Godzilla (2014)

• Year: 2014
• Released: 16 May 2014
• Country: United States, Japan
• Adwords: 7 wins & 31 nominations
• IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0831387/
• Rotten Tomatoes: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/Godzilla
• Metacritics: https://www.metacritic.com/movie/godzilla
• Available in: 3D, 720p, 1080p
• Language: English, Japanese
• MPA Rating: PG-13
• Genre: Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
• Runtime: 123 min
• Writer: Ishirô Honda, Takeo Murata, Shigeru Kayama
• Director: Gareth Edwards
• Cast: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Bryan Cranston
• Keywords: remake, monster, japan, san francisco, california, disaster movie,

	6.4/10
	62/100
	15% – Critics
	28% – Audience

Godzilla Storyline

As the story opens in Japan, we find dedicated nuclear power-plant manager Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston) so caught up in his work that he forgets it’s his birthday. Sending his young son Ford off to school before reporting to the plant with his wife Sandra (Juliette Binoche), who works in the reactor, Joe begins to suspect that some suspiciously patterned seismic activity may be something more sinister than shifting tectonic plates He’s right, too, because when the plant goes into meltdown mode and Sandra gets caught on the wrong side of the containment door, a massive cover-up ensues. Fifteen years later, Ford (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) has become a bomb-disposal expert in the U.S. military. He’s just returned home to his wife Elle (Elizabeth Olsen) and their son Sam (Carson Bolde) when he gets word that Joe been arrested in Japan. Long estranged from his father, who was written off as a conspiracy theorist for his failed efforts to prove the Japanese government was attempting to hide something about the earlier disaster, Ford nevertheless ventures to Japan to get him out of jail, and reluctantly agrees to join him in traveling to their old home in the quarantined zone. Subsequently taken into custody, the pair end up in the very plant where Joe used to work, and where scientists Dr. Ichiro Serizawa (Ken Watanabe) and Vivienne Graham (Sally Hawkins) are studying a massive cocoon-like structure that appears to feed on radiation. The situation turns critical when the events of the present begin to mirror those of the past, and a terrifying winged-creature dubbed a “MUTO” is unleashed. Meanwhile, as the military attempts to devise a plan to destroy the beast, signals indicate that it had been calling out to something before it broke free, and the scientists learn that it has awoken a towering, godlike leviathan that has lied dormant for centuries, and may be mankind’s only hope for restoring the balance of nature..

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Godzilla Movie Reviews

See this on the big screen – it’s worth it

This isn’t the usual kind of disaster action movie. It’s a bit more serious and the disaster scenes aren’t rushed. It’s better to see this on a big screen because some of it is in the dark or under dusky skies.

Effects are good not dizzying or overdone. The assorted monsters move naturally and are relatively realistic. The various locations from Japan to Hawaii are nicely done too though SanFrancisco could have been a bit brighter during the destruction. The Golden Gate and other landmarks aren’t that precise but I get that things had to be spread out to accommodate the monsters.

The basic plot isn’t needlessly complicated though I got a bit lost in the details with the tactics to kill the monsters and the nuclear link to the monsters. The story about the people is secondary to the monsters which is good as it doesn’t intrude.

The main character played by a sensitive looking Aaron Taylor Johnson isn’t some superhero type saving the day. He is more a in the thick of things observer which is refreshing for a change. No way out bravado here.

Elisabeth Olsen isn’t a drop dead gorgeous love interest, more every day ordinary. Her screen time isn’t that much. Bryan Cranston (why didn’t he age?) and Juliette Binoche (who did her hair?) also lend solid support.

Ken Watanabe looks right for his part but his diction isn’t clear enough for relaying the plot through dialog.

Overall it’s a good solid and well made big screen action disaster monster movie that deserves a big screen watch.

Satisfying Summer Blockbuster

I saw the trailers for this a year ago while I attended a screening for Aronofsky’s NOAH . I didn’t fancy it much . GODZILLA conjures up memories of the big budget blandfest from a decade and a half ago . Just put some CGI on screen and voilà you’ve a Summer blockbuster . This version did get a very good average rating when it opened , something in the region 8.1 but progressively got lower and it now has a rating of 6.6 indicating something average . To be fair I went in with an open mind and did find myself enjoying things more than I probably expected

The original GODZILLA from 1954 was of a course a Japanese film that used the monster as a metaphor for the bomb . It did quickly abandon this subtext and just became a long running franchise where the titular monster got involved in all sorts of battles with other giant monsters . In its favour Gareth Edwards version of GODZILLA does keep the ethos of this . Radiation is very much to the fore of the story and while Godzilla might not be the hero he’s certainly not the villain and this is reserved for “Massive Unidentified Terreistial Organism” a sort of hybrid between a giant praying mantis and a dragon . You know at one point they’re going to be meeting in a climatic battle

Of course two hours of giant CGI creatures getting in to a punch up isn’t going to resonate with an audience so Edwards includes a very human backdrop as the story takes place through the eyes of serviceman Ford Brody . You got to love that name , it’s sounds like a character John Wayne was born to play , a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do , get off your horse and drink your milk etc . It wasn’t until I found out after seeing the film that I found out Brody is played by English actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson who I was totally convinced was one hundred per cent Uncle Sam . That said this isn’t an actors type of film and I’m speculating that the casting of Cranston and Binoche might have led to the backlash by many people . If you want to see Binoche try not to be blink because you will literally miss her . It’s also difficult not to notice that there’s a strong streak of manipulation as to how the characters play out . It’s also yet another film where a little kid is used in a scene to keep the audiences emotions on tenterhooks

Regardless of this people watch a film like GODZILLA for action set pieces and you can’t really fault Edwards for what he’s done here . He doesn’t have a idiosyncratic quirk to his directorial style and the film does have that kind of Summer blockbuster look but he also previously directed MONSTERS and that movie featured a couple of aliens mating and here the MUTOs have a similar though much more shorter sequence . If you need a film calling for alien reproduction I can see Gareth Edwards being a natural auteur

Mixed feelings, inevitably

When I heard that the American studios were producing a new GODZILLA movie, I had mixed feelings about it. Their previous GODZILLA film, made in 1998, was absolutely execrable. The director of this new version was Gareth Edwards, who previously made the low budget MONSTERS, which I wasn’t too keen on. And as a massive fan of the various Japanese film series, how could the Americans possibly hope to do the subject justice? The answer is that they don’t, at least not really. Only in the last half an hour of the film does this become a GODZILLA film properly; until that point, it feels more like MONSTERS 2. Edwards obviously has a passion for huge-sized beasties, but as a film-maker he leaves me cold. Much of the running time here consists of following around an absolutely dull, one-dimensional American family who have little to do with the actual big events of the film.

Thus we get Bryan Cranston grieving his wife, Elizabeth Olsen randomly working in a hospital, and an annoying kid lurking around. The worst of the lot is the erstwhile lead, Aaron Taylor-Johnson (KICK ASS) who gives the singularly most wooden performance I’ve seen in a while. What a poor choice of actor for the lead role, and what a pointless role to begin with anyway. Ken Watanabe is considerably better, but under used in a show of tokenism.

As for Godzilla, he has a couple of beetle-like enemies to contend with here, and the creations are larger than ever. Inevitably CGI is used to animate the monsters and the result is visually impressive; enough money has gone into it to make this a dark and brooding visual experience. As I said before, though, it’s only in the action of the last half hour that this starts feeling truly like a Japanese GODZILLA film, which is what I was hoping for the whole time. You could excise the whole, somewhat pointless, first hour and a half and still get the same result.