Pacific Rim: quality film plus an old soul with monsters & robots

Pacific Rim is a movie that I didn’t want to like.  “Hurry up and make HellBoy 3 Gulliermo Del Toro, why are you messing around with Pacific Rim?”, my inner fanboy said a couple years ago.  Now that I’ve seen Pacific Rim I’m eating my words to an extent because it is great fun, still has aspects of what makes all of Del Toro’s movies great, except with a much bigger budget.

Imagine a movie that has aspects of Blade Runner, Independence Day, Godzilla, Top Gun and Star Wars.  A mish mash of all that shouldn’t work in theory, but in the case of Pacific Rim, it does.  Pacific Rim takes traces of those movies, weaves them into a giant cape, wraps itself in it and manages to be something original, fresh and great-for what it is.

It’s a movie about alien monsters from another world coming to Earth from a wormhole at the bottom of the ocean.  Humans have built these monster machines that can battle the monsters.  At first the human made monsters are pushing the monster back into the wormhole, but they are evolving and making a comeback.

And THAT is where the movie starts.  Remember how Lethal Weapon 2 started from the first moment with a car chase?  That is how Pacific Rim starts-in the middle of action.  The action sequences are very large, spaced out and loud.

Once the plot gets going it does have familiar elements, the washed up pilot, grizzled commander, eccentric shady dealers and so forth.  However, fans of Del Toro will recognize the detail and dare I say, love-that goes into all of his shots.  The bar scene in Star Wars.  The fairy market scene in HellBoy 2.  They both had elements that made you examine each frame, just to see the details, rust on the bolts, steam punk bicycles in a future that should have technology far beyond them and so on.

As big and expensive as Pacific Rim is, the movie was obviously crafted with care, an amazing eye for detail, creativity and wonder.  This is the kind of movie that young boys 8 years old and up will see over and over.  Could younger children see it?  In our showing there was a 7 year old girl, I didn’t see her reaction and it all depends on the youth.  But be warned the movie is very loud and has long sequences of robot to monster combat.

There isn’t any foul language that I could remember or any singular act of violence that would make young ones squirm.  However, the fight sequences are long, loud and violent, but they’re robots and monsters.

Pacific Rim is a grand, large scale movie that all but serves you popcorn when you sit down.  It’s a fun, incredible detailed film and so well made that it’s just out of the league of ‘popcorn’ movies.   It also makes you realize how lame the Transformers movies are.  If you listen closely you can hear Godzilla and the upcoming sequel to Transformers shaking in their metal suits.  The ladies will also like Pacific Rim for Charlie Hunnam, who appears shirtless multiple times.