So Michael Bay shot his mouth off recently, calling out Pacific Rim for being a Transformers rip-off, a remark he subsequently apologized for.
But even if it was, there’s no way Del Toro could do a verbatim rip-off of anything, because his style is so uniquely his own. It would certainly be interesting to see what Transformers would look like through his eyes, but Pacific Rim is more of a nod to the Japanese giant robot and monster films of the ‘60s and ‘70s than any toy franchise.
Sure, Warner Brothers would love to have the next Transformers on its hands, but Pacific Rim is clearly going to be its own film, and those who want plenty of robots beating the sh*t out of each other shouldn’t be disappointed.
As the Wall Street Journal tells us, a full size, four-block set that replicates Hong Kong was built and destroyed for the film. Yet as Del Toro told the Journal, he’s taking “an almost romantic, operatic approach to the adventure. We have people from every walk of life and every country coming together and not conquering with superior firepower or macho dynamics but through ingenuity and sacrifice.”
As far as the size of Pacific Rim, you get the impression it’s indeed reaching epic proportions, but you have to be careful not to get too big or you start getting into Spinal Tap dimensions. (The robots go to 11?) Del Toro told the L.A. Times, “We built parts of the robots, and the only thing that would fit in the largest stage in North America was the feet. That’s it.”
Then there’s also the magnificent monsters that come out of Del Toro’s imagination, and as the director continues, “The monsters are more powerful than I’ve ever designed. We use cars and buildings as you would use glasses and tables in a bar fight.”
Funny enough, JJ Abrams also just claimed that Pacific Rim is inspiring him to potentially make a sequel to Cloverfield. Abrams told Playboy, “Part of me just wants to let [Cloverfield 2] go, though we’ve had a couple of discussions about cool ways to do it. I’m looking forward to seeing Pacific Rim this summer. It feels like there are some really big monsters coming down the pike that could inspire something we do.”
First we’ll have to wait to see how Pacific Riml does at the box office when it’s released on July 11, but if it indeed delivers plenty of rock ‘em sock ‘em action and cool robot tech, it should do just fine.
