Pacific Rim (2013) (1 Viewer)

[Vic Pardo]

Those of us who have a history of digging giant monsters and giant robots will be in seventh heaven. Those who are expecting a Paul Thomas Anderson film will no doubt be disappointed.

 

[TravisR]

Those of us who have a history of digging giant monsters and giant robots will be in seventh heaven.

I'm not a big fan of that kind of thing but I do like a good action movie and I think Del Toro is going to deliver that.

 

[Tino]

Got my IMAX tickets for 10 am Friday. Hope it doesn't disappoint.

 

[David_Rivshin]

I so want this to be good. Too often I'll see a trailer or preview of an upcoming film and thing "that could be really cool if it's done right", only to have it turn out to, shall we say, not be done right. If this was a Bay film I would not have my hopes up, but given del Toro's track record my hopes are pretty high.

I usually just wait for films to be out on Blu-Ray, only going to a theater for those rare movies which are both very good, and demand the IMAX treatment. So I'll be eagerly awaiting the reviews from HTFers to see whether this will be one of those rare times. Of course even in that case I'll need to decide whether to break my rule about avoiding post-converted 3D (the local IMAX will only do 3D showings), so any comments on that aspect would be great too.

Del Toro, you haven't let me down before, don't start now!

-- Dave

 

[dpippel]

The reviews so far are pretty positive, with some of them almost glowing. Pacific Rim is currently sitting at 75% on the TomatoMeter. Looking forward to it.

 

[Chris Will]

Looks like it is down to 71% now. I still don't know what to make of this movie, I like the director but the trailers haven't done anything for me.

 

[dpippel]

I'm pretty confident that if there's a director out there who can elevate a film of this genre above cliche and repetition it's Del Toro, and I'm willing to roll my $15 worth of dice to find out.

 

[Tino]

The one shot in the trailer that has bothered me since I saw it is when one of the robot is dragging a ship and uses it like a baseball bat. I'm no engineer but there's no way that ship can withstand the stress of being used like that. But then again we are talking about a film with giant monsters and robots so..........

 

[RobertR]

The one shot in the trailer that has bothered me since I saw it is when one of the robot is dragging a ship and uses it like a baseball bat. I'm no engineer but there's no way that ship can withstand the stress of being used like that.But then again we are talking about a film with giant monsters and robots so..........

Of course the physics are silly, but that's never stopped Hollywood.

http://movieline.com/2013/01/09/pacific-rim-vs-real-world-physics-giant-robots-guillermo-del-toro/

 

[Patrick Sun]

"Pacific Rim" delivers on the promise of big-time cinematic monsters vs. robots action, though I wished they'd actually show some fight scenes where it wasn't raining and/or at night time. The acting was average, the plot was serviceable for such a genre film, though it did feel like a hodge-podge of other films, and then you throw in the robots/monsters to keep the film going.

It's worth seeing on the big screen if you like this sort of film.

I give it 2.75 stars, or a grade of B-.

 

[Robert Crawford]

"Pacific Rim" delivers on the promise of big-time cinematic monsters vs. robots action, though I wished they'd actually show some fight scenes where it wasn't raining and/or at night time. The acting was average, the plot was serviceable for such a genre film, though it did feel like a hodge-podge of other films, and then you throw in the robots/monsters to keep the film going.

It's worth seeing on the big screen if you like this sort of film.

I give it 2.75 stars, or a grade of B-.

Thanks Patrick, your film grade is good enough for me to take a chance because I didn't want to waste my money if the film was a disaster. Is this a 3-D production?

 

[Chuck Mayer]

It is a post-conversion, but a decent one.The film is structured like a war movie made during the war being shown. Straightforward, earnest, direct, even a little old-fashioned. The human parts are serviceable and occasionally pretty good. But this is a genre film, so it is not much deeper than the previews would lead you to expect. There are some nice people moments, but nothing that will blow you away. Idris Elba is eminently watchable, though.However, the visual density in this film is incredible. The direction is excellent and it absolutely comes alive during the battles. Alive in a very, very big way. It almost gets overwhelming in a way, but del Toro paces it meticulously and shrewdly. These sequences bring a tremendous amount of energy and physical beauty.All in all, a great summer movie, and a good movie outside of that context. See it on the biggest screen you can find.

 

[Patrick Sun]

I will say that, to me, some of the early action scenes can feel a little too "crowded", I wasn't getting enough "wide" shots to establish how the monsters and robots (called jaegers) were positioned in relation to one another.

 

[Rhett_Y]

I liked it, great no, good yes. The two doctors really got on my nerves though. The special effects are really good!!! The monsters are pretty cool looking and the giant robots are cool!

I also didn't like the russians. As soon as I saw them I immediatly thought of RobotJox. Hahaha. Yeah to me it was that bad.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Not a bad sequel to "Cloverfield". haha.

Is it bad that I think that the little girl in the film gave the best acting performance in the whole film.

 

[Tino]

I was disappointed. I didn't hate it but thought it was pretty much a big mess. Reminded me too much of Godzilla and the Transformer films. All the action scenes were either in the dark and rain or underwater. We're they attempting to hide bad cgi? I don't think so so IMO it was a bad decision to film the action scenes that way. Also the performances were hit and miss. Loved Idris Elba, who is pretty much great in everything. The lead was ok but kept confusing him with the other guys son. We're they the same actor?? Didn't like the actress who played Mako. Her performance was not up to par. She was the weakest in the film. And all the scenes with Ron Perlman were distracting and seemed to be in the film simply because he is a Del Toro regular. And I agree with Patrick above that the best performance cam from the little girl. Seriously. The story was ok but nothing that original IMO. In the end I was entertained but expected so much more from Guillermo. The 3D was great tho.

 

[Michael Elliott]

Well, this was a throwback to those Godzilla films so I expected a lot of Godzilla moments. I thought the film was a real fun blast to the past and I think this is going to appeal to monster fans a lot more than your typical mainstream viewer. In fact, the packed theater I saw featured quite a few people getting up and walking out (but coming back) and what was so shocking is that they were doing it DURING the action scenes and not during the quieter moments.

Either way, I thought the film was a lot of fun and unlike so many good movies of today, it featured some real imagination. Was the story original? No but you really can't be original in regards to story anymore in a film like this. Plus it's sea monsters vs. robots so why expect story? The performances were fun enough for this type of film and I wondered why a "star" wasn't used but if one had it probably would have taken away from the real stars who were the monsters and the robots.

I typically hate CGI because so many directors don't know how to use it but del Toro clearly isn't one of them. I thought the effects were excellent all around and they really created a "real" world for you to see all of this destruction in. As for filming them in the dark, I really didn't think it was as bad as some early (fan) reviews made it seem. It seems pretty clear that the director loves the darkness so it seems pretty obvious that he'd shoot the scenes as night.

The only real negative is that "B" movies should run 131-minutes. A good ten or fifteen minutes off the running time would have helped things.

Still, *** 1/2 from me.

 

[Michael Elliott]

It's worth seeing on the big screen if you like this sort of film.

I always laugh when I heard some people try to say Blu, a home theater or other formats are the "way" to see movies. I got to see this today on the largest screen that this theater had and it was rather amazing seeing all of this destruction in such a "big" way. This is certainly the type of movie that one has to see on the big screen and I really don't care what the upcoming Blu looks like or how much time and energy went into someone's home theater. It's not going to compare to seeing these monsters on a large screen.

 

[Tino]

I would give the film ** 1/2 stars out of four. And I thought the other two "disaster" films of the summer were better..Star Trek and Man Of Steel. Btw, I agree with seeing this on the biggest screen available. Saw it in IMAX 3D and thought the presentation was awesome.

 

[Bryan Tuck]

I enjoyed this movie immensely. It's completely preposterous in all the right ways, and remarkably uncynical about it. The plot is an amalgam of Top Gun, Independence Day, and several other things, but that really didn't bother me.

It's actually refreshing how uncluttered the plot is. It doesn't waste time with unnecessary mythology or surprise "twists." It gives us a little info about the characters as it goes and then gets down to business. There's a bit of VO exposition at the beginning, which often gets on my nerves, but it gets through it pretty quickly. The two scientists were also kind of annoying at first, but they won me over in the end.

The Transformers films always seemed to know they were silly, but I don't think they ever understood how dumb they were. Pacific Rim understands exactly how dumb it is, which ironically makes it a more smartly-made film. And the action sequences are coherent and intelligible; you can actually tell what's happening most of the time.

I'm sure it won't be for everyone, but I loved it.