Pretty good, once it got started

Rating: 6/10 (20 September 2007)

Okay, the movie is called "Pearl Harbour" not "Some guy screws his buddy's girlfriend". Sheesh! get on with the frickin' story. This movie is basically a really cheesy chick flick disguised as a war movie for the first 1/2 of the film.
It's not just that this is a chick flick... it's not even a very good one. The characters do stupid things and react in shallow ways to the situation, and we're supposed to "feel" for their predicament. Sorry, dude. I'm not a 14 year-old girl.
And don't get me started on how the 1940s women were carrying on like a bunch of bone-hungry sexually-liberated women of the 1990s. That was beyond nauseating.
But once the actual story gets started, about 90 minutes in, this movie is pretty good. Very dramatic, very intense visuals, lots of heart. It does what every war movie should: paying tribute to the courage of the brave and noble, while trying to find meaning behind the actions of "the bad guys".
If not for the whole romantic "subplot" which pretty much dominates most of the film, this would have been nearly a classic. As it stands, I was sitting there with my testicles retreating for cover from the barrage of estrogen-fueled "feelings" and wondering if Mrs. Bay was the one who really directed this thing.
When I watch the DVD, I start it from the morning of the attack and it's a perfectly fine movie.