So, movie review it is!...or, more like a movie rant. Safe to say, I'm not a huge fan. My girlfriend like it, though, so I guess that counts for something. For her, not for me.
Anyway: meh. I think that best sums it up; a resounding "Eh, that wasn't very good.".
Let's start with the good stuff, so we can get that out of the way, seeing as how there isn't much to say there:
It looks nice, and the 3D FX aren't atrocious.
There, that's the good things. Now, for the rest:
The Acting
The acting wasn't spectacular, to say the least. The two main characters were hamming it up all over the place, chewing scenery like they were William Shatner. Heck, the most subtle way they could think of to indicate that there was a romantic connection was for the female lead to make a face like she's having an orgasm every single time she looks at him.The only good acting performance came from Idris Elba, who seemed to be channeling Benjamin Sisko at times. He was the only one who seemed to know that you didn't need to beat the audience over the head with every single bit of emotion you wanted to show.
Things were slightly improved with the inclusion of Ron Perlman, who seems unable to not make a fantastic performance wherever he goes.
The Premise
Oh boy, here comes the garbage...See, the point of the movie is that there's this interdimensional portal in the Pacific Ocean, and giant monsters come through it at decreasing intervals. Fine.
However, earth for some reason decides to fix this by building huge fucking mechas called Jägers, which are for some utterly contrived reason hooked up to human brains in order to pilot them.
First problem; why the hell would they build mechas? They are the very worst shape you could possibly have for a war machine. Why, did they think the reason why humans dominate the terran continents is because of our immense physical strength and endurance? Fuck that, humans are stupidly built! You know why we succeed? Because we can make big fucking guns, that's why!
So, are the kaiju (as the monsters are called) somehow impervious to shots from huge plasma cannons or big rockets? No, not at all. In fact, those are the most effective weapons of the Jägers, even more so than the completely useless punches they throw.
In essence, the human body is a terrible design choice. We have limbs that can be damaged or torn off (which they are, in the movie), heads that can be bashed in (which they are, in the movie), joints that can be crippled (which they are, would you know) and walks upright, making it very vulnerable to being tripped (which it gets).
How about a tank? Hmmm? Just a big fucking tank with big fucking guns and thick as hell armour? You wouldn't need silly psychic-pilot-pairs, the kaiju could never topple it, you could fit a shitload more guns on such a platform, and you could add as much armour plating as you'd need, since the damn thing doesn't have to stand up and fucking take a walk!
Or, if I'm not being too bold here, how about a strategic bomber? Throughout the movie, we never see one single reason why bombers and heavy attack fighters couldn't just blow the shit out of it. Sure, there are some establishing shots of it punching out fighters, but those were clearly piloted by pillocks, because fighters are adapted for combat at ranges of several miles, and that's against other fighters which are a million times more agile and certainly much faster than the kaiju. The pilots in those planes clearly thought the very best range for an attack was somewhere around six inches.
Come to think of it, why are the pilots in the heads of the mechas in the first place? That was literally the first thing my girlfriend thought of when we were introduced to the Jägers; why the hell do they need pilots INSIDE the damn thing? Couldn't they just control them remotely, which would somehow give the impression that their technology is at least as advanced as ours, rather than hopelessly out of date?
Add to that, why are the pilots in the HEADS of the mechas? Why there? It's the single worst spot to control it from; it's the most exposed part of the body, kaiju are going to want to claw, bite and smash that bit sticking up from the shoulders, and they actually do that in the movie!
You know how, on modern cars, the driver is always seated on the front of the hood of the car so that any collision from any direction other than straight from the rear is 100% fatal at all times?
No, because that would be fucking stupid!
The Plot
The plot isn't bad. It's not going to take home any Academy Awards for best writing, but it doesn't exactly suck. It's run of the mill.Things start out in the shitter, what with huge monster mammals attacking cities, but then the humans fight back with huge mechas and everything is wonderful again.
The unusual thing is that all this happens in the prologue. The very first scene after that we get is where it goes down the shitter again, and then it just keeps going further and further down the shitter until the heroes win through a last ditch effort. Of course there's also a council of the world's biggest fucking idiots who try to fuck everyone over through sheer idiocy.
"Hey, Bill, let's scrap the program with mechas that can actually kill the monsters, and funnel all that money into building a huge fucking wall!"
"-Good idea, Steve, but what about when the wall is finished, even if it works exactly as planned? We'll have hundreds of kaiju outside the walls, increasing in number every day, getting bigger and bigger. Are we just going to assume that they'll never be able to get through that wall in any way? Because if they do get through, even in one single place, we'll have exactly no way whatsoever of defending ourselves."
"Shut the fuck up, Bill."
Nothing spectacular, but the story isn't the point of the movie
Essentially, we are treated to a plot that only serves to enable fights with big fucking monsters and heroes who turn into Big Damn Heroes. And I'd say it serves that function pretty well. It's not very clever, and it's not very well done, but it's just a vessel for big scenes with mechas fighting monsters and monsters demolishing shit.
Except one thing at the end. You know the one, where one kaiju uses an EMP and knocks out the most advanced Jäger. At that point, the main protagonist goes "Hey, our old piece of junk still works, because it's not digital, it's NUCLEAR!".
What the fuck, guys?
This is fully equivalent to the infamous "It's the neutrinos! They have...mutated!" line from the movie 2012.
This is not how science works, dickheads.
First of all, whether it's nuclear or not has absolutely dick to do with if it's digital or not. My computer is digital, it uses fucking digital circuitry, yet the energy for it mostly comes from nuclear power plants.
Second of all, it doesn't use digital circuitry? Great, we're entrusting humanity's survival to something controlled with...what, vacuum tubes?
Bullshit, learn some science!
Conclusion
It's "Meh". Not a big fan of this one. The movie is simply too damn stupid.Two stars.
