After you've sat through three hours of "Pearl Harbor" -- 90 minutes' worth of passionless romance, 45 minutes of incessant explosions and then a seemingly endless 45-minute coda -- while your butt is screaming to get off that seat and out the door, the final bomb drops. As the credits roll -- including about 15 minutes of special-effects technicians -- they hit you with yet another of those generic adult contemporary ballads. It could have been Whitney or Mariah or any of those blowhard divas, but I think it was actually Faith Hill.
1923, a Tennessee farm; cue the Norman Rockwell cliches. Two tykes, Rafe and Danny, share an obsession with aircraft. One day they manage to take off in a crop-dusting plane. Danny's dad gives him a hiding, but Rafe -- protective of his buddy -- wallops Danny's dad with a plank.
1941, a U.S. Air force base: Rafe (Ben Affleck) and Danny (Josh Hartnett) are now hotshot flyboys. Rafe falls in love with saucy Navy nurse Evelyn (Kate Beckinsale), but Danny is too shy to score. Ever the alpha male, Rafe volunteers to fly with the RAF in defending Britain against the Blitz. He says goodbye and ships out, while Danny and Evelyn are transferred to Pearl Harbor.