Some people like it when you are able to boil down your opinion of something into a neat little easy-to-understand rating. This works great for cars, cleaning products, and cell phones, but when it comes to judging works of art, to me it means very little. Opinions on art is primarily based on the emotional reaction of the viewer/listener. Emotional states fluctuate due to any number of factors: health, the perspective of age, time of day, your surroundings, the people you're with, general mood, significant life events, etc., so while boiling it all down into a static rating may seem practical, it's actually kind of dishonest and lazy.
Nonetheless people love bite-sized categorization, which is why I have Professor Shifty's Movie Grades over to the left. Eagle-eyed readers may have noticed that, occasionally, the grades will change. This happens when I see a movie a second time and my opinion has altered. They can go up, they can go down. Here are a couple of recent examples. My opinion of "Star Trek: Into Darkness" was remarkably lower the second time around. "Man of Steel" was pretty much the exact same experience when I saw it again. Which brings us to "Pacific Rim", a movie which I've seen twice. I love it now, but the first time I saw it I was disappointed.
Let me clarify: I wasn't disappointed because I thought it was bad. I was disappointed in the same way that a parent is disappointed in a good, intelligent kid who deliberately does something stupid - you still love them, but your opinion has been temporarily marred. The second time I saw this, the good shit came into sharper focus and the bad shit faded into the background. What bad shit, you ask? Well, here you have a movie which is the cinematic equivalent of a breath of fresh air - it's not a remake, sequel, or adaptation - yet the filmmakers chose to run with some hoary, timeworn cliches which could have benefitted from some witty finagling. Honestly, it's a bit nitpicky, but it bugs me a little.
The Pros:
- Guillermo Del Toro. He can do horror ('"Cronos", "The Devil's Backbone", "Mimic"), he can do fantasy ("Pan's Labyrinth"), he can do Comic Book ("Blade II", the "Hellboy" movies) and now he's proven that he can do Anime. "Pacific Rim" looks and sounds spectacular. And it's distinctively Del Toro, from the look and feel, to the economic storytelling, to his emphasis on story emerging from character relationships, to his usual obsession with recurring visual motifs (heads and shoes baby, heads and shoes), to the color-coded lighting schemes, it's unmistakable and very, very welcome. This movie is clearly a labor of love for Del Toro. It wears its heart on its robot sleeve and the audience feels it.
- Industrial Light and Magic. This is their best work in years. Lately they've been getting their CG asses handed to them by the likes of WETA Digital and Digital Domain, among others, but it's nice to see them recover from such disastrous effects craptaculars like "Battleship" and "Transformers" to reclaim the throne. Sumptuous may seem like a strange word to use when describing special effects, but the attention to detail is amazing. It's remarkable how many interesting new details I noticed in the effects work the second time around.
- World Building. This is the start of a new cinematic mythos, and frankly I would like to see more of it. There's a great setup for a new sci-fi universe here, one which never felt over-explained or preachy to me. The whole notion of using giant mechs to fight off an invasion of giant monsters is rather silly, but it's set up and conveyed convincingly enough for me to buy it (like "The Matrix"). Plus, it's just plain cooler than killing off the monsters with some kind of designer disease or something. Maybe that will be a future subplot. Plus - there are many subtle ideas sprinkled around which I'd like to see explored in the future (ex: the pregnancy, why the Kaiju went after little Mako, Kaiju pilots, etc). Plus Plus - the idea of needing two mentally and emotionally compatible pilots to drive the Jaegers (via mind meld) is a fascinating idea. Making the fight scenes rely on the compatibility of the characters gives the movie a personal, humanistic edge which helps invest the audience in all the comic bookish shenanigans.
- Memorable Names. I love these character names! Raleigh Becket. Stacker Pentecost. Hannibal Chau. Mako Mori (my favorite character). Hercules Hansen. And the Jaegers (the mechs) have great names, too! Gipsy Danger. Striker Eureka. My favorite is Crimson Typhoon. The Kaiju (monster) names remind me of "Pokemon". Knifehead. Leatherback. Otachi. This movie has thick layers of texture.
- The 1980s. I was taken aback by the style of this movie at first until I realized that this was intentional. In terms of the acting style, the dialogue and the general feel of the movie, it's Del Toro's tribute to sci-fi of the '80s. Del Toro himself has said that this is his tribute to"Star Wars". It eschews modern-style cinema (internalized emoting, blunt cynicism, cinema verite camerawork) in exchange for classic '80s earnestness. The unimaginative would call it 'cheesy'. I call it a return to the good old days. Even the score is retro - simple and catchy and rock-n-roll. Perfect for "Pacific Rim".
- Rock 'em Sock'em Jaegers. The action scenes are perfectly executed. The Jaegers, unlike the Transformers, have a real weight to their movements, and I was never confused or lost track of what was happening during the fight scenes. Plus, they never overstay their welcome. This movie flies by fast. Despite the fact that it's establishing a new cinematic universe to play around in, the movie never feels bloated. I wanted more.
- IMAX 3D. Perfect. This is the best movie I've seen in that format in, well, ever. It's really well done. I would like to see this in 2D, just to compare, but I don't want to miss another chance for an IMAX showing. Once it's gone, it's gone. Unless the movie gets rereleased in the future.
- Cast of Unknowns. Like "Star Wars", Del Toro purposely avoided casting any big stars, and it paid off. Some of these characters are cliches, but I dig 'em all the same. Idris Elba is fantastic in everything, even when he's in crap like "Prometheus". Charlie Hunnam is reasonably engaging as the main character. He's a bit too 'whitebread', but I like that he's a kind of damaged Luke Skywalker. Rinko Kinkuchi is my favorite character in the movie, Mako Mori. Her line delivery isn't the best (this is her first English-speaking role), but line delivery is only one facet of what makes a good character. She's the 'Neo' of the movie. The scientist characters (Charlie Day and Burn Gorman) are borderline annoying, but they never crossed that line for me. They made me laugh a couple of times (like the scene with the toilet in the ruins). And, this being a Del Toro movie, Ron Perlman shows up to be awesome, as always.
The Cons:
- "Pacific Rim." Crappy title. Tells you nothing of the movie.
- Climactic Fizzle. Like 95% of genre movies these days, the best action sequence in the film (the battle for Hong Kong) is not the climactic sequence. The climax is still good, just not as good.
- Rain and Darkness. Most of the action scenes take place at night, in the rain. Or in the ocean, but that's fine because the Jaegers are meant to intercept the Kaiju before they make landfall, so it's a mythology thing. I would just like more daytime, nice-weather battles.
- Avoidable Cliches. The 'aliens' who are sending giant monsters through the Breach to exterminate us have one goal in mind - to suck the Earth dry of all of its resources. Then they will move on to another world. They are weird, bug-like creatures with large oblong heads and spindly arms. Our last-chance method of striking back is to send a nuke into the Breach to hit them where they live. Before this plan starts, Pentecost makes a rousing speech about the last stand of humanity, at the end of which cheers erupt. Sound familiar? Besides "Independence Day" there are also a few "Top Gun" chestnuts. The character of Chuck Hansen might well have been named Iceman. It bugs me that the filmmakers couldn't have tweaked it up a little bit, just to differentiate it. It's a good thing that I prefer "Pacific Rim" to "Independence Day" (or "Top Gun", for that matter). Just keep the cliches out of the sequel.
Bottom line: it's one of my favorite movies of the year and will likely be viewed by me many more times on Blu-Ray. It's not perfect, but it's fun.
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