cues and the scene from each film whenever I want to revisit them (saves A LOT of time).

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

Thanks, everyone!

 

It's going to take a while to get all these videos out, but don't worry. There's cool stuff coming. Here's the second video, brief as it is:

 

 

2. The Encased Mosquito
1m2 The Encased Mosquito

 

Inside the amber mine, the choir returns as we push in on the very source of our adventure: a tiny prehistoric mosquito encased in amber. We cut to a dinosaur bone being unearthed. The choir turns from low and ominous to high and awestruck as the remains of the extinct animal are uncovered by the many diligent hands of paleontologists. A misterioso oboe and clarinet line coincides with the appearance of the legend “BADLANDS - Near Snakewater, Montana”. This is where we're about to meet our hero. As ALAN GRANT rises into frame for the first time and states his position on the film’s nature vs. technology theme, Williams underscores the comment with a final ominous chord in the orchestra's lower registers.

 

This cue is heard in its entirety.

[Disco Stu 15,502]

THIS. IS. GREAT.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,445]

Well done!

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

It's time for our first video featuring unused music. Hurray!

 

From now on, you'll quickly be able to see if a video features unused music. These titles have been marked with a *.

 

3. Entrance of Mr. Hammond *
2m1 The Entrance of Mr. Hammond

 

So this is the first cue to feature unused material, even if it is only very brief. After the disruptive arrival of a helicopter at the dig site, Alan Grant first meets JOHN HAMMOND, who makes Alan and his colleague/girlfriend ELLIE SATTLER an excellent business offer. As Hammond blows the pair away with his generous offer, this brief cue underscores the celebration of the two. In the film, this is where the score ends. But when we cut to a distant foreign location, Williams underscores LEWIS DODGSON exiting a beat-up taxi with an ominous coda, as the film’s corporate espionage subplot is about to begin.

[aj_vader 570]

Fantastic work. Looking forward to the rest! 

[Jay 39,762]

ooooh, can't wait to watch these after work!

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

Our first long video is here!

 

 

4. Journey to the Island
2m3-3m1 To the Island
3m2 The Dinosaurs
3m2A The Entrance of the Park

 

After witnessing the shady deal between Dodgson and DENNIS NEDRY, we smash cut to a helicopter over a bright blue ocean. Williams’ first setpiece of scoring begins, kicking off nearly nine minutes of continuous score that is used in its entirety and lines up almost perfectly with the film. Williams showcases his many sensibilities in this track, starting with a playful tune for IAN MALCOLM's introduction. He then goes into full on bombast for the island approach and introduces the adventurous theme for the park. We’ll dub it the adventure theme for the purpose of this writing and it is indeed perfectly fitting theme park music. This is followed by an incidental piece for the car journey into the park, that plays around with the adventure theme.

 

Tense strings build as Grant spots something off-camera, before the theme from Jurassic Park (which I’ll refer to as the main theme) makes its first appearance as the visitors lay their eyes on a giant brachiosaurus. After Grant's astonishment, Williams rounds out the cue with a short march that takes us to the park’s visitor’s center. As Hammond takes our heroes inside, Williams lays a sped-up version of the main theme over a playful version of his march.

 

This track is notable for introducing the two big themes from the score (the main theme and the adventure theme) in their full force, before Williams starts offering variations. Thematically, this actually makes sense, since Jurassic Park is about to unravel. It may hold great promise at this point, but unlike a character’s journey leading from humble beginnings to a grandiose finale, this park is at its grandest during this sequence. So instead of introducing these themes in a reduced form and developing them throughout the score, Williams plays them for the first time at full orchestrated force instead.

 

Two minor edits were made in this video. First, the pause before the main theme starts is slightly longer than on disc, so I lengthened the pause accordingly. Second, the march for the arrival at the visitor's centre is slightly longer in the film and appears to be looped. I have trimmed the beginning of the footage for the cars' arrival by about a second to maintain the integrity of the track and the flow of the music.

[RedBard 71]

Loving your work so far.

 

Keep 'em coming. Looking forward to the cartoon segment.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

Thanks! I aim to crank out one video each day, so keep checking in.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

An early one today!
 

 

5. Stalling Around **
3m3 Cartoon Demonstration

This source cue is used for the introduction film the tour group is shown. However, Williams still manages to underscore Malcolm’s amazement as he realizes how Hammond pulled off the trick of cloning dinosaurs. It's a small departure from the rest of the score and until The Adventures of Tintin came along in 2011 it was the only bit of animated scoring Williams had done!

 

There's a small music edit in the film during the shot of the scientist that starts at 1:57. I've left a small gap after that shot to make sure the rest of the cue syncs up. Other than that, this cue is heard in its entirety. To mark the micro-edit in the film, this track has been marked with **.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,445]

Cartoon!

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

 

6.  Hatching Baby Raptor
4m1 Hatching Baby Raptor

After escaping from the automated tour (life will not be contained and all that), the group moves to the hatchery. As a dinosaur egg hatches before the eyes of the group, Williams returns to scoring the beauty of nature and the the angelic choir of awe returns. This cue plays in the movie as it was written.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

 

7. You Bred Raptors?
4m2 You Bred Raptors

The awe of nature makes way for ominous tones as Grant realizes he is holding a baby velociraptor. This brief cue appears in the film its entirety.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

 

8. The History Lesson
5m1 The History Lesson

After meeting Muldoon, a short debate and the introduction of LEX and TIM MURPHY plays out without any music, the group is about to go off and meet the dinosaurs. A playful cue featuring variations on the adventure theme underscores Grant trying to get away from fanboy Tim, who is every bit as obnoxious as Grant feared a child would be. Another cue that plays in the film as written.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,445]

Nice!

[Sandor 846]

GREAT..!

[Disco Stu 15,502]

It's like a wonderful little present waiting for me on the board every morning.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

Well, here's another one then. And good morning to you!
 

 

9. Jurassic Park Gate **
5m2 Jurassic Park Gate

Hold on to your butts, the second act is about to kick off. As RAY ARNOLD starts the tour program, Hammond watches the cars start from his control room. The jungle drums return as the cars depart. Here again, the music plays like theme park music. It might as well have been playing over the car speakers. The low register string chord connecting the swelling adventure theme to the music for Hammond talking over the intercom is dialed out in the film. Instead, we hear the loud echoing sound of the Jurassic Park gate closing behind our heroes. This is the only part of the track that is not in the film. As the cars drive past the seemingly empty Dilophosaurus pen, Williams quiets down and uses mostly strings to score the unknown jungle, a sound he'll return to in the next cue, which was dropped from the film entirely.

 

Starting tomorrow, we'll be looking at a stretch of tracks that was either dropped entirely from the film or had large chunks removed. So stay tuned!

[JohnnyD 1,330]

Awesome stuff. I just have a minor correction for you: the low register string chord connecting the adventure theme to the section of music for Hammond talking over the intercom is NOT dialed out in the film. The echoing of the Jurassic Park Gate is just loud enough to make the strings hard to hear, but they are there.

[Jay 39,762]

Marc, these videos are great!  I finally had a chance to catch up on Friday (so have only seen your first 6 videos) but I really enjoyed all of them.  It's a neat idea to present these with the film's audio in tact, but at a lowered volume.... Really lets the music shine, while also showcasing better how he make it complement or take focus depending on what is happening at the time.  Neat stuff, and I can't wait to catch up on the ones you've posted since!

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

15 minutes ago, JohnnyD said:

Awesome stuff. I just have a minor correction for you: the low register string chord connecting the adventure theme to the section of music for Hammond talking over the intercom is NOT dialed out in the film. The echoing of the Jurassic Park Gate is just loud enough to make the strings hard to hear, but they are there.

 

 

I don't hear it, though. It's supposed to be audible after we've already cut to Hammond. I could check the Blu-Ray later tonight, though. I'm mostly working off a low-res rip for these videos.

 

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

Well, I checked the Blu-Ray. It's not there. When we cut to Hammond, the music doesn't come in until 1:05 in this video. It's a very minor edit, but it's an edit nonetheless.

[BloodBoal 7,541]

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

I checked again with headphones on and the volume way up. It might be there, but if it is, it's certainly dialed way down compared to the album mix.

[BloodBoal 7,541]

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

Either way, I just unraped it for you. You're welcome.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

 

10. Goat Bait *
5m3 Goat Bait

This is the first cue that was dropped from the film in its entirety and it kicks off a short stretch of unused music. I’ve started this cue on the cut to the cars arriving at the Tyrannosaur paddock and it lines up pretty well. I personally think the scene works better without the music, but it's cool to see how it would play with score (although the music obviously wouldn't have been mixed in as prominently as it is here). The sound used for the Dilophosaurus pen turns darker and more ominous. The music tries to ramp up the tension and condition us to fear the jungle. Some of the orchestration is quite similar to the sound Williams will use for Ellie and Muldoon’s jungle adventure in the third act (the cue was combined with music from that scene on the original album). The cue runs right from the start of the scene to the end, concluding with the goat sitting down and fading out as we cut to Hammond in his control room. In the film, the scene plays entirely without music. The focus on sound and dialogue shifts the tone of the scene from one of threat to one of dry wit and disappointment in the tour.

[Incanus 5,818]

 

11 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

OK, then. Spielberg might have raped my childhood.

 

11 hours ago, Mr. Breathmask said:

Either way, I just unraped it for you. You're welcome.

Marc. Unraping childhoods since 2017.

 

And again great work on these. Keep 'em coming!

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

 

11. The Saboteur *
6m1 The Menace Dennis

Also dropped in its entirety, this is another cue that is almost exactly as long as the scene it was meant to underscore. We return to the sound of suspense and intrigue, as the control room realizes a flaw in the tour’s design and we revisit Nedry, who’s biding his time at his work station, getting ready to pull his scam. The final chord takes us back to Grant and co.

[Luke Skywalker 1,970]

nice! i think that cue could have been in the film and enhaced the scene.

 

 

I think mattessino told in the interview what the 'saboteur' real cue name was.... but i cant remember it.

[Incanus 5,818]

2 minutes ago, Luke Skywalker said:

nice!

 

 

I think mattessino told in the interview what the 'saboteur' real cue name was.... but i cant remember it.

Yes Matessino mentioned it. The cue title is The Menace Dennis. 

[Luke Skywalker 1,970]

That's a giacchino cue...

[Incanus 5,818]

24 minutes ago, Luke Skywalker said:

That's a giacchino cue...

Johnny was punny before Gia was even born. He just doesn't flaunt it on the CD track titles.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

Cool. I forgot about that. I'll put it in there.

[Jay 39,762]

All of Williams' original cue names are available on my spreadsheet

 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hZY4hhCz-5NzbjKuPOx8R9Yb0iWnr4P4SwzG1-6VSTg/pubhtml

 

You'll note that 2M1, 3M3, 6M1, 6M2, 7M1, 8M1, 10M3, 11M1, 11M2, 12M3/13M1, 14M2, and the cues inside Journey To the Island and Welcome To Jurassic Park all have different titles on CD than as originally written.

[Muad'Dib 1,876]

8 hours ago, Incanus said:

Yes Matessino mentioned it. The cue title is The Menace Dennis. 

 

Hey Mr. Williams!

[Doo_liss 6,639]

7 hours ago, Incanus said:

Johnny was punny before Gia was even born. He just doesn't flaunt it on the CD track titles.

Once in a Vial.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

 

12. Ailing Triceratops *
6m2 An Ailing Monster

As Grant leaves the group behind, bassoon and strings accentuate the mystery of what he saw. This start of the cue was not used in the film. Instead, the music starts as Tim reaches the clearing and the sick Triceratops is revealed. This ends a seven-minute stretch of film without music for which about four minutes of score was written. The last time we went this long without score was during the debate section between seeing the baby raptors and getting in the cars. Interestingly, this last score-less stretch also featured debate on the park’s workings and the vain attempts at controlling nature.

 

The majestic and touching music for the sick Triceratops plays out the same in the film, until the very end of the track. Ellie’s realization the West Indian Lilac might have something to do with the disease plaguing the Triceratops herd is unscored in the film, as is her idea to investigate the droppings. A short horn line and the very end of the cue were dropped from the film (starting at 2:13 in this video).

[Incanus 5,818]

13 hours ago, Fal said:

Once in a Vial.

Or Is It a Bird? from 1977. But that is more of a witty reference than an outright pun.

 

I have always had a fondness for TLW's Pain of Glass. A classic.

[Luke Skywalker 1,970]

It's painful to see a paleobotanist outwitting the veterinarian, not having noticed the pupil reaction on the triceratops... He is supposed to be top avian-reptile vet in the world if he has been contracted for jurassic park... Also he is "almost sure" the dinosaurs do not eat the poisonous seeds...they hadnt check the faeces... checking both is almost standard procedure... And someone should have read about dinosaur gizzard stones?....or see the young animals eat them while they were growing? It's a little sloppy writting from crichton....and now i notice that dropping the explanation scene may be intentional...maybe spielberg thought in the end that it was unvelievable that the paleontologists with the help of timmy would solve a problem a group of elite-no-expenses-spared-billed veterinarians (and probably ecologists and biologists) could not....

 

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,445]

They needed to give Laura Dern something to do in that part of the film. Thats all it was. You know. Show her as a strong, independent professional woman who's willing to dig through shit to find her answer.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

 

13. The Coming Storm
6m3 The Coming Storm
As uncontrollable as anything in nature, the weather is about to turn for the worse. The breaking waves are scored like the coming of disaster and we return to more thriller score as Nedry pleads with his contact to wait for him to deliver the embryos. This cue is uncut in the film.
 

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,445]

Always loved that cue

[Incanus 5,818]

Yeah I have had a soft spot for this little cue as well. Johnny captures the whole little sequence so well from the rising storm to Nedry's intrigue.

[Mr. Breathmask 566]

 

14. Dennis Steals the Embryo
7m1 Dennis Steals the Embryos

Our thriller subplot comes to a heat as Nedry puts his plan into effect. Reminiscent of JFK’s The Conspirators, Williams heavily employs synthesizer to back the orchestra. The cue hits every escalating beat as systems go offline, Nedry collects his embryos and heads into the park and the tour vehicles are stranded somewhere in the park. As Muldoon, Arnold and Hammond realize they are in trouble, the cue ends in the film right where it should. For the next ten minutes we’ll have to do without the comfort of John Williams’ music to guide us, making the events that are about to unfold all the more terrifying.

[A24 4,603]

On 4/8/2017 at 3:54 AM, Mr. Breathmask said:

14. Dennis Steals the Embryo

 

Williams Steals 'The Conspirators'