Warner Brothers Pictures and Legendary Pictures Pacific Rim
Starring: Charlie Hunnam, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day and Ron Perlman
Directed by. Guillermo del Toro
Run time: 2 hours 11 minutes
Rated: PG-13
Warner Brothers
Our Score: 4 out of 5 stars
Beginning in the present day and running through the year 2025, “Pacific Rim” delivers a futuristic lesson about coming together; not as a nation or as a race, but as humans joining together to keep Earth safe from destruction.
2013 brings the first attack. It comes from the bottoms of the sea as opposed to space, where we look for our aliens to come from. A monstrous being called Kaiju rises from the depths and wreaks havoc before it can be brought down with tanks and air support. Soon another one rises and again, with some effort, it is destroyed. The world realizes that protection will be needed and humanity develops a brand of robots called Jaegers that will be able to take on the 3,000 ton monsters. Each Jaeger is operated by 2 humans in a process called “drifting.” With two brains responsible for one wave length, every movement is perfected and synched in able to control something so big. Brothers, cousins, fathers and sons; all are used to drift as they will operate better together rather than two strangers. Over time the Kaiju develop and adapt, becoming stronger, larger and quicker. In time there are only four Jaeger teams left: retired pilot Raleigh Becket (Hunnam) and rookie up an coming pilot Mako Mori (Kikuchi), are among those called upon to rescue the world and block the intruders from the Kaiju’s world.
This is a film where the acting is secondary but, then again, this is an action movie with some underlying themes and not a movie looking to earn nominations for best actor or actress. I don’t think that is what director del Toro was trying to accomplish anyway. The story is great and it flows well. There were some predictable parts I had worked out before they happened, but the battle scenes and special effects ore than made up for that.
“Pacific Rim” is action packed and visually brilliant. I had the luxury of seeing this in IMAX and 3D and it is truly the only film that I have ever seen in 3D where I felt some scenes put me a little to close to the action for comfort. Director del Toro has a great reputation when making movies for American audiences and this one is no different. This easily could have been a film thrown together with loud noises, poor 3D and horrible special effects but del Toro delivers another success. If you plan to see this film I urge you to see it on the big screen