The film begins, showing a mother Iguanodon watching over her nest. A young dinosaur wanders up and looks into the nest, but the mother shoos it away. The young reptile follows a small, winged lizard into the forest, only to come upon a large Carnotaurus. The Carnotaurus chases him out of the forest, and soon the whole herd of dinosaurs is on the run. The Carnotaur tramples most of the Iguanodon's eggs, but one survives.
The surviving egg is stolen from its nest by an Oviraptor; the Oviraptor fights with its mate over the egg, which falls into a river; a Koolasuchus tries and fails to eat it; Talarurus are distracted by its passing; Pachyrhinosaurus nearly trample on it; a Pteranodon takes it over the ocean, and loses it in a struggle with two Ichthyornis. It lands on Lemur Island, an island inhabited by lemurs. The baby Iguanodon Aladar soon emerges from the egg, to the fear of some and the delight of others among the tiny mammals. The lemurs are initially cautious about the dinosaur, but they nonetheless take him in and raise him.
Not long after Aladar has grown up, disaster strikes. A tremendous meteorite falls from the sky, landing in the ocean. The resulting fiery shockwave destroys Lemur Island, but Aladar and his adopted family are able to escape.
They soon are attacked by a pack of Velociraptor, but are rescued when a herd of dinosaurs crosses their path, scaring the predators off. The herd is heading for their traditional breeding grounds, believed to have been spared from the meteoroid's blast. Kron, the leader of the herd is a merciless Iguanodon with a strong belief in the survival of the fittest. He leads the herd at a strong pace, showing no mercy for the weaker dinosaurs. This causes strong tension between him and Aladar, which is only complicated by Aladar's attraction to Neera, Kron's sister. She is the first female of his kind he has ever seen.
While the herd travels, they discover that they are being pursued by two large predatorial dinosaurs called Carnotaurus. Aladar, the lemurs and several weaker dinosaurs (a Brachiosaurus, a Styracosaurus and her "pet" Ankylosaurus) get left behind as the herd picks up its pace. The group struggles with several hardships, but eventually finds its own way to the breeding grounds through a cave. Once there, they see that the original route to the breeding grounds has been blocked by a landslide, leaving the herd without a way in. Aladar leaves to tell Kron of the alternate route.
Aladar discovers that the herd is following the leader, Kron, in a perilous attempt to scale the wall into the breeding grounds. Aladar tells them of his discovery, but Kron won't listen. A Carnotaurus corners the herd. The hungry carnivore is discouraged from a meal by the combined efforts of the group (lead by Aladar), but then spots Kron climbing the wall, and follows him up. Neera and Aladar follow to save Kron. The resulting battle kills both the Carnotaurus and Kron, but Aladar and Neera survive, and usher the herd through the cave into the nesting grounds. The movie ends with one of Neera and Aladar's eggs hatching, showing the dinosaurs' peaceful life in the valley.
As the film closes, Plio's voice can be heard above the jubilant bellows of nesting mothers, saying
"None of us really know what changes, big or small, lie ahead. One thing is certain; our journey is not over. We can only hope that, in some small way, our time here will be remembered".
This seems to be a comment on the idea that, while dinosaurs are extinct, they will never be forgotten.
Iguanodon, like Aladar and Neera, did not have lips, but hard beaks. The artists found it difficult to create speaking Dinosaurs with beaks, so they added lips. The beaks act as pseudo teeth in the resulting characters.
The film was originally intended to have no dialogue at all, in part to differentiate the film from The Land Before Time, with which Dinosaur shares many plot similarities. Michael Eisner, however, insisted that the movie have dialogue in order to make it more "commercially viable." Coincidentally, a similar change was early in the production of The Land Before Time, which was originally intended to feature only the voice of a narrator.
It was the most expensive movie of 2000, costing $130 million (although unofficial estimates put it around $200 million).
The Countdown to Extinction attraction at the Disney's Animal Kingdom theme park was re-named and re-themed to the movie, and is now known as DINOSAUR. The storyline was always intended to tie in with the movie, considering the usage of a Carnotaur as the ride's antagonist and Aladar is the iguanadon that guests rescued from the meteor shower and take him back into the present, seen wandering the Dino Institute in Security Camera footage seen on monitors in the attraction's unloading area.
Pop singer/songwriter, Kate Bush reportedly wrote and recorded a song for the film but due to complications the track was ultimately not included on the soundtrack. According to HomeGround, a Kate Bush fanzine, it was scrapped when Disney asked Bush to rewrite the song and Bush refused; however, according to Disney, the song was cut from the film when preview audiences did not respond well to the track.
Animals featured
Iguanodon (Aladar, Neera, Bruton, and Kron. Medium-sized ornithopods with a quadrupedal stance and spikes on the inside of their "hands.")
Lemurs did not exist in the Late Cretaceous period. They were added for entertainment's sake, as the filmmakers claimed that the true mammals of the era were "hideous".
Longisquama and Brachiosaurus did not exist alongside the other animals in the film. In fact, many of the animals were taken from different locations and time periods and mixed around. Velociraptor was from Mongolia, however north america and asia were conected at the time (so a pack of raptors might have migrated), iguanodons lived all over the world and it mentions that carnotaurus "Have never gone this far north before" (Carnotaurus lived in South America).
There is strong evidence to suggest that both Oviraptor and Velociraptor had plumage. In fact, the initial designs depicted the Velociraptor as plumed animals. However, due to time, technological, and budget restrictions, they ended up featherless.
Iguanodon had beaks, rather than lips.
Carnotaurus was not as large as the film depicted it. It was resized for entertainment's sake. In fact, it was smaller than Iguanodon. In the day when the film was made, however, there were reports of findings of a larger Carnotaurus.
Talalurus most likely would not sleep on their backs, for doing this would expose their armor-less bellies (as well as cause them discomfort by being propped on their spiky, dorsal protrusions, or cause them to become stuck and unable to move.)
Iguanodons supposedly used their spiked thumbs to fight off predators more often than tail-whipping and head-butting. Kron uses his thumb-spike once, but the creators most likely found it to be too violent to use frequently.
Longisquama could not fly as it did in the film.
Meganeura was bigger than in the film, and did not live at that time.
Rating
This film was rated PG by the MPAA for intense images.
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