unbelievably poor in every way

Rating: 2/10 (26 May 2001)

I just lost three hours plus travel time on this movie, so I'll be brief here to spare myself a bit.
I'd read the reviews and properly lowered my expectations because a couple of friends wanted to see PEARL HARBOR. Even those lowered expectations weren't met. This souless thing... yeesh. Blows every opportunity it has. It saps the buildup toward the Japanese attack of any mounting sense of dread, manages to make four love stories unbelievable (including Ben and Josh's -- hey, folks, "best buddies" is a love story whether you like it or not), makes the full-on attack pretty tensionless, and insults the first decorated black soldier by pinning it on him while he's still alive. Jon Voight is pretty good as FDR, I'll say that, but even his makeup in his first scene is bad enough to be pretty distracting (it smooths out later).
My buddies wanted to see it for the action, and we all came away disappointed. The cinematography is mostly expert, though the decision to use a flawed lens in a key hospital sequence was, well, flawed. It muddled things to have characters drifting in and out of focus as they moved about in the frame, and rather than evoking (as TRAFFIC did), it distracts. Brave idea, though.
I dearly hope I've put someone off seeing this. My sacrifice will have been worth it. And if you've decided you'll just wait for the video, I'd strongly suggest not even bothering then. It really is that poor: poor of imagination, poor of craft, poor of humanity. With an epic war movie and love story, this kills.