One of the biggest puzzlers of the year has to be the lackluster performance of Guillermo del Toro’s Pacific Rim, at least here in the US. Was the film over-hyped? Did American audiences just not connect with the traditional kaiju/mecha genre? The film did incredibly well in Japan, however, and probably made enough money for the studio to get behind a sequel (del Toro confirms he is writing a sequel, but the studio has yet to give him the greenlight for production), and now with the home video release, those reluctant to plop down the cash for a night out at the movies can check the film out in the comfort of their own homes.

If you’re not familiar with the story, in a nutshell, the planet has been under attack from giant monsters, called kaiju, from another dimension. In the initial attacks, shown with chilling effect in news footage, the kaiju decimated large coastal cities but the humans finally fought back by building giant robots called Jaegers which required two pilots to operate. The pilots had to be linked by a process called The Drift so that they shared everything, from motor skills to memories. The world government decides to shut down the Jaeger program to build giant walls around the coastlines instead, but when the walls prove to be less than impenetrable, a rogue group of Jaeger pilots and officers surreptitiously restart the program to save the earth from kaiju domination.

Warner Brothers’ new Blu-ray edition of Pacific Rim is reference quality in both image and sound. The high definition video looks sharp and crystal clear, with beautifully saturated color, particularly in the neon-drenched Hong Kong scenes, with nice deep blacks in all of the nighttime scenes (and a lot of this takes place at night or in dark areas). Warners also gives you two audio options: a beautiful 7.1 DTS-HS Master Audio track, for those with a system that can handle it, and a comparable 5.1 DTS-HS Master Audio track. Both tracks keep the dialogue clearly front and center, never letting the sound effects or music overpower the dialogue. Either way, this disk is the one you want to show your friends to convince them to upgrade their own home theater system. The Blu-ray also includes an audio commentary track with Guillermo del Toro explaining his influences and admiration for the films that led him to create Pacific Rim, as well as speaking in-depth about the films, effects and sets. He also talks about how much he loved the 3D conversion process, but unfortunately, a 3D edition of the Blu-ray was not provided for review.

The Blu-ray/DVD combo package contains three disks. In addition to the audio commentary on the Blu-ray movie disk, there is also over an hour of Focal Points which are short featurettes covering various aspects of the making of the movie. These shorts take you behind the scenes from pre-production to post-production, and some of the most amazing footage shows raw production elements that reveal most of the huge sets, while having some physical elements to them, were all shot against green screen. Seeing the green screen and then the “sets” being added is really getting a peek at movie magic.

The third disk (Blu-ray) consists of more behind the scenes footage and interactive elements. These include:

• The Director’s Notebook — An interactive presentation of del Toro’s Pacific Rim notebook with clickable pages showing notes and images created during production. Movie geeks will get a real kick out of this feature.
• Drift Space, which breaks down the film’s four Drift sequences.
• The Digital Artistry of Pacific Rim — A look at the creative process of creating the kaiju, from the mind of del Toro to the computers of ILM.
• The Shatterdome — An archive of video and stills created during the three phases of production, including never before seen animatics, maquettes and concept art.
• Four deleted scenes
• A Blooper Reel featuring a lot of mugging from the cast.

If you saw Pacific Rim and loved it, then there is no question that you have to have this Blu-ray. If you were on the fence about seeing it in a theater, now is the time to take the plunge and see what you missed. It won’t have the same impact as it did on the big screen, but it will still be an enjoyable experience any way you look at it.

The Blu-ray/DVD combo package of Pacific Rim was generously provided to CliqueClack by Warner Home Video.

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This contest is now closed. Please follow @CliqueClack on Twitter for alerts on contests, news and reviews.

Who doesn’t love giant robots and giant monster, especially when they’re in a fight to the death against each other? CliqueClack, through our friends at PartnersHub and Warner Home Video, want to give one lucky reader a copy Pacific Rim on Blu-ray! The rules are simple: leave a comment on this post telling us why you want a copy of Pacific Rim. Be sure to fill in your complete name and email address in the form. The winner will be contacted by email. If we can’t reach you, a new winner will be selected. One entry per person, per email address. The deadline to enter is 6:00 PM Eastern, Sunday, October 27. Tweet your friends about the contest using @CliqueClack and #PacificRim.

Be sure to check out the Pacific Rim Blog App below. You can control the animated GIFs by moving your cursor across the image, take the Superfan Quiz and play with the Soundboard to create your own epic Kaiju battles! Enjoy and good luck! This offer is open to residents of the US only.

Pacific Rim comes to home video October 15th.

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With the recent spate of end of the world movies (This is the End, World War Z, etc), something becomes quite clear. There are two ways to view the end of days: 1) Without hope and 2) With hope. Sometimes it’s about despair and fear as the world collapses, and acknowledging that the only thing that can be saved is the human spirit, if not the world. But then there are the other ones … the ones that hope that despite the sense of doom, humanity can band together and defeat the external threat, whether it is aliens (Independence Day among many), natural disasters (again too many to count), or something else. This faith that despite our many differences, our very sameness binds us and may serve as the path to safety. And if there can be the thrill of ungodly behemoths smacking each other around, that’s just an added benefit.

Pacific Rim is the latest film from Guillermo Del Toro, better known for his more horror-oriented films like Hellboy and Pan’s Labyrinth. But although there are elements of cosmic monstrosity here, it’s not really that sort of movie. Instead, it’s an homage and love letter to every classic monster movie and every giant robot story, tying back to the times kids smashed immovable toy dolls together. The movie begins with a voiceover narration that tells the story expediently and quickly; it’s clear that it’s all about getting to the next part. It’s not the most effective narrative device, but it’s quickly forgotten once things get going for real. It seems that in the very near future the Earth is attacked by monsters rising up from a mysterious rift in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. These creatures, called kaiju (which is the slightly mistranslated Japanese term for the monster movie genre) are immense in size and are only killed with heavy losses. So the world bands together to build giant robots, called Jaegers, to fight back — monsters with monsters, as it’s said, piloted by humans. But the sheer size of these Jaegers is too much for the puny human brain to handle, so it becomes a team effort. Two pilots, working together, sharing memories in a “drift” — the closer the bond, the better it is. So far so good, right? But the movie starts as things have just started to get worse, and humanity is running out of options and time.

Too much can be spoiled by specifics, but I can say that performances were variable here. Many of the side characters are archetypes and near caricatures, like the Russian and Chinese pilots that have few lines of dialogue, or the hotshot Australian kid that isn’t impressed by the hero and his gruff but loving father. Oh, did I forget about him? Well, it almost doesn’t matter, but the primary point of view is young American Raleigh (Charlie Hunnam, who’s actually British), a former pilot with a dark past that comes back despite himself to save the planet. His character is a bit bland, but then there are the other two main characters. Idris Elba plays Marshal Pentecost, the head of the defense effort, and he is charismatic, intriguing, and consistently awesome. Rinko Kikuchi plays Mako Mori, a girl with her own dark past (they all have them), but may be tied into the pasts of others. And naturally, she’s got something to prove too. But that makes it seem like I disliked the acting, which isn’t quite accurate. For the most part, the acting was quite good; even the over the top Australian father and son pilots had some genuinely emotional moments. Charlie Day and Burn Gorman play nutty scientists that serve as comedic balance and may also hold the key to saving the world. There are even a few little minor characters that show up that I won’t spoil, unlike a lot of other people, because I didn’t expect it; I think it was better that way.

But the characters are just part of the story, the way to get us to actually care about this world and have any sort of stakes at all. The real spectacle is the awesomeness of seeing unbelievably huge things destroy each other. Yes, it’s all CGI here, but the animation has a weight and heft to it, the designs looking worn and lived in. It feels nearly real. Are there some plot holes and inconsistent story elements? Sure. Are the pieces original? Not really. But the fun of this movie overrides any worries about flimsy characterizations and simplified plotlines. Plus, the action is easy to follow — this is no Transformers, where you can’t tell the good guys from the bad ones. The only part I felt mixed on was the very ending, but it’s really a small complaint in the scheme of things. Perhaps there’s more to grow for these characters, but I can say that most of the sacrifices mattered. And in the end, it’s nice to see something made with an overall level of competence and love. Del Toro lives for this stuff, you can tell. With the international cast, there’s real potential for expansion here, despite the seeming “lead” of the one guy who’s capable of great deeds more than most. Luckily, he’s not the only hero here. And you know, I like a movie to be a bit optimistic about humanity.

It’s nice have hope sometimes.

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