Grade: C+

Verdict: Partly campy, mostly straight-ahead horrific and nearly always watchable.

Details: Starring Sam Neill, Tea Leoni, William H. Macy and Trevor Morgan. Directed by Joe Johnston. Rated PG-13 for intense sci-fi terror and violence. One hour, 32 minutes.

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Review: In the first two “Jurassic Park” films, Jeff Goldblum was dead-on with his constant babble about a certain theory. If this dino film franchise is lumbering toward anything, it is chaos.

“Jurassic Park III” is one weird, watchable flick. It heaps on ferocious dino attacks, hungrily chomps on its actors-as-appetizers and, without even blinking, plops right into your face a Raptor that talks. In English.

Granted, that last bit of wacko is a mere blip in a dream as a snoozing Dr. Grant (Sam Neill from “Jurassic Park” numero uno) and others are en route to the land of the dinos. But it is this film's position that those ever-hunting, ever-vicious Raptors could communicate with each other. As Dr. Grant himself postulates, Raptors were “smarter than dolphins, smarter than whales, smarter than primates.”

The Raptors in “III” honk and bray in their own gutteral click-and-sound language. Usually, it's not really clear what they're saying to each other. One must presume it's an argument over who gets the wishbone. But it's an oddity in a film overloaded with the bizarre.

There were reportedly several scripts being tossed about during the making of this movie. It shows.

It's never real clear what “Jurassic Park III” is trying to be. Sometimes it's an homage to the first flick (the notes of John Williams' original music twitter here and there). It can feel like it's headed toward Japanese-style “Godzilla” camp (how else to explain that dream Raptor). But mostly it is a near Freddie Krueger horror flick full of nasty dino toenails and teeth trying to rip and tear at human flesh.

Our stars — and the requisite lunchmeat supporting cast — end up on the dino isle (the second one from “The Lost World: Jurassic Park,” not the first one from “Jurassic Park”) to locate a 14-year-old kid named Eric (Trevor Morgan of “The Patriot”), trapped there for eight weeks after a Dino-Soar parasailing excursion went haywire. Convenient, huh?

And it just so happens that the instigators of the hunt are Eric's d-i-v-o-r-c-e-d parents (William H. Macy and Tea Leoni).

In any event, everybody lands and the carnage begins. Unlucky people get munched and crunched.

Similar to Ray Harryhausen's remarkable “The 7th Voyage of Sinbad,” a character is snatched by a flying behemoth and plopped at a nest to be food for large baby Pteranodons.

Parents should take note: there's not a whole lot of blood and ripped-off body parts in this film but there are extra doses of viciousness. The intensity level at times exceeds both “Jurassic Park” and “Lost World.”

The film also introduces a new dinosaur — the two-ton, long-snouted Spinosaurus. He sure is one ugly cus. And a persistent stalker.

Is there a message in all this?

Well, maybe for divorced parents. After all, young Eric tells Dr. Grant being stuck on the island with all the dinos isn't really so bad. For him, it's better than the chaos back at home.

— Bob Longino, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution