Giant Robots

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PACIFIC RIM-2013-Earth is invaded by giant prehistoric like monsters from another dimension. Dubbed "Kaiju", mankind counters by building "Jaegers", Transformer like giant robots controlled by two pilots whose minds link when they operate it. Charlie Hunnam (SONS OF ANARCHY) plays Raleigh Becket whose brother dies in battle with a monster. He winds up working in Alaska but is called back 5 years later when the government shuts down the program. The remaining Jaegers are deployed to Hong Kong where the project former leader Stacker Pentecost (Idris Elba; THOR's Heimdall) has a plan to destroy the invaders. Along the way Becket meets Mako (Rinko Kikuchi; BABEL) another pilot tortured by child-hood memories of a Kaiju attack.

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Despite a couple of long stretches of character development and some comic humor that doesn't really work, PACIFIC RIM has some of the best SFX I've ever seen and the battle scenes take it to another level.  Director/co-writer Guillermo del Toro went on to make THE SHAPE OF WATER. Ron Perelman (who starred in the two HELLBOY by del Toro) is in it too. 

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The Devil's Backbone

THE DEVIL’S BACKBONE-2001-This supernatural ghost story from Spain is great! After his father is killed in The Spanish Civil War, a young boy named Carlos (Fernando Tielve) goes to an orphanage run by the kindly Prof. Casares (Fererico Luppi: he starred in John Sayles’ MEN WITH GUNS) and his unfaithful one legged wife. They also have a small cache of gold that the slimy caretaker (Edvardo Noriega) is after. Besides the usual peer pressure and bullying the orphanage seems to be haunted by the spirit of a dead boy.

Director Guillermo del Toro (CRONOS, MIMIC, HELLBOY) doesn’t allow the story to get lost in visual effects and creates some mesmerizing scenes.

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It Might Bug You

MIMIC-(1997)-Some people like insects. Love 'em or hate 'em Guillermo del Toro's MIMIC at the very least will make your skin crawl.

A entomologist (Oscar winner Mira Sorvino) accidently creates a mutant type cockroach that likes to eat humans. It's pretty routine until the fairly exciting climax in an old subway terminal where blood, guts and gore fly. Charles Dutton is on hand as a cop who says "fuck" a lot. Jeremy Northam (who was in ARMISTAD the same year) is Sorvino's boyfriend- doctor who whispers most of his lines. Giancarlo Gianini hangs around too. You could do worst....

Del Toro's next effort was the excellent THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE and then BLADE 2.

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