 |
| Universal |
Set ten years after the first film, Uprising follows Jake Pentecost (John Boyega), the son of legendary hero Stacker Pentecost (Idris Elba). Rather than following his father’s footsteps, Jake has descended into a life of hedonism and crime, interrupted only when his thieving ways make him cross paths with inventor Amara Namani (Cailee Spaeny) and the authorities after her. Faced with jail time, Jake’s adopted sister Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi) offers him one way out: return to the Jaeger program and train the new series of recruits with his old partner Nate (Scott Eastwood). Jake accepts, and just in time, as the Kaiju are returning and a rogue Jaeger is running around causing trouble. Action ensues.
Look, it’s kind of pointless arguing the merits of this as an actual film because we all know what this is here for. It’s here to give you a ton of awesome action and entertain you, and this does deliver on that promise. While the Kaiju are saved until the end, the action sequences between the giant Jaegers are pretty cool, with lots of cool visuals and well-filmed brawls. It is interesting to see the giant mechas fight, especially since the two primary combatants are evenly matched. Of course, it’s when the Kaiju arrive that things really kick into high gear, with an insane final action sequence that blew my mind and made me pump my fists like I was watching a wrestling match. Seeing the way these Jaegers and Kaiju battled and just brutally trashed each other was pure awesomeness, and is the definite highlight of the film.
 |
| Universal
Go, go, Power Rangers!
|
In fact, I think the action is something this does have over the first film, mainly for one reason only: you can actually see the fights. Del Toro’s action scenes in the first, to me, were cluttered by too many weather effects and an absurdly dark atmosphere whenever the monsters appeared. By contrast, Steven DeKnight films almost all the action during the day and keeps the Jaegers in bright primary colors to distinguish them in battle. Even the one fight scene at night is easy to follow and fun because of how DeKnight handles the camerawork.
Another bonus that this film has is a very charismatic cast (on the whole). John Boyega is charm personified, able to take even the very worst dialogue and selling it like a pro, and the others aren’t far behind. I thought he and Cailee Spaeny had a good relationship with each other and sold some of the more dramatic (read: cheesy) scenes. I enjoyed seeing Charlie Day and Burn Gorman back as the two kaiju experts, especially since their roles were smaller and they weren’t as obnoxious for the most part. And for once I actually liked Scott Eastwood, who is stuck playing the straight man role and does it pretty well. There isn’t an Idris Elba-level performance here, but this time the entire cast steps up and puts on a pretty good charm offensive that won me over on the whole.
 |
| Coming Soon
Sorry, Charlie
|
Okay, so now that we have those positives, which I do recommend the film on alone, let’s be honest: this film is pretty garbage on every other level. The scripting is poor, the dialogue is atrocious, character work is non-existent, and even something as simple as scene transitions are bungled here. I’m amazed that Steven DeKnight, a first time director, was able to helm the action so well but fail in some of these basic areas. I understand that this is just meant to be fluffy, light fun, but I think we should at least expect some ground level competency at this point from our big tentpole action films.
Mentioning the director, I do feel like it is important to comment on the change of directors here, because part of what made Pacific Rim such a fun, dumb awesome movie was Guillermo del Toro. As uneven as it was and self-serious as it got at times, you really felt the passion and love for the two genres in every frame. If del Toro is anything, he is a huge geek, and you knew that he had to have watched a lot of Godzilla and Gundam in preparation for that film. Add to that those weird little quirks and idiosyncrasies about his universe and you have a film that is truly special even though it’s honestly not that good. It’s memorable, and the things that shine really do.
Steven DeKnight, on the other hand, was clearly hired because he could deliver a studio film with very little genuine flair or artistic vision. I can forgive a lot of things in a giant beat em up movie like this if there is a certain style to it, but that just isn’t here. It’s all about moving here to there, punching some stuff, and then saying dialogue and then repeating the cycle. That’s all well and good, but it loses a lot of what made the first film so unique. There is no Hannibal Chau Kaiju market scene here, or one like the building of the giant wall in California. There aren’t even any “holy s**t!” moments like in the first one, like the Kaiju sprouting wings or coming through the giant skyscraper to attack Gipsy Danger, which I still remember fondly even though I haven’t watched the film in years. Uprising, on the other hand, is just a standard studio action movie.
 |
| GIPHY |
Pacific Rim Uprising is a fun continuation of del Toro’s original film, upping the cool with the action and the cast while taking a backseat in the creativity department. I sound pretty harsh with this review but I do think that the good does outweigh the bad here, and that the movie is a great time at the theater. It’s a good shut your brain off movie that actually delivers the goods, and I hope it does well so maybe they can do a third one and give us much more of the robots and monsters that we want. Let’s hope we do, and that this subgenre doesn’t get run into the ground before then!
My Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Hey guys, if you like this article please leave a comment or share this post so we can get the word out there! If you have any questions or comments you can find me at:
Twitter: @PresidentGlover
Instagram: _steveng_
No comments:
Post a Comment