Pacific Rim
Giant robots battle monsters from the deep.
Directed by Guillermo del Toro
(PG-13)
***
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
“There are long sequences in this movie that merit the most overused of terms, ‘awesome,’” said Rene Rodriguez in The Miami Herald. The work of a director who clearly loves genre entertainment, it pits Mothra-size monsters that emerge from the ocean floor against gargantuan robots piloted by humans, and it “contains some of the wildest, giddiest sights of any movie this summer.” Don’t go expecting nuanced character drama, said Andrew O’Hehir in Salon.com. The “remarkably charismatic” Idris Elba (The Wire) serves as commander of the overmatched pilot squad, but no member of the able cast gets to play more than action-flick stereotypes. Pacific Rim isn’t aiming to reinvent the Japanese monster movie: It’s “an attempt to make that kind of movie as good as it can be.” Director Guillermo del Toro “never succumbs to the humorlessness that has dragged down” so many other noisy summer action pictures, said Ann Hornaday in The Washington Post, but the story he tells subtly suggests that human empathy is a superpower in its own right. That warm-hearted touch “makes all the difference.”
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
Will California's EV mandate survive Trump, SCOTUS challenge?
Today's Big Question The Golden State's climate goal faces big obstacles
By Joel Mathis, The Week US Published
-
'Underneath the noise, however, there’s an existential crisis'
Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
By Justin Klawans, The Week US Published
-
2024: the year of distrust in science
In the Spotlight Science and politics do not seem to mix
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published