Pacific Rim - Immediate Reaction

Pacific Rim is visually vibrant, wonderfully entertaining, and surprisingly effective from a narrative standpoint. I’d had my reservations about just how compelling a “monsters vs. robots” story would be. Fortunately, the cast of lesser-known actors does (mostly) solid work making a larger than life story seem realistic enough. Charlie Day and Burn Gorman, in particular, are a lot of fun as the Jaeger program’s “research division.” It’s always nice to see Rinko Kikuchi (of Babel fame), even if her performance is hindered a bit by not being able to utilize her native tongue.

I saw the film in 3D, but it’s not one that I think really does much of anything special with the format. That said, the film’s got a really diverse color palette, which is nice to see. So many times, futuristic stories tend to lay on the drab grays pretty heavily. Additionally, this is one of the few films to effectively use the droning boom made far too popular by Hans Zimmer's score for Inception. 

Look, I’m not one of the Guillermo Del Toro faithful, convinced that he can do no wrong. In fact, the marvelous Pan’s Labyrinth aside, I’m woefully understudied in his filmography. That said, this is a welcome sight in the world of the summer blockbuster. It’s not a sequel, adaptation, or remake, and the film (and the audience) is all the better for it.

In a nutshell, Pacific Rim is a rousing good time, filled with imagination to spare. When these robots start using the objects around them to attack the evil "Kaiju," it's a grand sight to behold. There are moments herein that will make you clap your hands with joy and maybe even cheer a little. We all need that, don’t we?

4 stars (out of 5)