Godzilla (2014) review

Almost two decades ago in 1998, TriStar made the first major attempt at an American-produced ‘Godzilla’ film (not counting the American-produced cuts to a few of Toho’s original films)… and as we all know, that one didn’t turn out that well and it is pretty much universally despised. While I’m not as critical on it as a lot of people are (probably because I’m not that big of a Godzilla fan, having only seen the original film (after seeing the 1998 film first, for the record)), I too agree that quite frankly, it just wasn’t a ‘Godzilla’ film. Even Toho knew that the creature in that film wasn’t Godzilla and renamed it ‘Zilla’ when it was featured in 2004’s ‘Godzilla: Final Wars’, where the real Godzilla easily kicked its butt. That film was, at the time, the last Godzilla film… until a decade later. Now all eyes are on this new ‘Godzilla’ film, directed by Gareth Edwards, who had previously directed the independent flick ‘Monsters’. I haven’t seen that film, but with a title like that, Edwards definitely sounds like a good choice to helm this new ‘Godzilla’… and overall, he definitely delivers one heck of a monster film. I’m not going to say that it’s ‘perfect’, but at the end of the day, it’s easily miles above the 1998 film.

In 1999, seismic activity starts to occur at the Janjira nuclear plant near Tokyo, Japan resulting in the entire facility falling into ruin. While reports claim that this was caused by an earthquake, the plant’s former supervisor Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston), who lost his wife Sandra (Juliette Binoche) during the accident, believes that something else was the cause of it and 15 years later, he and his son Ford (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), an explosive ordinance disposal officer with the U.S. Navy, return to the area to investigate further into the matter. There, they discover that the real cause for the accident wasn’t an earthquake, but a giant winged creature referred to as a ‘Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organism’ (MUTO for short). The MUTO ends up escaping, along with a second MUTO, resulting in the military trying to figure out a way to destroy the creatures before they completely ravage the United States. But they soon find out that something else is hunting the MUTOs and this creature could possibly be the only thing that can stop them, and that creature is… Godzilla!

Fans of the franchise might be a little disappointed that Godzilla doesn’t show up until an hour in and that the film itself focuses more on the human characters (more on that in a bit). But overall, Edwards really delivers when it comes to monster vs. monster action… though I wish that during the first few fights between Godzilla and the MUTOs, the film wouldn’t cut away from it. Seriously, there are at least two different times during this film when a fight between Godzilla and the MUTOs is about to occur… and then it cuts away. That scene in the trailer where Godzilla is roaring as a shelter’s doors are about to close? Well, in the film, the doors close during an actual fight. Thankfully, that’s not a problem during the later fights and with that in mind the action was excellent and was pretty solidly-lit considering that most of the fights do take place at night. Overall this film’s Godzilla certainly fits the description of the character quite well and even though it is all CGI… damn that CGI is really good. As for the other monsters, the MUTOs, they look good too but they’re kind of lackluster compared to the other monsters in the Godzilla film franchise and I wish the filmmakers would’ve pitted him against something like Mothra or Rodan.

I’m finding that the general consensus for this film is similar to that of ‘Pacific Rim’ last year; great action but lackluster character development. Well, just like with that film, I ask this… why is that necessarily a problem? Because, again like that film, this film delivers on what it promises; Godzilla and monster fights. In fact, while I haven’t seen any of the other Godzilla film aside from the original, from what I can gather… that’s sort of the point with these films in the first place… though like I said earlier, this one sort of focuses more on the human characters. To the writers’ credit, they at least gave a decent amount of character development… nothing really noteworthy, mind you, but it’s not like this film is completely ‘devoid’ of character. For that matter, the cast is fairly solid; some unfortunately don’t get much to do, like the two main actresses, Elizabeth Olsen and Sally Hawkins (especially in Olsen’s case as the wife of Ford Brody), but there’s also some really good performances from Ken Watanabe and Bryan Cranston. For the record though, Cranston’s only in the film for about 10-15 minutes but even then he does make the most out of his short screen-time. The movie instead focuses on his son, Ford, and while I will agree that he’s not the most compelling lead, Aaron Taylor-Johnson does a fair job here.

If you’re still having bad memories of the 1998 American ‘Godzilla’ film, I believe you’re going to be more satisfied with this take on the character. It certainly is far more fitting to bear the title ‘Godzilla’ than that other film. Godzilla himself looks fantastic, he definitely has the qualities that the character is known for, and the film itself certainly delivers on some fantastic monster action. My only complaint though would be that the film cuts away from the fights quite a lot early on, which wouldn’t be a problem if it was just done once but it’s actually done a few times. But even with that in mind, this is definitely a pretty solid addition to the Godzilla franchise and I’m definitely looking forward to a sequel (they just announced one, so it looks like it is happening). If so, I hope that this next one gives us more monster action and heck, maybe another one of Godzilla’s famous fellow monsters (there’s a pretty neat Mothra reference in here so it’s possible). Also, maybe Toho can be a bit more involved in this one seeing how they are the company responsible for this franchise in the first place? Still, overall, this film serves as a really nice, and much deserved, return to form for the ‘King of the Monsters’.

Rating: 4/5