Jurassic Parkhas rightfully gone down in history as a cinematic milestone.Steven Spielberg’s adventure-thriller broke new ground withvisual effects technologyand crushedbox office recordsupon its debut, kicking off an iconic, highly lucrative multimedia franchise that remains beloved to this day. Whilethe human elements ofJurassic Parkwere certainly vital to its impact, the film’s true star power undeniably lies in its prehistoric counterparts, and much likethe fictional John Hammond, Spielberg and his collaborators spared no expense in bringing a horde of dinosaurs to life for the enjoyment of global audiences.
Aside from the seamless, jaw-dropping use of CGI andanimatronic technology,Jurassic Park’s formerly-extinct characters relied on innovative sound design to suspend viewers' disbelief. Leading the charge in recording, enhancing, and blending such sounds wasGary Rydstrom,a frequent Spielberg collaboratorand aural wizard who nabbed two Academy Awards for his work on the 1993 film. But as it turns out,many of these sounds were captured from a handful of earthly sources, some of which were often caught in compromising positionsandled Rydstrom to acknowledge, “If people knew where the sounds inJurassic Parkcame from, it’d be rated R!”
Many Animals Contributed to ‘Jurassic Park’s Dinosaur Sounds
With no way of knowing what dinosaursactuallysounded like, Gary Rydstrom and his fellow sound engineers had their work cut out for them. Turning to the animal kingdom for inspiration, they managed to amass a library of sounds that, individually, wouldn’t necessarily strike awe and fear into the hearts of viewers. When combined and altered, however, these living sources from the natural world soon became the stuff of cinematic legend.From a T-Rex to a Brachiosaurusanda Triceratops to Velociraptors, seemingly no prehistoric stone was left unturned.
As iconic as it is intimidating,Jurassic Park’s T-Rexowes a debt of gratitude to the growling of a Jack Russel Terrier, but the crucial component of the dominant dinosaur’s thunderous roar came courtesy of an unlikely source. “The key element of the T. rex roar is not a full-grown elephant but a baby elephant,” Rydstrom toldVulturein the previously cited source. Along with the Terrier, the sounds of the baby elephant were slowed to suggest a more powerful physical presence. Another recording that was slowed was that of a donkey, which stood in for the film’s Brachiosaurus. “There’s this pitch shift in donkey vocals, and if you slow them way down, you get almost a hooting, songlike quality,” said Rydstrom. As for when one of the towering herbivores sneezes all over Lex (Arianna Richards), audiences hear the blowhole of a whale paired with a fire hydrant.
Please, Hollywood, Let’s Close Jurassic Park for Good
Whatever wiped out the dinosaurs the first time around should consider a round two in Tinseltown.
To create vocals forJurassic Park’s sole Triceratops,recordings of cows were used, but the sound of the sickly dinosaur’s labored breathing also featured one of the film’s few sound effects partially generated by a human being. Rydstrom revealed that “there’s a lot of cow in there, but the key element of the breathing is mostly me breathing into a tube.” Regarding the menacing Dilophosaurus that brutally dispatches Dennis Nedry (Wayne Knight), sound designers combined the likes of a swan, a rattlesnake, and a hawk, creating stark contrast in the dinosaur’s initially benign behavior andsubsequent deadly attack. Through creative ingenuity and a host of wildlife, Rydstrom and his collaborators covered a variety of bases when assemblingJurassic Park’s creature-laden soundscape, butsome of the film’s most memorable sounds might as well have come from an X-rated Animal Planet documentary.
Some of ‘Jurassic Park’s Dinosaur Sounds Have Sexual Origins
If you harbor any doubts about Gary Rydstrom’s ability to think outside the box, let the following bits of movie magic trivia disabuse you of that notion.Relying on various animals to bringJurassic Park’s dinosaurs to life, as it turns out, presented some unique—and rather inappropriate—opportunities. Though arguably the most fearsome and sinister creatures in the film,the Velociraptors’ vocals were derived from recordings of horses, hissing geese, and tortoises, but within the reptilian component lies a dirty little secret. “It’s somewhat embarrassing, but when the raptors bark at each other to communicate, it’s a tortoise having sex,” Rydstrom toldVulture. “One of the key elements of the raptor screams was a boy dolphin in heat, so you can see pattern here.”
Rydstrom’s unexpected knack for catching animals in the midst of pent-up sexual urges wasn’t limited to tortoises. To vocalize the film’s sprinting flock of Gallimimus, he turned to horses, one of which proved to be rather horny. “I remember recording a female horse,” he said, “and the male horse came right by her and she squealed because she was in heat. And that’s the squeal the Gallimimuses make when they’re passing by, and the squeal one makes when it’s getting eaten by a T. rex.”
For his work onJurassic Park, Gary Rydstrom took home well-deservedAcademy Awards for Best Sound and Best Sound Effects Editing. Having lent his expertise to one of modern cinema’s most distinct and memorable auditory experiences, the 20-time Oscar nominee and seven-time winner’s contribution to his respective field is one for the ages, and a shining example of sound designers’ tendency to build soundscapes from unlikely sources. In hindsight, however, it’s unfortunate that Rydstrom neglected to thank his non-human collaborators inhis acceptance speechat the Academy Awards, especially those who went the extra mile for our aural entertainment.
