Pacific Rim

Directed by Guillermo del Toro

Starring Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day, Max 'Dirty' Martini, Robert Kazinsky, Clifton Collins Jr., and Ron Perlman.

I’ve been thinking of bringing back the Boozy Movie Chronicles for a little while now, and there seemed like no better way to do it than giant alien sea monsters vs. giant robots. Read back that value proposition in your mind: ‘Giant alien sea monsters vs. giant robots.’ Guys, it’s like they custom-built a movie to get drunk at.

I went to see it with old high school friend Ben, whose movie-boozing prowess I may have doubted initially. That is, until he came out with this nugget: ‘Hey, so, this movie is like a Japanese monster flick so shouldn’t we pound sake the entire time?’ I felt almost personally offended by the infallibility of his reasoning and how much more mentally prepared he was. He may as well have pulled out a lightsaber and said ‘Your powers are weak, old man.’ What a champ.

Pacific Rim runs on comic book logic, which in terms of balls-to-the-wallness is second only to Charlie Sheen logic. This entire 140-minute fare exists only to justify FX shots of Optimus Prime slugging Godzilla in the face with various large pieces of metal. Of course, to have a single monster fighting against a single robot is (as Brett Ratner would have put it) for fags, so the screenwriters lift the plot directly from Ninja Turtles and put an inter-dimensional portal in the middle of the ocean. Progressively bigger and badder monsters keep emerging from it so humankind, naturally, keeps building bigger and badder giant robots like it’s some kind or inter-galactic dick-measuring contest.

Just pause on that one. Can you imagine a movie getting off to a stronger start?

Yeah, me neither.

Talking about the plot of this movie is like discussing the lyrics in a Hendrix song. The movie itself is a shell, and it feels like the producers kept coming back to the screenwriters saying: ‘Guys, we need more story here.’ And about three hours and two bottles of Jack Daniels later the writers said to themselves: ‘Optimus Prime punching a giant alien crab a bunch of times counts as story, right?’

In stark contrast to last week’s Man of Steel, Pacific Rim knows exactly the kind of movie it is and embraces its nature fully. Plus Pacific Rim is basically two-hours of money shot. It doesn’t need a fluffer; it straight up delivers on every level. It cleverly circumvents the B-movie dilemma of ‘How do we make Guy A or Guy B stand out in this movie?’ by simply making everyone and everything in it rule hard.

I'm telling you, that thing is super-glued on

• Charlie Hunnam is a solid leading man who delivers even the most cheeseball lines with such assuredness you have to respect him.
• Idris Elba has the Bill Pullman role, only funnier, more street cred, and I’m pretty sure he’s wearing a giant fake moustache for the entire movie so of course he gets about twice as many close-ups as anyone else.
• Three-armed, jetpack-powered, knife-wielding Chinese giant destruction robot? Check.
• Charlie Day as one of the world’s leading biologists? Sold.
• Australians vying to prove their Australianess by having the biggest testicles around (and succeeding).
• Ron Perlman has no reason to exist in this movie other than he’s Ron Perlman. Hellboy 4 life.

At one of the movie’s pivotal moments, Max Martini encapsulates Pacific Rim’s MO in a single line: ‘We can either sit here and do nothing or grab those flare guns and do something really stupid.’ The movie knows exactly when and how many times to push the Full Retard Button. 

Not always the best idea, but invariably the most tempting one

 

There’s a point at which the only way forward is for the movie to go full retard and Rinko Kikuchi literally presses a big red button that may as well have ‘full retard’ written on it. It’s glorious.

To wit, here are some counter-examples of movies that press the Full Retard Button too many times or cannot back it up:

The Matrix sequels

Ghost Rider

Paycheck

Die Another Day

Gamer

Identity

Be Cool

I don’t know really where I’m going with this review; I’m still sorta drunk from last night. Just go see the movie and if I’ve missed anything leave it in the comments or whatever.

Damage: 7/10 (pre-movie: 100 ml Stoli vodka; during: ½ bottle Sawanotsuru deluxe sake) – Yes, I realise that usually wouldn’t warrant a 7/10, but I’ve been on heavy medication for the last three months which has had serious impact on my drinking abilities

Boozy rating: 8/10 (loses one point for not having Van Damme in it and one point for not having enough screaming civilians or boobs)

Next week: The Wolverine

 

DOOM -- stay-at-home boozy Hannukah edition

Directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak

Starring Karl Urban, Rosamund Pike, Raz Adoti, Ben Daniels, and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson

*** WARNING: VERY MINOR SPOILERS *** (as if you’re going to watch this trash, right?)

Oscar season is probably my least favourite time of year. Sure, the holidays are great, but the preponderance of films released tactically in November/December, ushered shamelessly into theatres to drive a Hollywood lobby around them, drives me fairly batshit. The audacity of studios – contemptuous enough towards audiences that they feel comfortable telling us what a “good movie” is or should be – is an annual affront that only becomes more offensive as the movies become more shittier. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close? Please. I’ve seen better film form atop hollandaise sauce.

So instead of spending a small fortune to see a useless piece of art that will vanish from institutional memory faster than Shakespeare in Love (although, to be fair, Gwyneth Paltrows funbags are permanently seared into my brain), guest movieboozer Patrick and I combined class and crass by making some delectable Chase vodka martinis and watching a 1½-star movie about Martian beasties. Mondays get the boozy treatment FOR SERIOUS.

This is what credibility looks like. Fuckers.

Shore leave is cancelled for a small team of tougher-than-tough, futuristic Marines when Sarge (The Rock) receives orders to respond to a distress call on Mars. Scientists are apparently missing, there’s talk of an emergency quarantine, and things at the Olduvai research facility seem to have gone altogether tits-up.

There’s a bunch of talk, a bunch of “let’s split up, you two guys search this area, you two guys search this other area, find the civilians, and kill everything else so we can all go back home and get some PROTEIN,” and then beasties introduced through some very loose scientific justification.

*** NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION EXTRA ***: See back there how I used the words “very loose” without drawing a parallel to or making a joke about Lindsay Lohan? Bam. New Year shizzle. I’m becoming a less belligerent person. Resolved.

You’ve played the video game. You know what’s up. A movie of this nature and at best tenuous quality can only truly hit the mark if everyone it in dies. No. Not merely dies, but gets pwned in thorough fashion. Like do y’all remember how hard Benicio del Toro gets pwned in Sin City when he flies off the handle at Brittany Murphy and a bunch of hookers? That level. That’s the level this movie needs.

The movie never reaches this level.

Worse still is that your main guys aren’t dealing nearly enough damage either. Doom is basically a 90-minute invitation to get drunk and watch a group of juice-monkeys fire senseless amounts of bullets and then get their shit ruined by aliens. It’s not complicated. Jim Cameron had no problem accomplishing this and that guy made Titanic, which I take as testimony that he’s borderline retarded. To spend $200 million on a sinking ship and a Céline Dion showcase is strong evidence (although, to be fair, Kate Winslet’s funbags are permanently seared into my brain).

Karl Urban is a satisfying action hero but essentially has no reason to exist in this movie. No one has any reason to exist in any movie The Rock is in. This guy takes keeping it real to the next level. A former boozy Tuesday excursion to Faster is a fine example. The Rock was released from jail and went on a grudge-killing spree while I went on a Pabst Blue Ribbon drinking spree. Me and The Rock we’re bonded deep.

True enough. What they don't do, however, is PWNAGE.

Which brings me to my next point: The Rock seriously does nothing in this movie. I stayed in a had, like, six vodka martinis to escape movies that treat me with contempt and at the apex of my drunk I realize that the most that Rock will ever do in this movie is yell at people. Don’t get me wrong, his freakouts and one-liners in this movie are totally epic; they are in fact pretty much the only reason to watch it. But when you cast The Rock as a special ops Marine in a movie about Martian beasties, I want to smell what he’s fucking cookin’. I want to see him do 20+ neck-breaks and connect Hell Knights anus to mouth (like a centipede). I paid £5 for this DVD so I feel I am entitled.

Possibly WORSEST is the under-use of Ben Daniels as Corporal Eric "Goat" Fantom. For starters, and I don’t think a great many would disagree with me here, but a special forces dude nicknamed Goat makes my nipples erect. It’s badass.

Second, this particular special forces dude is revealed to be a bit of a Godbag and at first you’re like “whatever, so was Britney Spears and we all know how that turned out.” Okay, right, I know, but then this cat knocks over an oxygen tank while patrolling and takes the Lord’s name in vain and as penance for his sin he CARVES A FUCKING CROSS INTO HIS ARM WITH A BUCKNIFE! He’s got a collection of Jesus scars! I know, right? Iciest coldest motherfucker alive (after Vin Diesel and Justin Timberlake, of course).

Full kit, no cleave. Thanks.

Third point: once he gets infected with this strain of zombie monster disease he commits suicide by bludgeoning himself to death against a plate-glass window. Dude bites the dust a third of the way into the film having fired less than a magazine of ammo and clocks zero kills. This all upset my drunk to such a point that I had to strangle a hobo on my way home just so that my evening would break even.

Plus Rosamund Pike doesn’t even take her gear off. I paid £5.

Damage: 5/10 (6 x Chase vodka martinis, probably around 2.5 oz of booze and 4 olives to each)

Boozy rating: 2/10 (I gave it a point above utter failure because there are two classic one-liners and it was Hannukah so I was feeling generous)