Fallen franchise

Back in the mists of prehistory, when I was eight, dinosaur films followed a set pattern. The dinosaurs themselves would be cheerfully unpalaeontological; women would wear improbable outfits; volcanoes would explode. Then, in 1993, courtesy of Steven Spielberg, came a sea-change. Jurassic Park was that cinematic rarity: a science fiction film that succeeded in influencing the science it was fictionalising. The story of a theme park populated by resurrected dinosaurs, it offered a portrayal of Mesozoic fauna that was as close to authentic as could then plausibly be achieved. For the first time, computer-generated imagery was used to portray dinosaurs as scientists had come to envisage them: agile, bird-like, smart. The impact was profound. A whole generation of palaeontologists who were inspired by Jurassic Park as children has now come of age. The result has been a golden age of dinosaur discoveries. That our understanding of how these long-extinct creatures looked and functioned has changed considerably since Jurassic Park is — at least in part — a tribute to its original impact.