Chris Pratt's 'Jurassic World': On track for $1 billion box office record

In the original 1993 film “Jurassic Park,” Jeff Goldblum hysterically says that the car he’s in “must go faster” as they drive away from a T. Rex.

It would be hard for the newest “Jurassic” movie, “Jurassic World,” to gross money any faster. In its initial box office report for this weekend, the Hollywood Reporter wrote that the film was on track to hit $1 billion worldwide, and will hit $1 billion faster than any movie in history. Now Entertainment Weekly is reporting that the film has indeed hit $1 billion.

“World” topped the domestic box office again this past weekend, taking in more than $106 million domestically, according to EW. 

The new film is the fourth in the “Jurassic” franchise. The series debuted with the original 1993 film and was followed by “The Lost World” and “Jurassic Park III,” neither of which were as well received critically as the original movie. The plot centers around scientists who are able to recreate dinosaurs from prehistoric DNA. In the newest movie, a dinosaur theme park has been created for families to visit, but things go badly wrong when those behind the park decide to create a dangerous new creature.

This new movie didn’t receive a great critical reception – it currently holds a score of 59 out of 100 on the review aggregator website Metacritic and Monitor film critic Peter Rainer gave the movie a B- grade, writing, “in terms of its thrills and graphic design, it still looks like a low-to-mid-range Spielberg effort … [the] chemistry [of leads Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard], as inevitably they flee [dinosaur] Indominus and Co., is something of a fizzle, and the two boys [who are Howard’s character’s nephews] are never sharply enough defined to make us care if they get gobbled or not. And since we know they won’t be, the tension with these two is even slacker. But [director Colin] Trevorrow and his co-screenwriters (Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, and Derek Connolly) do bring some nice low-key touches to the thudfest, and action is satisfying, if not galvanizing.”

But despite the reviews, the promise of dinosaurs, action scenes, and the critics who called it a fun adventure, despite its faults, brought in moviegoers. 

According to the website Box Office Mojo, if “World” does reach $1 billion, as it seems destined to do, it will be in such company as director James Cameron’s films “Avatar” and “Titanic,” both movies about the Marvel superhero ensemble the “Avengers,” and the newest “Fast and the Furious” movie “Furious 7,” among others.