Pearl Harbor

Meets the objective

Features: Ben Affleck, Josh Hartnett, Kate Beckinsale. Cuba Gooding Jr.
Director: Michael Bey
written: June '01
I swear. Some movies develop an anti-buzz before they even hit the theaters. "Anti-buzz" meaning the movie is supposed to be such a bomb that all the critics want to take their turns squatting over Pearl Harbor's film cans and see who can dump the biggest load. Armageddon , another movie directed by Michael Bey, suffered the same fate. All I can say is this is another example of "critics" getting on the pissing band wagon. Everyone else hates the movie, I don't want to rock the boat, therefore I hate it too. Kind of like Waterworld and The Last Action Hero--two movies I consider way better than what the simpering I've-got-to-follow-the-lead jerks had to say about them.

It's a three-way love story between Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett playing pre-WWII pilots falling for the same nurse played by Kate Beckinsale. So the plot is roughly similar to Titanic except for setting up just how Hartnett, childhood bud to Affleck, could also go for Beckinsale. Which brings up what I feel is the weakest aspect of the movie--not wrapping the story around Pearl Harbor, but to Silly Putty stretch it from New York City to the Battle of Britain to Pearl to the Doolittle Raid over Tokyo. If it was me, I would've concentrated the story on Pearl and made one of the men be unrequited lovers to the stunning Beckinsale.

The machinations they to use set up the Hartnett-Beckinsale relationship revolve around a plot point that is flatout wrong and would not have been done in actuality by the US military. Suffice to say that they dug themselves into a plot hole and only had a weak ladder to escape. At least Harntett and Beckinsale develop an easy going charm. Affleck is more problematic, so perhaps his further Oscar wins will continue behind the camera instead of in front.

Even if PH completely sucked, which is does not by a long shot, just to see it for the absolutely astonishing F/X is worth it in itself. The quality has been pumped up another notch. The CGI and copy/pasted real planes are utterly seamless. When a plane explodes, how they shred and the debris flying across the sky is completely realistic. So ILM makes up for their shoddy work on The Mummy Returns . Apparently executives at Disney feel the quality must go in before the name goes on, which is not the mantra preached at Universal, The Mummy Returns distributors. And it's not just the attack, it's also the Battle of Britain and the Doolittle raid on Tokyo. So it's not as if you only get F/X porno during the attack. There's breathtaking footage all thru the movie. Tough to see how this movie can lose the F/X Oscar next April. Same goes for Best Sound.

The ending is lifted right out of Star Wars :

  • Instead of Luke bombing the Death Star, we get Affleck bombing Tokyo.
  • Instead of Death Star cannons, we get Jap anti-aircraft guns
  • Instead of the Millenium Falcon, we get Hartnett's plane coming out of nowhere and to the rescue.
    (To be fair, Lucas showed early cuts of Star Wars with WWII movie footage of fighter planes since the F/X weren't done in time; so what goes around, comes around.)

    While you can rag on the sometimes cliched dialog, I see it as getting on with the show and the cliches get the point across quickly and succinctly. (That's why they become cliches.)

    While Pearl Harbor isn't perfect, you truly get a feel for what the attack and its aftermath had to've been like:

  • the complacency of the Americans
  • the cold-blooded determination of the evil empire Japanese
  • the ferocity of the attack
  • the futility of the American response
  • the horror of being trapped in a ship with the water rising and you know you are going to die
  • the hopelessness of rescuing trapped sailors
    It's been buku years since I've seen Tora! Tora! Tora!. That flick had a dry documentary feel to it and did not impart the effect of the attack like this movie does.

    While I read that Michael Bey wanted Pearl Harbor to be as historically accurate as possible, there's a fictitious strafing of the Pearl Harbor infirmary complete with nurses being killed. Why? Then there are the few American planes which managed to get in the air and fly with Star Wars' X-wing fighter capability--swooping and diving between two story buildings. Don't know P40s' capabilities, but I doubt they extended that far.

    So Bey juiced the story. And he extended the story way further than necessary. But he really and truly makes you feel You Are There.

    And that was no small accomplishment. Besides, I'd like to see how well you could do with this story of the triumph of ultimate Evil over Good and make it be all things to all people given what a huge turning point it was for America. Michael Bey has nothing to be ashamed and plenty to be proud.

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