Wild Eye Releasing, with
sales and distribution expertise provided by MVD Entertainment Group, will be
delivering dino-bites (or chomps, as the case may be) of their own on June 12
with the DVD debut of director Milko Davis’ Jurassic Dead.
It goes head-to-head with
Universal Pictures June 22 theatrical rollout of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom,
which will be a summer blockbuster. So
there is no comparison between the two, right?
It is sort of a yes and
no answer. On the surface Jurassic
Dead — a story about a crazed scientist who has developed a zombie-like
dinosaur (and things far worse) — and Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom are
worlds apart, but when you look at the production budget for each film you will
see something that is scaring the hell out of the studios; driving them crazy
with fear.
Director J.A. Bayona’s Jurassic
World: Fallen Kingdom likely has a film budget well in excess of $200
million, while Davis’ Jurassic Dead is probably somewhere
south of $75,000. So? What’s the big deal?
It goes like this, back
in the 1920s and ‘30s, stop-motion was state-of-the-art (King Kong and The
Lost World are great examples) for creature features; monsters …
dinosaurs, T-Rex and the like. Sci-fi
films of the 1950s were fun and delivered what was promised, but the special
effects were often wanting (Tarantula is a terrific film, by
1955 special effects standards, but today the big spider looks cheezy). The ‘70s saw Alien and Star
Wars … things were getting better, but still nothing like today’s
standards.
Skip ahead to the current
world of CGI and f/x and for under $100,000 an independent filmmaker like Milko
Davis — and his co-director Thomas Martwick — get an on-screen T-Rex that is
pretty damn good. Indeed, indie
filmmakers are methodically mastering the film technology that was once
reserved for the big-budget studio players … Jurassic Dead is a marvelous
example of just how far indie filmmakers have come.
For genre fans, while
they wait to queue up for Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, they
will be well-served to check out Wild Eye Releasing’s Jurassic Dead … 82
minutes of non-stop action, with a damn good-looking dinosaur at the heart of
it.
