Pacific Rim

 

 
  Shortly after seeing Guillermo del Toro's blockbuster Pacific Rim, my fiancee and I discovered something about the story that seemed entirely implausible.  Then we realized that if we were willing to get on board with the plot in the first place, then we have no right to question the believability of any of its outlandish contents.  Bottom line, this movie is a really fun escape - a perfect summer flick that will help you forget that school is less than two weeks away.  In terms of giant robots versus giant alien monsters, this one is tough to beat.  Del Toro, who directed Pan's Labyrinth and the Hellboy movies, creates a captivating world and does a great job at inviting us to come along for the ride.
  The movie starts with an incredibly eye-catching opening fifteen minutes that serve to set up the state of our planet in the not-too-distant future.  Charlie Hunnam (yes, the president of SAMCRO) plays a pilot named Raleigh who opens the film with voice-over exposition of what the monsters are and how humans have learned to combat them.  The monsters, called Kaiju, come up from a fissure in the sea floor and wreak havoc on our world while the humans have responded by building Jaegers (no, not the Jaeger), which are monumentally large robots that are operated by two people working in concert with one another.  The pilots are mentally connected and, while harnessed side-by-side in the stand-up cockpit, work perfectly together to move and manipulate the Jaeger.  It reminded me of how people operate a Nintendo Wii - or if you're older, a Nintendo Power Glove.  You and your co-pilot are both on the same page enough to know to both punch left at the exact same instant, which, in turn, swings the gigantic arm of the Jaeger you are controlling.  Pretty neat.
  The whole set-up was really effective.  It got me completely invested in the story and made me suspend disbelief enough to just sit back and enjoy the show.  If the first fifteen minutes didn't work then the rest of the movie would proceed on a shaky foundation and would probably fall flat.  But that didn't happen for me - I was totally into the movie.  Del Toro did a fine job at creating tension through much of the action sequences, mostly because he made it very clear early on in the movie that Jaegers can be destroyed somewhat easily by the monsters, so you never know when one of the great machines will die in a battle.  Due to this tension, I found myself biting my fingernails through much of this creative science fiction movie.  And who says a teacher's summer vacation isn't stressful?!