This is one of the easiest films to break down I've ever done: giant robots fight giant monsters.
If you go into this film expecting anything more than this, then you are stupid. Let me repeat the story line again, in case you missed it the first time: giant robots fight giant monsters. You can't go into this movie over thinking anything about it because if you do, logically this movie won't hold up, but the whole point of this movie is to have fun. There's nothing magical about the story line. Nothing super special with the story line. No mystery to this story. No crazy ending twists to be found here. This is just a movie about giant robots beating up giants monsters. And from a nerd standpoint this movie delivers on every promise of giants robots beating up giants monsters.
Guillermo del Toro is an interesting filmmaker as he seems to be one of the few directors out there who has hasn't lost his way when it comes making movies that stir up fan boys and fan girls hearts. He always seems to deliver when he makes these kinds of movies. He hasn't let the Hollywood system steal his soul like it has done to Spielberg, Lucas, and Cameron. His movies still have plenty of heart, joy, and passion oozing out from every frame without every loosing that little spark of life from being a fan.
Pacific Rim delivers on every promise of that simple premise: giant robots fighting giant monsters. The robots are very cool looking and singularly unique in design. Along with having their counterpart pilots be as diverse as the robots. This is a totally outlandish story line but del Toro introduces enough things about the robots and their pilots to make their story interesting. I like the fact he doesn't go overboard on the pilots' history. He goes just far enough and then pulls back the reigns before it gets to sappy or overly dramatic annoying: see Star Trek Into Darkness for not knowing when to let up on story line and personnel back history clashing with action scenes. Del Toro for the most part seems to know how to balance those to out, after all he did well enough with both Hellboy movies and I didn't expect anything less from him with this movie. Even the monster designs were very individualistic as they all had a basic design but had their unique things as well without having to steal from Jurassic Park (American Godzilla I'm talking you).
Another thing I liked about this movie was the small details of the production design: from the sets, costumes, and even CGI. Those small details were making everything in this battle worn world look broke down, scratched, paint peeling, and generally well used. Unlike most CGI stuff today that has a super polished looked to the point where it looks fake (Star Wars prequels and Hobbit, I'm talking to you). The world of Pacific Rim looks lived in. These robots would never have a new paint job on them and would be severely scarred from their many fights with the giant monsters. I like how del Toro incorporated this into the movie because for me it just helped to make this movie a little more likable. The world I live in is not super polished. It's a blue collar world and the world of Pacific Rim is a blue collar world through and through and del Toro makes sure this movie wears that world on its sleeve with pride.
Now the acting is every bit as one would expect with a del Toro movie. All the actors and actresses buy into the world he is building and run away with it like kids in a candy store, much the same way as del Toro does when he makes a movie. They seem to be having a lot of fun with the whole concept of (and I'll say it one more time) giant robots fighting giant monsters. All in all I had a great time watching this movie. It was funny when it needed to be and it was dramatic when it needed to be without diving into the over melodramatic.
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