Pacific Rim (2013)

Plot Summary

When monstrous creatures, known as Kaiju, started rising from the sea, a war began that would take millions of lives and consume humanity's resources for years on end. To combat the giant Kaiju, a special type of weapon was devised: massive robots, called Jaegers, which are controlled simultaneously by two pilots whose minds are locked in a neural bridge. But even the Jaegers are proving nearly defenseless in the face of the relentless Kaiju. On the verge of defeat, the forces defending mankind have no choice but to turn to two unlikely heroes-a washed up former pilot (Charlie Hunnam) and an untested trainee (Rinko Kikuchi)-who are teamed to drive a legendary but seemingly obsolete Jaeger from the past. Together, they stand as mankind's last hope against the mounting apocalypse.

Director: Guillermo del Toro

Screenplay: Travis Beacham & Guillermo del Toro

Story: Travis Beacham

Stars: Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi

Budget: $180,000,000 (estimated)

Reviews

The Telegraph: At first, watching Pacific Rim feels like rediscovering a favourite childhood cartoon – but del Toro has flooded the project with such affection and artistry that, rather than smiling nostalgically, you find yourself enchanted all over again - 5/5

Film.com: It is one of the better dumbass sci-fi action movies to come down the pike in quite some time - 4/5

Total Film: A huge, CGI-heavy popcorner that still feels personal. Come for the epic monster-on-mecha showdowns, stay for the likeable humans - 4/5

The Guardian: Pacific Rim's wafer-thin psychodrama and plot-generator dialogue provides little for the human component to get their teeth into - 3/5

Village Voice: Pacific Rim is big and dumb in a smart way - 4/5

The Hollywood Reporter: To kill time between action set-pieces, del Toro has done an above-average job of avoiding tedium via some flavorsome casting, passably interesting plot contrivances and, above all, by maintaining strong forward momentum. Unlike so many similar crash-bang action spectaculars, this one feels lean and muscular rather than bloated or padded; the combat is almost always coherent and dramatically pointed rather than just splashed on the screen for its own sake - 3.5/5

indieWIRE: Too in love with itself to ever totally go off the rails, Pacific Rim doesn't qualify as the first full-on dud of del Toro's career, but it's hard not to get the sense that something's missing - 3.4/5

Slant Magazine: Guillermo del Toro doesn't rise above the obligations of staging a film of this sort as a multi-level video game, a stylish but programmatic ride toward an inevitable final boss battle - 3/5

Empire: Del Toro is giving scope to a boyhood lust for mayhem, the multi-million-dollar equivalent of kicking over sandcastles and torturing insects. There is something infectiously juvenile in that - 3/5

Variety: Although assembled with consummate care and obsessive attention to visual detail, Pacific Rim manages only fitful engagement and little in the way of real wonderment, suspense or terror - 2/5

The Verge: Del Toro makes one of the most satisfying movies of the summer - and one of the best of his career - by creating not just a new world, but one whose mythology actually deserves a universe - 4/5

Yahoo Movies:  Pacific Rim offers a few laughs and a few thrills, but it feels like a very large platter serving a disappointingly meager meal - 3/5

MovieMoReview Rating of Pacific Rim  -  3.5/5