Pacific Rim

Guillermo del Toro, 2013


2/5

As giant alien creatures (known as the Kaiju) ascend from the middle of the earth to destroy humanity, humans join together to mobilize a defense. They decide to fight fire with fire as they create massive robots called Jaeger's that rival the Kaiju in size. These robotic machines are human operated involving two people bound by the mind. They are able to gain a bit of a foothold in the war with their machines but are intent on destroying the crevice in which they emerge from.

A film likely to be adored by thirteen year old boys across America. And only them. Guillermo del Toro proves that he should stick to the Fantasy genre, and not enter the world of big Hollywood Blockbusters. Toro goes from treating viewers to such haunting, imaginative creations in Pan's Labyrinth to removing all layered storytelling and just shoving big budget effects down our throats. Like the monstrous Jaegers in Pacific Rim, the film is bloated, too big for its own good, uninspired, and derivative. The premise itself feels imitative. The look of Iron Man. The interface of Avatar. The utter destructionism of Godzilla. The Transformers-like battles. Yeah, we've seen all of that. It's been done before. 

What is the point of the soldiers proving that they are capable of proving their martial arts abilities? The robots don't even utilize those moves. They slowly punch through the air like soaking wet Rock-em Sock-em toys. Oh, and they can break out a sword in a clutch moment to abruptly end the battle so the film can make one of many erratic cuts in the story? How convenient. The $190M budget was clearly spent on CGI and not on the writing. The dialogue is so elementary and just feels empty and downright lacking. Cliche sayings like "step into my office" or "let me check for a pulse, okay, no pulse". Charlie Hunnam (Sons of Anarchy) does step out of his Jax Teller comfort zone (albeit handcuffed to Ron Perlman), and does come off as a more wholesome figure than his well-known Samcro President role. And poor Idris Elba. The man who will always live in infamy for his role as Stringer Bell deserves more than this. But he probably made the mistake we all did. We all saw Guillermo del Toro's name on it, and thought: "how could this be a bad move?!". He had nothing to work with. The soldiers jump into the Jaeger head and they look like Daft Punk members who couldn't play an instrument. The interpersonal relationships between father and son, or almost-lovers feels rigid. It will be interesting to see how history treats this film. Maybe Guillermo is saying bye bye to his darker days. Clearly at this point he is more inclined to channel Ishiro Honda instead of The Brothers Grimm. 

Mama

Andres Muschietti, 2013

3/5

Directed by Muschietti and produced by notorious nightmare-inducer Guillermo del Toro. Lucas is eating through his life savings to find his long-lost nieces who were abducted years before when his brother abducted them after killing his wife and business partner. When they are finally found, he learns that they have become feral after being in the wild for so long. What he doesn't realize, is that they had some help with their survival. 

Mama is an imaginative effort with an original story. It pays tribute to some of the films in its category (Insidious, The Grudge, The Ring) while standing out on its own. The initial unpredictable nature of the two feral girls, Victoria (Megan Charpentier) and Lilly (Isabelle Nelisse) almost create a second and third villain early in the film when they are discovered. You don't really know what they did to survive, or what skills they learned from "Mama". You know that with del Toro on board, you are going to be treated to some good visual features and this film does not disappoint in that department. There are some dream sequences where some really beautiful filters are used that almost give the shot a negative-like effect.

Good performances by most of the actors on board. Nikolaj Coster-Waldeu (Game of Thrones, Headhunters, Virtuality) is effective as the struggling artist uncle who takes the girls in. His girlfriend Annabel, played by Jessica Chastain, was clearly a miscast. Anyone that has seen her in Zero Dark Thirty knows she can act. She just needs to be in the right role, and that is not as the self-serving, rough around the edges Goth-girl. The film drags a bit in the end, and the final scene felt a bit imitative. But overall, the film supplies some good scares and is paced quite well.