Pacific Rim

New Release Review
Starring: Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day, Burn Gorman, and Ron Perlman
Director: Guillermo del Toro 

Pacific Rim is the story of kaiju (monsters) coming to Earth via a dimensional rift deep in the Pacific and attacking the nations bordering the ocean. The world then comes together against this common enemy and build the jaegers (robots) to counter the kaiju attack. This small background is explained in an effective prologue, narrated by the main character: kaiju pilot Raliegh Becket.

I have to give Pacific Rim a lot of credit for at least trying to have a plausible story and, unlike many of the giant-robots-saving-humanity movies, not feeling like the acting was a way to join together the fight scenes. There are a few characters who have personal challenges to face which brings a certain depth to the fighting because we know who they are and why they're fighting. I really enjoyed watching the characters of Raleigh and Mako grow together as co-pilots of the Gypsy Danger jaeger. Pilots link minds in order to jointly control the jaeger and in the process they share memories and in the process create a bond that is so strong they can anticipate each other's moves and become an exceptional fighting team.

I saw Pacific Rim in 3D and it was totally worth it. When you've got a movie like this which is all about spectacle why not go all the way? The kaiju are given a lot of screen time so we get a chance to really see what makes them all different and what special offensive powers each brings to the fight. The kaiju get progressively more threatening and more powerful filling the fights with...not tension, since we know that Americans don't lose...filling the fights with curiosity. The question "how will they get out of this one?" makes these scenes very entertaining, if not entirely believable from an engineering perspective. One of my co-workers was very annoyed at the way the jaegers walked through the waters of Hong Kong bay as though there was no resistance at all but really, if that's the part of the movie you have a problem with - not the giant monsters, nor the mind-melding technology, not even the deep-sea technology used to view the portal - then the movie can't be that bad.

Overall it's a brilliant show of monsters, robots, and martial arts on a massive scale. Throw in some fairly stereotypical characters from Australia, Russia, China, and United States, and you've got yourself an entertaining movie. Pacific Rim is worth seeing - if only for Ron Perlman and his fantastically over the top black market mobster Hannibal Chau.

P.S. There is an extra scene about half-way through the credits so don't leave right away :)



IMDB
Rotten Tomatoes