Disney's Forgotten 25-Year-Old Dinosaur Movie Deserves A Second Look
by Rafael Motamayor · /FilmThe turn of the millennium was a great time to be an animation fan, but a horrible time to be a studio executive. Indeed, the early 2000s saw the release of several huge animated movies that defied what a studio feature could look like yet failed to light the box office on fire, including Disney's fantastic Jules Verne-inspired steampunk adventure "Atlantis: The Lost Empire" (the rare animated movie that actually warrants a live-action remake) and its sci-fi "Treasure Island" re-telling "Treasure Planet" (which similarly rules). Meanwhile, Don Bluth made his own animated sci-fi epic with "Titan A.E.," a film that effectively bankrupted Fox Animation. However, it wasn't the only largely forgotten animated movie from that era that hailed from a now-shuttered studio yet retains a loyal following, as there was also Disney's under-appreciated prehistoric feature "Dinosaur."
Released in 2000, "Dinosaur" follows Aladar (D. B. Sweeney), an Iguanodon who's adopted and raised by a family of lemurs on a small island. After surviving a meteorite crash (yes, THAT meteorite crash), the group is forced to escape to the mainland and joins a large herd of dinosaurs migrating to safer grounds, pitting them against the herd's ruthless leader and dangerous carnotaurus.
"Dinosaur" has a fascinating and bizarre origin story. It began as an idea that VFX legend Phil Tippett and director Paul Verhoeven cooked up while working on "RoboCop" (not exactly a Disney movie). Tippett wanted to make a completely silent and decidedly adult film about the extinction of dinosaurs, complete with bloody dinosaur brawls, dinosaur sex, and more. Though then-Disney president Jeffrey Katzenberg initially approved the project, it quickly became a safe, family-friendly film featuring talking animals. Verhoeven and Tippett eventually stepped away, though it did inspire producer Kathleen Kennedy to recruit Tippett for a different dinosaur movie titled "Jurassic Park."
Disney's Dinosaur remains a special film
While the film didn't turn out as bold and innovative as Tippett wanted, there's still a lot to admire about "Dinosaur," especially its opening scene. If you were a kid circa 1999, chances are you either saw "Toy Story 2" in theaters and/or brought "Tarzan" on VHS in early 2000. In either case, you would've definitely caught the extended preview for "Dinosaur," which took the form of the movie's dialogue-free prologue (itself the closest thing we got to Tippett's original vision). The sequence follows a dinosaur egg that's separated from its family after a carnotaur attack and ends up being passed around and flown throughout a live-action prehistoric landscape accompanied by James Newton Howard's roaring score. It might only be five minutes long, but it's still one of the best dinosaur movies that isn't called "Jurassic Park" on its own.
One of the most interesting aspects of "Dinosaur" is that it combines animated characters with stunning live-action landscapes, including the Venezuelan tepuis (where the prologue was shot). Its blend of live-action backdrops and CGI dinosaurs still looks incredible today. Sure, the character designs and animation are dated, but the realistic textures and the way the characters interact with water looks way better than other CGI movies of the era. Much of the credit for that belongs to The Secret Lab, a now-defunct studio that then-Disney CEO Michael Eisner envisioned as a competitor for Pixar and the various legacy VFX studios. Besides "Dinosaur," it also worked on the incredibly underrated "Reign of Fire" and conducted early VFX tests for a proposed Tony Scott project that eventually became Ang Lee's "Gemini Man."
Though "Dinosaur" suffers heavily from having talking characters, it remains a fascinating and visually impressive film. You can stream it now on Disney+.