The Pacific (HBO Miniseries) [Blu-ray]
The Pacific (HBO Miniseries) [Blu-ray]
The Pacific is an epic 10-part miniseries that delivers a realistic portrait of WWII’s Pacific Theatre as seen through the intertwined odysseys of three U.S. Marines - Robert Leckie, John Basilone and Eugene Sledge. The extraordinary experiences of these men and their fellow Marines take them from the first clash with the Japanese in the haunted jungles of Guadalcanal, through the impenetrable rain firests of Cape Gloucester, across the blasted coral strongholds of Peleliu, up the black sand terraces of Iwo Jima, through the killing fields of Okinawa, to the triumphant, yet uneasy, return home after V-J Day. The viewer will be immersed in combat through the intimate perspective of this diverse, relatable group of men pushed to the limit in battle both physically and psychologically against a relentless enemy unlike any encountered before.
User Ratings and Reviews
4 Stars Story was good, but no Band of Brothers
I mirror the same comments of those who found it hard to connect with the characters portrayed in The Pacific. But, at the end of the series, unlike Band of Brothers, I think the mission of the mini-series was to portray the misery of the war in the Pacific as the main “character”. For that, I think the work hit the mark. But personally speaking, what made Band of Brothers one of my all time favorites was the sense of connection with all of the characters while portraying the good and bad of war. I do look forward for the release of the BD as I cannot wait to hear it in a more lossless format.
2 Stars Can’t Live Up To Band Of Brothers : (
Coming from someone who loved Band of Brothers with a passion (5 STARS), the second installment by the name of The Pacific fell along way short of entertaining me. From the very first episode this show had little steam and I was slightly concerned about the rough start it had as the characters introduced were in no way like-able, and the story a little bit hard to follow. But I was sure they would get me back into it with the following shows, I mean after all it was only the first episode. Well I was wrong. The rest of them were kind of similar. I felt in the Band Of Brothers that the story was very exciting and the characters were fun to follow because they were all very interesting and memorable.(of-course it helped that there were A-list actors, which there are none of in Pacific) The story in Pacific is unfortunately very dry and boring. Nothing really ever happens, except for when the occasional fighting sequence breaks out.(Few and far between) And that would even be okay with me but the freakin’ battle scenes are even hard to follow. In B.O.B. the fight scenes are fantastic, jaw dropping, edge of your seat, felt like I was there in the mix, makes me want to grab a rifle and help my fellow band of brothers. In Pacific the camera moves way too fast. You don’t really get a good idea what’s happening, the camera is sometimes too far away or shaking or whatever. On a different note The Marines I felt were portrayed in a slightly insulting light. Lets face it. Marines are war machines in the best of physical and mental condition, and bad Mother Bleeps! These guys in Pacific appear wimpy, scrawny, a little effeminate at times. They don’t remind me of “Leather Necks” at all. And you know what? There are episodes believe it or not, where nothing at all happens. NOTHING! And that right there is why I have to(not want to) have to give 2 of 5 Stars.
1 Stars The Pacific: too much ado about nothing.
I rated this mini-series one star, in honor of those who fell during the war in the Pacific. I you invest 220 million US dollars in a mini-series, you’d expect the main characters to be portrayed with a minimum of depth. Some battle scenes were depicted in a reasonable way, but the sum of its parts, is less than what we expected from Spielberg and Hanks, who did a great job with Band of Brothers. Maybe the problem lies just there: after Band of Brothers, you’d expect at least the same quality with The Pacific. Unfortunately, Spielberg and Hanks failed to privide the goods.They tried to combine a more personal touch, by showing the characters with their families and added a few sex scenes. This didn’t raise the quality of The Pacific. It’s true that Band of Brothers didn’t show any family background scenes with its main characters, but that didn’t prevent from Band of Brothers to be one of the best mini-series ever, if not THE best. If you already invest so much money, efforts and time in a mini-series(overfour years), how is it possible to STILL produce a dud? It only proves that even uber-producers Spielberg and Hanks can make mistakes. The Pacific was such a huge mistake.
5 Stars Television’s finest ten hours
I watched each every brilliabnt episode of HBO’s The Pacific and found on more than one occasion tears were streaming down my face by the end of the one hour. The series was an astounding study of the war in the Pacific theatre, but more a profoundly moving work on the loss of innocence of the young men who fought there in the mud and rain so bravely. The performance of Jos Mazzola (the kid in Jurassic Park) was superb and I am amazed he was snubbed for an Emmy nomination. One could see the innocence and small town boy becoming a hardened killer as the light in his eyes slowly goes out. His breakdown in the woods with father tore my heart out because what his father had dreaded had come to pass…his son had given up a part of his soul. Rami Malick was brilliant as “Snafu” the cocky soldier who becomes Mazzola’s best friend, and even when they seem to hate one another there is never any doubt they have one another’s backs, and there time will be forever remebered. War buddies…they shared something we will never understand. When Snafu leaves and cannot wake his friend to say goodbye we understand it is because he does not how to say it, how can they have shared the depths of hell they have shared and then part ways?? Better to say nothing. Just a brilliant bit of television from the masters of the art form, HBO. A stunning achievement.
2 Stars The Good, the Bad and the Boring
As production values go, this show has everything in abundance. It even puts most motion pictures to shame.
Pitty it didn’t have a script that was of the same value.
In fact it failed badly in so many ways that I have no interest in buying the set, regardless of collecting War Movies in general.
Comparison with Band of Brothers is unavoidable and also highlights its failiure. In BoB it is Easy Company that is the true central character of the show. We get to know Easy through its fighting men, but the story has a fixed background that we can associate with and character development is easy to follow. In the end you almost feel as part of the unit. In HBO Pacific no paticular unit is followed and instead we get a summary of the Pacific Campaign seen through various (and certainly variously interesting) characters. This means we do not get to follow the same characters all through except in a disjointed way. So all through the show I never felt becoming a part of anything.
Then the show does something amazing. It seems to try to cater to everyone? We have episdoes which almost have no place in a War drama like Episode 3 where the brave marines spend an entire episode trying to invade Australian Women. Worse the focus becomes entirely devoted to a single rather boring character, melhancoly and depressed. At the time the show uses this paticular characters memoirs as a base but really if Episode 3 hadn’t been there it not only would not have been missed but probably would have been a better show, or better if it had been crammed into 10 minutes before getting back into action. But it was Episode 4 that almost killed all interest in the show for me. Having already suffered from watching Episode 3 then Episode 4 started out o.k. with action at Cape Gloucester where the main enemy is the jungle itself. 10 minutes in and I had forgiven Episode 3. But then the script writers flushed a good start down the toilet and we get to follow our melhancoly lover Lechie to a field hospital where he spends the rest of the Episode in a mental ward in his customary depressed way. Imagine watching BoB and the Bastonge Episodes had focused on Buck recovering from an arse wound rather than what happend in Bastonge and you wouldn’t be far off. After being subjected to Episodes 3 and 4 the series start to focus on a new character and even if there was more action to follow the series failed to engage me from then on. Episode 8 is called Iwo Jima, except it has almost no Iwo Jima but again is focusing on some love drama. Boy.
High production value and a sad script make this a watcher but hardly a collectable and if you never see it, it is no great loss. Seems the Pacific is a little cursed when it comes to movie making with Pearl Harbor, Windtalkers, Flags of Our Fathers and now the Pacific.
Filed under: Blue Ray Movie Reviews