Pearl Harbor-Sneak Attack with Affleck
What makes Pearl Harbor such a great film? Pretty much nothing. Pearl Harbor is one of those movies designed to manipulate you into caring about the characters, but it just falls short. It is certainly unfair to say that it was predictable as we all know what happened there, or at least I hope everyone reading this knows. Just if by some horrible chance the educational system has completely failed you, Pearl Harbor was the event that brought the United States into WWII. The Japanese bombed our Pearl Harbor base, killed lots of troops, sunk lots of ships and later probably wished they had chosen another route. That’s not opinion, that’s probably a safe grouping of facts. Pearl Harbor the movie, is full of people you are suppose to care about, but don’t. It has lots of running around, lots of stuff exploding and there are quite a few excellent action sequences. But in the end your sort of left saying, “okay, so what?”
The film has been ripped apart for all sorts of historical inaccuracies, but I am not going to dive into this aspect of the film, as cataloging them would not only dominate this review, but extend it far beyond normal length. Lets just say there were some errors, but truthfully, I am not about to set down and log them all.
There are two ways to look at historical errors of this type. The attack on Pearl Harbor, the path leading to the attack, the US response, all of it is well-documented but it is also complex, thus errors are somewhat understandable. However, on the flip side of the coin, the filmmaker, in this case Michael Bay signed up for the job. If you sign on for a history piece of this kind you have to be ready to be a anal retentive freak about minor details, but there are a-holes that live to point out small flaws, and they go into a nirvana like transcendence if they can find big ones. They run to the internet and scream with delight. Many will argue that we must hold films of this kind accountable, and so on, or people will have misconceptions about history. There is some truth in this, but one must not go too far, or one ends up looking like an a freak.
Yet, there is another problem, almost larger than even the casting of Ben Affleck. This movie is 3 hours long. In order for a film to pull that off, it has to be really good. I feel that most folks would agree on this point. Consuming three hours of someone’s time is asking a lot and you should deliver. Pearl Harbor, delivers here and there, but not consistently.
Pearl Harbor is escapist fun, wrapping itself in the flag and pretending to be an important movie. That is uncool and that is why I am irritated with Bay and everyone involved. You make the movie three hours long, full of characters that we don’t care about and then you put Ben Affleck in it? Come on Bay what did we ever to do you?
Story C-
Acting C-
Visuals B (At time there are some really nice shots in this film. Kate Beckinsale is almost hypnotic to look at, but this probably isn’t going to be of help for everyone.)
Originality/Innovation D+
Enjoyability Grade C-
Home Theater/HD Factor B
Overall Grade C-
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