“The experience for the audience is that they come along and get the sense that they are travelling to Jurassic World from the film series, and they get to encounter the dinosaurs as visitors to Jurassic World would,” says Philip Millar, Associate Creative Director of Creature Technology, the Melbourne-based animatronics company that has made the dinosaurs for this exhibition.
“So you see the life size animatronic dinosaurs, as if they’re real creatures moving about, and hopefully feel like you’re in the dinosaur’s world, rather than the other way round.”
The exhibits that form Jurassic World are inspired by scenes from the film, and all the dinosaurs you expect to see – the skyscraper-sized Brachiosaurus, the T-Rex and the villainous, Frankenstein-esque creation “Indominus Rex” – will be there.
In addition, Philip says Creature Technology has incorporated the most up to date information on dinosaur anatomy and fossil discoveries into creating their animatronic beasts. He says their focus has been on making dinosaurs’ appearances and movements as close to the real thing as they can be.
While allowing viewers to experience once again the wonder and excitement of Jurassic World is paramount, Philip says a key aim for the exhibition’s creators is ensuring people learn something about dinosaur science.
“I think that’s critical,” he reflects. “Particularly because it’s being held in a museum, I think it’s important the real world of paleontology is reflected. And people can go around the rest of Melbourne museum and see actual bones and real specimens. I’d like to think people leave realizing there’s quite a lot of dino-research going on and interesting, exciting discoveries being made that go beyond having large monsters roaring at you.”
The exhibition’s final room houses the most recent developments in dinosaur science, while the work of Jack Horner, the famed paleontologist who served as scientific consultant on the set of all the Jurassic films, is also reflected throughout the exhibition.
Philip says organisers would be “delighted beyond belief” should the exhibition receive the same enormous success of the film that spawned it.
“The huge difference of course is when you go and see a film, everything is neatly contained on a screen for you and you’re entirely safe sitting down and being quite passive. Whereas at this exhibition you’re strolling along beside these creatures, and they appear to be actual animals in front of your moving about.
“So it’s a whole other experience, and whether people embrace it to the same extent they have the film remains to be seen. I certainly hope they do, because I think it’s a very exciting change from what you’d usually see at a cinema or indeed in a museum.”
It’s not surprising Melbourne has been chosen to host the world premiere of the exhibition. Creature Technologies, which has also made the beasts that have featured in the arena shows of Walking with dinosaurs, King Kong and How to Train Your Dragon, was founded here in 2006, and Philip says the company has a long and rich history with Melbourne museum.
“Melbourne museum has a fabulous paleontology section, and there’s a lot of interesting dinosaur research that goes on there. And we have a close relationship with Melbourne museum, we made two animatronic dinosaurs for them about five years ago to tie in with discoveries at Dinosaur Cove (near Cape Otway on Victoria’s Great Ocean Road). Also our general manger was formerly exhibitions manager at Melbourne Museum.
“We do animatronics that go around the world, but being able to create something we can launch locally is good in terms of practicality, obviously. Also because it’s our local space, and we can see what people think of our work first-hand.”
So what explains our seemingly insatiable love of dinosaurs? They’re big, yes, and some of them have mighty roars and impressively sharp teeth and claws, but what is it about these long gone titans of our world that keeps us coming back fascinated again and again?
For Phil, who is working in his dream job having grown up making model dinosaurs out of plaster, bandages and wire, the answer is quite simple.
“There is something amazing in realizing these creatures actually existed once like we do today. When massive bones are found, you can’t help but wonder ‘how did that even stand up?’ And so it’s quite exciting trying to imagine that animal moving about, and knowing that it did, and did so successfully for 160 million years. I think that’s just intriguing.”
BY ALEXANDER DARLING
