Entertainment

Cinema review: Pacific Rim

By Kev McCready

It’s been a long, cruel summer for those of us of the geeky persuasion – Iron Man 3 flew into a pit of its own snark and Man Of Steel made me think I am now truly bored of seeing people thrown through skyscrapers. 

And next up is Pacific Rim.

With humanity under threat from giant aliens, called Kaiju, emerging from a dimensional portal beneath the Pacific humanity defends itself in giant robots, called Jaegers, with neurally-linked pilots. Keeping up? 

The potential is good but the execution is pretty poor, with the script just about creating a narrative where Kaiju attacks are a fact of life. 

The best ideas are buried under a layer of those nicked from other films and the characterisation is weak with some names – Raleigh Beckett and Stacker Pentecost – coming from the average spam filter.

The acting is negligible with a blur of faces you may know including Idris Elba, arguably the most well-known, who needs to STOP SHOUTING TO EMPHASIS THINGS.

Otherwise, it’s bloke off Sons Of Anarchy and woman out of ‘Norwegian Wood’ who may register a flicker of recognition, with special guests including Eastenders’ Shaun Slater, the guy from Torchwood and the chap who plays the titular character in Hellboy.

Underneath there is a message about love, brotherhood and childhood fears but unfortunately you don’t really care; you just want to see more of the giant robots fighting the giant aliens and it is here, finally, that Del Toro manages to get some of his dark humour in. 

This is a film that truly knows its audience, Kaiju may be Japanese for ‘giant beast’ but it’s also the genre of giant monster films, such as Godzilla

It’s a verbal and aural assault on your senses, even more so in 3D, as the great cities of the southern hemisphere get trashed by aliens and robots fighting them (the latter causing as much damage as possible).

Pacific Rim features Singapore getting trashed, as a giant robot fights a giant alien. 

Giant robot then smashes giant alien’s skull in using a super tanker as a club. 

If this sounds outrageous, it gets absolutely ridiculous and then absolutely wonderful as the scene progresses.

Ultimately Pacific Rim succeeds as an unpretentious piece of summer entertainment… And did I mention it has giant robots and giant aliens?

Image courtesy of Warner Brothers via YouTube, with thanks

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