This millennium's stalk in the park stars Sam Neill reprising his role as Dr. Alan Grant a respected paleontologist who barely escaped with his life, and hat, the first time he tangled with live dinosaurs cloned from fossilized DNA. Dr. Grant has a theory that Raptors, short for Velociraptors, were both the smartest and fiercest creatures on earth (imagine if dragonflies were really flying dragons and you'll start to get the picture). Grant theorizes further that the Raptors would be the dominant species on Earth if they hadn't become extinct by still unknown causes. Maybe they had a change of heart and became Buddhists and died out because the other vegetarian dinosaurs had already eaten all the plant life. Who can say?

Tea Leoni as Amanda Kirby

Anyway, with his research money running out faster than a cupful of quarters in Las Vegas, Grant reluctantly agrees to guide the Kirbys (William H. Macy and Tea Leoni), a rich, thrill-seeking couple, on an aerial tour of Isla Sorna. For those not up on their Jurassic history, Sorna is within shrieking distance of Isla Nublar where Grant first encountered the renegade reengineered Raptors, T-rexes and assorted other giant scary creatures. Once the plane enters the airspace of Isla Sorna and, of course, crashes, Grant realizes the truth about what the Kirbys are really looking for, their son Eric (Trevor Morgan) who disappeared into the same island jungle eight weeks earlier while parasailing on vacation. See what happens when you don't go to a nice all-inclusive resort? Nothing but trouble. Stuck in a prehistoric nightmare, where it's strictly survival of the fiercest, Dr. Grant, his research partner (Alessandro Nivola), who talked him into going in the first place, and the Kirbys have to fight tooth, claw and nail every millimeter of the way. Rescuing Eric, and not becoming birdseed for some very nasty canaries in the process, turns out to be a race against time in a land that time forgot.

Well, if you liked the first two Jurassic field trips, there's no reason not to sign on for a third tour of duty. And even if mega-budget science-fiction fantasy doesn't usually get you hooked, you still might want to give it a look. I wasn't expecting much and now I can't stop typing late into the night about it. Might be time to switch to Sanka. Nevertheless, the special effects are astounding, the story carries you along despite little things like believability and it's over before all the thunderous footsteps and reptilian mayhem get to be overwhelming. It's a loud, fast, violent place, but for an hour and a half Jurassic Park III is the summer's most thrilling place to chill. At least until Planet of the Apes comes out, when we'll see what species really rules the planet.