Universal Studios Hollywood brings most successful motion picture of all time roaring to life with stunning ''Jurassic Park -- The Ride''.

UNIVERSAL CITY, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 26, 1996--You'll wish it were just a movie.

This summer, Universal Studios Hollywood will bring famed director Steven Spielberg's epic movie -- which created a worldwide phenomenon and became the top-grossing motion picture of all time -- roaring to life when it unleashes the greatest and most technically sophisticated attraction ever created, ``Jurassic Park -- The Ride.''

For the first time in history, man will finally come face to face with dinosaurs.

Studio guests will explore a real-life Jurassic Park, where they will encounter the most awesome, terrifying and lifelike dinosaurs ever created. These magnificent creatures will roam the Earth again in a sprawling tropical habitat in the heart of the famed studio lot.

This phenomenal interactive ride adventure will thrust guests into the living, breathing, three-dimensional world of Jurassic Park, a land where stormy skies are pierced by colossal five-story dinosaurs that move within inches of awestruck faces and a world where riders discover that they have become prey for the terrifying Tyrannosaurus Rex, as they are hunted by the most fearsome creature ever to prowl the Earth.

In Jurassic Park, guests will not only get a frighteningly close-up look at ``living'' dinosaurs, they'll also experience a treacherous 82-foot plunge, straight down the longest, fastest, steepest water descent ever built.

After they have explored the steaming, lush, tropical waterways that ebb and flow through the dense primordial forest, ``Jurassic Park -- The Ride'' transports visitors into an ominous, futuristic 13-story, labyrinthine edifice spanning six acres and serving as home for scientists seeking to clone the giants of the past.

``Jurassic Park -- The Ride'' has been in development by Universal Studios Hollywood since the beginning of this decade, three years before the debut of the ``Jurassic Park'' motion picture. Spielberg has served as a creative consultant since the ride's inception and has watched as his menacing on-screen stars have evolved into full-scale performers.

Ride producer Neil Engel said: ``Even if you know the film, you still won't be ready for the terror that stalks you in `Jurassic Park -- The Ride.' It's a staggering achievement against which all future interactive adventures must be measured.''

The newest Universal attraction combines the most state-of-the-art computer and robotic technology to create animatronic figures more advanced than any ever before designed. ``Jurassic Park -- The Ride'' fuses recently developed computer and robotic technology to create the most advanced animatronic figures ever designed.

For the first time, a ride will be truly interactive, with the dinosaur inhabitants of Jurassic Park actually noticing and responding to the visitors as they journey through the prehistoric past.

That transformation from the film's remarkable special effects to seemingly living, breathing giants was no simple task. According to Engel, the full-size, scientifically accurate dinosaurs are ``breathtaking to behold.''

``The Stegosaurs, Parasaurolophys, Dilophosaurs, Velociraptors and the other Jurassic Park dinosaurs move faster, more fluidly and more realistically than any animated creatures ever built,'' he said. ``Many of these dinosaurs will lunge at guests at speeds of up to 25 feet per second -- nearly the quickness of a striking venomous rattlesnake.''

Indeed, the Ultrasaur stands as tall as a high-rise building, and the Stegosaurus measures more than 50 feet from nose to tail. These animatronic figures and their companions are the first such creations ever crafted, incorporating newly discovered principles of hydraulic physics, mechanics and space-age robotics.

A distinguished team of scientists, paleontologists and aerospace engineers worked closely with Universal ride designers to achieve this triumph of technological wizardry.

Behind the celebrated and towering monolithic wooden gates emblazoned with the Jurassic Park crest awaits a world as it was before the birth of man.

An informative multimedia introduction on massive, high-definition video walls by host John Hammond, owner and creator of Jurassic Park (as in the film, portrayed by renowned actor/director Sir Richard Attenborough), explains the concept of the park, the world's largest living laboratory devoted to the study of dinosaurs.

It is here in Jurassic Park that scientists and geneticists clone the huge, prehistoric animals in a miracle of modern bioengineering.

Studio guests then board one-of-a-kind, free-floating river rafts, the largest water-ride craft ever designed -- thus enabling ``Jurassic Park -- The Ride'' to handle more guests than any other ride in the world.

Seating 25 ``explorers,'' the rafts navigate through misty fog banks, brilliantly colored foliage and exotic vegetation of Herbivore Country, home of the vegetarians of the dinosaur world.

Nearby, the feared predators, the swift Velociraptors and the ferocious T. Rex, are securely contained in Carnivore Canyon behind a crackling, spark-laden 10,000-volt electrified fence.

Underscored by Academy Award-winning composer John Williams' soaring ``Jurassic Park'' music and punctuated by narrator Richard Kiley's words of welcome, the boats gently cruise through radiant Ultrasaur Lagoon, picturesque with gentle waterfalls and clear tide pools. A fingertip away sits a gigantic 30-foot Ultrasaur cooling off at water's edge.

The craft is nudged by what seems to be a rock below the surface but is really a surprised baby Ultrasaur, who spies the riders with wide-eyed curiosity.

As the waterborne visitors glide out of the lagoon, two rambunctious Pasittasasaurs frolic nearby, splashing water across the boat's bow.

Erupting geysers spewing billowing flumes of white steam greet the boat's arrival into Stegosaur Pond. Both mother and baby Stegosaurs seem glad to have company. ``Tiny'' 6-foot dinosaurs called Compys shriek their greetings. Riding an increasingly swift current, the boat next moves into Hardrosaur Cove.

Suddenly, the waters begin racing at speeds of more than 40 miles per hour and the raft is driven dangerously off-course into Carnivore Canyon, where guests encounter the Velociraptor pen -- revealing a jagged, gaping hole in the pen's electrified fence.

The vicious Velociraptors are nowhere to be seen ... signs of danger surround studio guests as their raft veers out of control and deeper into unknown territory. A wrecked land cruiser dangles perilously from a nearby guard rail. An empty raft drifts by -- seemingly abandoned until a Spitter rears his multicolored crown and bares his teeth in a sinister smile.

Jurassic Park's water-pump station is bedlam. Blaring alarms sound as nearby catwalks begin to collapse and the station's pipes crack and give way, shooting scalding water in the path of the raft. A pack of clever and voracious Raptors spring forward to startle and pursue the runaway raft.

``That's as much as we can tell you,'' said Engel. ``From here to the end, the relentless final moments of `Jurassic Park -- The Ride' hold an unprecedented array of shocks, scares and surprises. We would love to keep the ride's conclusion secret until our guests experience it for themselves.''

What began as literary legend and then produced cinematic history has now become ... the ride of a lifetime.

CONTACT: Universal Studios Hollywood, Universal City

818/622-3855 (media information)

818/508-9600 (public information)