The script that'll live in infamy.

Rating: 3/10 (29 May 2001)

Pearl Harbor may be victim of its own hype. The promotions that
bombarded the media as merciless as the Japanese attack,
showed cheesy shots of children playing with planes that I saw
before on the last 15 minutes of the movie Armageddon. My low
expectations were met accordingly. Though the jaw-dropping
recreation of the attack of Pearl Harbor is worth the price of the
ticket alone, the movie was sandwiched with a story worthy of a
screenwriting 101 class. It all came down to money. To make the
gamble they made with the budget less risky, they softened and
dumbed down history, so the desirable audience of the same
braindead teens that make MTV so popular could watch it. The
blurry camera that was shamelessly used in scenes to mask the
gore was laughably ridiculous. The acting was worthy of a TV
movie of the week, at least they kept a straight face saying their
god-awful lines. The real life characters, not surprisingly, were
better scripted than their fictional partners, what makes me
wonder what'd happen if they based the whole story more in facts.
Pearl Harbor would've been a great movie several years ago,
before Saving Private Ryan raised the bar on war films. World War
II movies of decades past had the same cardboard stories and
characters, but they were fine for their time. At least Michael Bay
entertains us with the boomfest, and proves no other movie
director blows up stuff better than him. The moral question is that if
this real life tragedy should be made into a pop corn flick with lots
of explosions. If you want to see another World War II movie full of
possibilities, but ruined with a cheesy love triangle, walk to the end
of the hallway at the multiplex showing Pearl Harbor and catch
Enemy at the Gates.