Pacific Rim

This film begins by giving us the back-story. Beginning in the year 2013, a breach has been created by an alien race in the Pacific Ocean. They use it as a portal. Monsters then began coming through it. They are huge and they are called Kaijus, which is Japanese for giant monster. They wreaked havoc on the world until all of the governments have come together to pool their resources. They began to make giant robots to fight them and called them Jaegers, which is German for hunter.

I have to say I was leery about this one, but was surprised by it in a good way. First and foremost, I have yet to see a bad movie by Guillermo del Toro. I think I haven’t is because of how deep he makes the story. I didn’t realize there was going to be as much back-story for the kaijus as there was. This isn’t just a giant monster vs. giant robot movie, but there is more to it, which I really liked.

For the acting, I was pleasantly surprised. The focus was clearly about the monsters and the robots, but what was coupled with it was good enough for me. The cast is solid though as well. Charlie Hunnam as Raleigh Becket has some surprising depth for what happens around him. Idris Elba is solid no matter what he is in it seems. I also thought that, Rinko Kikuchi, Clifton Collins Jr. and Ron Perlman were also were pretty good. Finally a shout-out to Charlie Day. He is a scientist who kind of loses his mind and I love his portrayal of this.

As I kind of touched on, the monsters and robots of this film actually look amazing. It is a CGI fest, which I think you have to come in expecting. I thought they looked really good though. It is pretty seamless and I didn’t have any issues with what was generated for the film at all.

Now part of the problem I had with this one is we get some fighting in the beginning, there is a big gap of the movie before we get more. The end of the movie has a good half hour of mostly fighting scenes, which was good. I think there needed to be a little more with filling in the story in the middle. Doesn’t ruin the movie, but drug it out a little bit. I just think this hurts the pacing a bit, but I understand why they did it.

I have this is an enjoyable movie. If you like the giant monster movies, I think this is a solid one to fall into that genre. The fight scenes are realistic, as is the look and movements of the kaijus and Jaegers. The acting isn’t going to blow you away, but it is good enough to go along with the action. The direction of del Toro and depth of the story really makes it worth a viewing. I think this is an above-average film.

My Rating: 7 out of 10