Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)This is a GREAT 4 hour fantasy miniseries, with beautiful sets and production artwork, terrific special effects, and a pretty decent story line. Having said this, I have to admit that the plot was targeted at adolescents and young teens, and for an adult to fully enjoy the story requires that you slip your mind out of `critical gear' for a few hours.
Every time I watch Dinotopia, I am blown away by the unexpectedly high production values in this relatively unknown miniseries. Some of the reviews posted here lean in the direction that Dinotopia's effects are `almost as good' as movies like "Jurassic Park", and "Walking with Dinosaurs" but I actually think, in fairness, I would have to say that the effects in Dinotopia are better, or at least, at a minimum, more ambitious. The reason I say this is that Dinotopia takes on the MUCH more difficult challenge of turning some of the dinosaurs into full time, walking, talking, supporting characters, (and pulls this off remarkably well). Also, in this miniseries, a much higher percentage of the scenes are special effects shots involving a dinosaur character, and under these circumstances, you would think that there are bound to be a few shots that just don't quite hold up, but I'll be darned if I can pick out a single scene to cite as an example.
Given the fact that we are talking about maybe ten times the number of effects shots involving dinosaurs as there were in the first "Jurassic Park" movie, and given that the dinosaurs are interacting with the human characters in much more complex ways (in one scene, a man sized dinosaur named `Zippo' plays ping-pong with one of the human characters), I think they did an absolutely remarkable job on the effects in this miniseries.
Even minor characters like the `postal bird' are executed beautifully, and aside from the dinosaur effects, the quality of the sets and production artwork in many of the scenes is absolutely stunning, making this miniseries a real visual treat.
As far as the story line goes, I have to admit that I had to chuckle at times over the `psycho-babble', `granola-flake' perfection of the Dinotopian society, but this is, after all, a fantasy. Given the quantity and quality of the material, and the low cost of this DVD set, I think this miniseries was quite a bargain, and I can't think of another recent DVD purchase that has pleased me more.
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