I just watched the movie. I give it either an 8 on 10. I was not going to see it, but then I was swayed by Analee Newitz' review at io9.com, I thought it would be some Godzilla vs Transformers flic. I watched it, it was a lot more like Neon Genesis Evangelion meet Independence Day, which is fine.
Below: A lot of spoilers.
What I liked most about the film, and the reason you should all watch it, is that these are simply the best monster fights I've ever seen. I know, I know, we all like plot, character, etc... but we also like monster fights. These are simply the best, even better than the T-rex vs King Kong fight from King Kong. There's a lot of originality to them, a lot of pacing, unexpected turns, and a lot of diversity. The musical score is really good and really matches the fight scenes.
The plot is relatively original. At its core, we're seeing Neon Genesis Evangelion in plot, though not the same in terms of themes. We do have human robots built as a response to giant alien organic beings, and we have neural networks between human beings and the giant robots, which requires a special skill, and human society commandeers a lot of resources to building these robots. That's where the similarity ends, I think. The themes, and the world building, are less interesting in Pacific Rim, which is acceptable because matching Neongenesis Evangelion is a tall order that should not be demanded.
What Pacific Rim does right in terms of world building is the gravity of the threat is well-portrayed (I think) -- it's obvious that a lot of resources are commandeered to fighting the invasion. It brings the countries of the world together, and they feel the pinch of all these resources. It's nice to see some of the consequences on display. We hear about the effects of the neural networks on people, and we see that there's a subculture. There are also no obvious plot holes in the movie, the sequences of events seem to move forward in a coherent manner. The threat is legitimate, it's here in a semi-plausible way, the response makes sense, as does how the attacks and counterattacks happen.
Where it fails is in terms of characterisation. A lot of moments are simply too cliche, and thus pulled me out of the movie. The two scientists are caricatures: we have one biology specialist and one physics specialist. Both are poorly-groomed 5'6" dweebs with poor social skills. Neither of these two characters have any staff to help them out. We see them work things out on a giant blackboard but not on a computer, an appeal to outdated cliches. One of them later accesses the neural network technology without any prior training or assistance -- by stealing it. I have to give the movie props though: A lot of Hollywood films or productions have a single expert for both biology and physics. Here, they recognise the need for two experts, it's a step in the right direction.
]All of the military people are in the range of 6'1" - 6'4" except for one female, in spite of the fact that neural networks is a special skill that shouldn't select for being on the high school basketball team. They get into brawls with each other, to let us know they're tough. Every character in this movie is an archetype.
A huge number of characters have British accents. This is a cheap trick Hollywood uses to make us feel like we are on some great adventure far away -- they use British accents. It doesn't work on me anymore, I just notice the trick, and that Hollywood has a comparable concentration of british accents to the UK.
When Idris Elba's character is about to go an important mission, he gives "the speech". This is where a large crowd surrounds an alpha male as he gives a monologue about the stakes being high, about how we need heroism, and about how we're going to win. When he's done, people cheer and clap, kind of like after the president speaks in "Independence Day".
On gender and race, an important issue to me, performance is mediocre. The one female character of note turns into a love interest for the primary male character. She is the only female characters with lines and a name. She is also asian, and she makes stereotypical remarks against creativity and risk-taking to the white, male, American character. At least she has a productive arc ...
For the one Black character, I'm satisfied. He is put in a position of authority, and respected rather than undermined/humiliated like in other Hollywood films like Contagion. He has a positive, productive, arc.
All in all:
10/10 for monster fights, the score, the special effects
9/10 for world building, plot
4/10 for characters and dialogue
Below: A lot of spoilers.
What I liked most about the film, and the reason you should all watch it, is that these are simply the best monster fights I've ever seen. I know, I know, we all like plot, character, etc... but we also like monster fights. These are simply the best, even better than the T-rex vs King Kong fight from King Kong. There's a lot of originality to them, a lot of pacing, unexpected turns, and a lot of diversity. The musical score is really good and really matches the fight scenes.
The plot is relatively original. At its core, we're seeing Neon Genesis Evangelion in plot, though not the same in terms of themes. We do have human robots built as a response to giant alien organic beings, and we have neural networks between human beings and the giant robots, which requires a special skill, and human society commandeers a lot of resources to building these robots. That's where the similarity ends, I think. The themes, and the world building, are less interesting in Pacific Rim, which is acceptable because matching Neongenesis Evangelion is a tall order that should not be demanded.
What Pacific Rim does right in terms of world building is the gravity of the threat is well-portrayed (I think) -- it's obvious that a lot of resources are commandeered to fighting the invasion. It brings the countries of the world together, and they feel the pinch of all these resources. It's nice to see some of the consequences on display. We hear about the effects of the neural networks on people, and we see that there's a subculture. There are also no obvious plot holes in the movie, the sequences of events seem to move forward in a coherent manner. The threat is legitimate, it's here in a semi-plausible way, the response makes sense, as does how the attacks and counterattacks happen.
Where it fails is in terms of characterisation. A lot of moments are simply too cliche, and thus pulled me out of the movie. The two scientists are caricatures: we have one biology specialist and one physics specialist. Both are poorly-groomed 5'6" dweebs with poor social skills. Neither of these two characters have any staff to help them out. We see them work things out on a giant blackboard but not on a computer, an appeal to outdated cliches. One of them later accesses the neural network technology without any prior training or assistance -- by stealing it. I have to give the movie props though: A lot of Hollywood films or productions have a single expert for both biology and physics. Here, they recognise the need for two experts, it's a step in the right direction.
]All of the military people are in the range of 6'1" - 6'4" except for one female, in spite of the fact that neural networks is a special skill that shouldn't select for being on the high school basketball team. They get into brawls with each other, to let us know they're tough. Every character in this movie is an archetype.
A huge number of characters have British accents. This is a cheap trick Hollywood uses to make us feel like we are on some great adventure far away -- they use British accents. It doesn't work on me anymore, I just notice the trick, and that Hollywood has a comparable concentration of british accents to the UK.
When Idris Elba's character is about to go an important mission, he gives "the speech". This is where a large crowd surrounds an alpha male as he gives a monologue about the stakes being high, about how we need heroism, and about how we're going to win. When he's done, people cheer and clap, kind of like after the president speaks in "Independence Day".
On gender and race, an important issue to me, performance is mediocre. The one female character of note turns into a love interest for the primary male character. She is the only female characters with lines and a name. She is also asian, and she makes stereotypical remarks against creativity and risk-taking to the white, male, American character. At least she has a productive arc ...
For the one Black character, I'm satisfied. He is put in a position of authority, and respected rather than undermined/humiliated like in other Hollywood films like Contagion. He has a positive, productive, arc.
All in all:
10/10 for monster fights, the score, the special effects
9/10 for world building, plot
4/10 for characters and dialogue
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