Jules (2023)

★★★½
When I read the premise for Jules, I imagined a fictionalized version of the story of a supposed U.F.O. that crashed in Kecksburg, Pennsylvania in 1965. I learned of the incident in a 1990 episode of Unsolved Mysteries, which I watched while growing up in Southwestern Pennsylvania, and it was kind of cool to see that such an event occurred in our part of the state. Maybe writer Gavin Steckler set his story for Jules in a fictional Western PA community (Boonton) because of the Kecksburg incident. As I watched the movie, I quickly realized that this was not a story of cover ups and mysterious government agents in radiation suits who take over a town and silence everyone under threat of violence. Instead, this is a surprisingly gentle tale that examines the difficulties of old age and its effects on the family. At one point I began to search for parallels with Ron Howard's Cocoon, but there were none. This is its own story, and director Marc Turtletaub tells it beautifully.

Jawbreaker (1999)

★★
A black comedy fusion of Clueless and Heathers, Jawbreaker falls short of both. Darren Stein’s tale of high school murder and revenge isn’t nearly as clever as it thinks it is and relies on a heavy dosage of in-sync dialogue delivery and creative cutting to carry the day. It isn’t boring, and sometimes it’s amusing, but once the subterfuge wears off, all that’s left is a forgettable story of insignificant impact. Only two weeks after this movie’s release came Cruel Intentions, another twisted high school tale, but one that was much more satisfying, with an ending that worked because that movie’s villainess was fully fleshed out, while Jawbreaker’s Courtney is the result of a script run amok.

Jurassic Park (1993)

★★★
In the summer of 1993, it was Jurassic Park vs. Last Action Hero, with the former soundly defeating the latter in a battle of big-budget motion pictures. Audiences flocked to see Steven Spielberg's dazzling showcase of jaw-dropping special effects while many avoided Arnold Schwarzenegger's underrated action film parody. Jurassic Park suffers a little because it freely omits many intriguing elements of the book in order to concentrate on the action aspect. I read the book in 1994 as part of an English 101 class that I took, yet the sense of wonder generated by its detailed scientific elements still remains. Michael Crichton's novel was loaded with scientific information. He presented his material in such a way that the book often read like a graduate student's thesis on bioengineering. Though the very idea of a prehistoric theme park is outlandish, Crichton found a way to weave all his information into a convincing story. Jules Verne accomplished the same thing with 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. That story, about a self-sustaining submarine, would have appeared far-fetched when it was written in the 1800s, yet the scientific detail is enthralling.