Pacific Rim

Directed by Guillermo del Toro

(PG-13)

***

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“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.”