Excuse Me While I (Spoiler-Free) Rant About Godzilla (Minus One) · 10:38pm Dec 7th, 2023
And now for something a little different. This is going to be a long one, folks.
So this past weekend I went to see Godzilla Minus One. It’s the first movie I’ve gone to watch in four years. For those of you not even aware this was a thing, have a trailer:
There are multiple trailers out there, but I picked the one I felt represented the movie’s actual content best. Now, I should make note that I am by no means a huge Godzilla fanboy. I’ve seen extremely few of the older movies, and didn’t really start paying attention until the 2014 movie. I always liked the concept of Godzilla and read a lot about it in the past, but that was as far as it went. I generally liked the 2014 movie and thought the 2019 King of Monsters was a lot of shallow fun. Godzilla vs. Kong was kind of a letdown though; I felt the underlying story was just too dumb, and if that was the direction it was going then I had no more investment in the series. I have zero interest in Godzilla X Kong. I’ve written off all future Legendary Godzilla material, much in the same way I wrote off all Marvel content post Infinity Wars.
Then I was reminded that Toho was releasing this, a reimagining of the original movie. I figured, why not give the Japanese version a shot?
Holy shit, guys. It’s like night and day.
When I think of Godzilla movies, I think of giant monsters destroying cities and each other and that’s it. No deeper story, no interesting characters, just dumb monster fun. Godzilla Minus One is not that. At all. Don’t get me wrong, there’s definitely a giant monster destroying a city, but a dumb action flick it isn’t.
There were a lot of moments within the movie that were highlights, but the point that really told me I was seeing something special: the atomic breath. Godzilla is going on his rampage through Ginza, Tokyo, and he unleashes his signature attack. For every Godzilla movie I’ve ever seen, these scenes are moments of fun. “Oh, look at the big monster crushing the city, my inner manchild thinks this is so cool!”
I didn’t feel that this time. No, when Godzilla unleashed his atomic breath on the city, I felt… alarmed. A feeling in my gut that said “this is horrible.” I felt small, a little scared, and very worried.
In that moment, Godzilla himself was actually frightening. I didn’t even know that was possible.
Which brings us to the question: why is this Godzilla frightening? There are a lot of factors at play, and the fact that the creators were able to evoke so many things in this movie is proof positive that this? This is a good movie. Not a good Godzilla movie. Not a good action movie. Just a good movie. Period.
Let’s start with the opposite of everything you expect to care about in a Godzilla movie: the people. This movie is set in Tokyo immediately after World War II. Tokyo, for those of you whose history classes utterly failed you, was nothing in this time period. The whole city had been practically destroyed by American firebombing. Japan is a shadow of its former self, its military is being forcibly dismantled, everyone’s poor as dirt.
The (non-kaiju) star is Kōichi (that’s ko-ee-chee, for those of you illiterate in romaji), a kamikaze pilot who chickened out and faked plane troubles to escape his suicide mission. He was also one of the only two survivors of an early Godzilla attack on a small island airbase just before the war ended. This man runs the entire show. He’s not a distraction from the action, he is the action, even when no action is taking place. He spends the entire movie struggling with survivor’s guilt, PTSD, and the shame of his past failure. He’s berated as a coward by his next door neighbor, a woman who lost her entire family in the firebombing, and is too kindhearted to kick out a vagrant woman and the orphan she found after the bombs fell. He is surrounded by this colorful cast of characters and many others who all face their own problems. They grow. They evolve. They lean on one another, and it becomes impossible not to start rooting for them as a whole.
This is something that Godzilla 2014 tried and failed to do: make us care about the people. Kōichi and those around him are beaten down by the events in this movie again and again and again, constantly struggling to survive and make better lives in a country that is barely scraping by even before a giant monster comes along. Yes, there are long periods without Godzilla around, but I didn’t care because the lives of these characters were so compelling.
As one video reviewer commented: you could take Godzilla out of this picture completely and make it solely about Kōichi and his personal struggles and you would still have a great movie.
The themes are many and pervasive. Overcoming your own demons, finding hope amidst seemingly endless losses, self-forgiveness, risking everything because it’s necessary, taking fate in your own hands, finding value in family, and more. All of it delightfully told via excellent visuals, excellent acting, excellent pacing, excellent… hell, everything. As yet another video reviewer noted, even if you felt the movie goes a little long (at 2 hours 5 minutes), trying to find something to cut feels impossible because every moment just works.
And when Godzilla finally does show up, it is still a spectacle. This movie cost around $15 million to make (compare that to King of Monsters ~$170 million budget) and yet it looks amazing. Takashi Yamazaki demonstrates that you don’t need to break the bank to make kaiju look great. They must have stretched the use of every single yen to make a movie look this good on such a tiny budget.
And this Godzilla is, himself, different. He’s meaner, more aggressive. He’s not getting back at a country for its wrongs, he’s not defending himself. Hell, in one scene it seems like he’s destroying these seemingly helpless boats all alone in the open ocean for sport. Then he shows up in a Tokyo that hasn’t even finished rebuilding from the war and destroys all their hard work that we’ve spent the last hour watching the Japanese people struggle through.
And that’s why the atomic breath moment hit so hard. We’ve been there, watching these wartorn, struggling, heartbroken people trying to make their way back to some semblance of normalcy for two years, and this dick just not only wiped all that progress away but actually set them even further back than they’d already been.
Godzilla Minus One. Because the people were already starting at zero, and Godzilla just brought them even lower than that.
That’s the other thing Godzilla 2014 was unable to do. This movie found a balance between the plot value of Godzilla and the plot value of the human characters. Again, I’m no expert in Godzilla movies, but from the copious review videos I’ve watched since I saw the movie this is apparently something that every Godzilla movie has struggled with since the original 1954 incarnation.
Speaking of the 1954 movie: what’s the point of Godzilla? Godzilla usually if not always represents something. In the 1954 movie he represented the threat of nuclear proliferation. In 2001 a Godzilla emerged who represented the fury of soldiers whose lives were lost fruitlessly in WWII. The Monsterverse Godzilla represents the ultimate power of nature. So what does Minus One’s Godzilla represent?
I’ve seen a few theories relating to this topic, but the one I like the most is that this Godzilla represents trauma. Something that you keep trying to get over, only for it to return again and again and knock you back down every time. Everyone in this movie has something they lost due to the war and are struggling to get over it, to overcome the grief, to find a new ‘normal’. Some, as a critical near-end scene demonstrates, never do. And the film stresses that this failure is normal, it’s not something to condemn, and you can’t force the solution. If you’re going to overcome your trauma, you will need the support of others but, ultimately, will have to take the final step yourself.
Does that sound like a potent theme for a mere monster movie? Yeah, it is. Because this is not merely a monster movie.
I would also like to point out the effectiveness of the music and, in particular, Godzilla’s theme, which shows up twice in the movie. If you’ve watched any of the Monsterverse Godzilla movies, you may recall this tune. In King of the Monsters, hearing it as Godzilla marches on Boston with jet fighters flying to his aid against King Ghidorah gave this certain badass “this is awesome” feel to it, did it not?
When the Godzilla theme finally hits for the first time in Godzilla Minus One, it doesn’t feel badass. There’s no sense of awesomeness. There is only an uncomfortable realization that things are about to go to shit for a lot of good people. It’s a complete thematic turnaround from what I was accustomed to when hearing that song, and I guarantee you it’s going to have a lot more staying power. Which is all my roundabout way of declaring that the musical direction in this movie is great too.
There are a few things that did come off as odd or as mistakes. For example, in one late scene they try to do a bit of foreshadowing and being sneaky, but it really doesn’t work. If you caught the hints not five minutes before and are paying even the slightest amount of attention, then that scene effectively spoils the rest of the movie. It’s a done deal and you’re just waiting for it to happen. It was, at least in terms of storytelling, perhaps the low point of the movie.
Well, I say that, but I saw a handful of movie reviewers claim the ending surprised them. Maybe they were lying through their teeth. Maybe I’m just better at this plot prediction stuff. Who knows?
There’s also this scene where Kōichi learns that Godzilla is attacking the nearby city of Ginza. He has a friend over there. And somehow we’re expected to believe that in spite of the great distance, the trains being out (and in pieces), and total panic in the streets, he manages to find his friend in the knick of time before they can become a smear under Godzilla’s foot.
So… yes, there is a little bit of movie magic going on.
There’s also the quirkiness of Godzilla’s movements on land. Throughout much of the movie, he’s a fast juggernaut, whipping around and destroying everything in his vicinity. But then there are moments where he’s walking forward and he’s almost robotic, taking one… big… clumsy… step… at… a… time. I get the feeling this was intended as a nod to older renditions of the character, something to catch the attention of true Godzilla aficionados. If that’s the case then, y’know, I get it. I’m told a lot of things in this movie were designed with that in mind (in fact I think one aerial shot might have been a direct recreation of a scene from a previous movie). But that doesn’t stop it from looking really weird when not thirty minutes ago he was smashing through Tokyo with far more grace.
It doesn’t matter. Given how compelling the characters and their personal stories are, I’m willing to accept a little movie magic and awkward moments. It doesn’t change that this is easily among the best movies I’ve seen in years. I’m not the only one leveling that kind of praise at it either. Gareth Edwards, who directed Godzilla 2014, said he was jealous of it. Lifelong Godzilla fans all over the internet are declaring it the best Godzilla movie ever made. Everyone, critics and audiences alike, Godzilla fans or not, love this movie.
So do I. After I watched it I was disappointed only because I didn’t have anyone to gush to over it in the radioactive afterglow (hence this blog). If you have any interest whatsoever in going to see movies on the big screen and/or are tired of the trash being shoveled out by Hollywood these days, go watch this. It’s like a breath of fresh air.
On that note, I have to warn you all that this is a limited time offer. When originally released, the shocking intention was to only keep Godzilla Minus One in theaters for a week. You read that right, one week, and then only in a limited number of theaters. There are a lot of reasons I’ve heard for this. One is that the theaters doubt the staying power of foreign films, despite the fact that they often do wonderfully. There’s also the fact that you can only see the movie subtitled, and God forbid we expect moviegoers to have to read while watching a movie! I didn’t actually know about this tiny window until about Wednesday of this week, else I would have posted this on Monday when I first wrote it.
The good news: because it is dominating at the box office, Toho and the theaters have extended the time (and number of theaters) in which the movie will be available, supposedly until year’s end. You’ve still got a chance to see it. But it won’t go into 2024. Apparently this is because Legendary Pictures and Toho have a contractual deal to not have one another’s Godzilla movies in American theaters in the same calendar year, and Godzilla X Kong is set to come out in April. So yeah, if you want to experience the joy of seeing this movie on the big screen, you’ve got until the end of the month. (EDIT: Just saw they've only extended it to the 14th. If it continues to rule the box office (pun not intended) they may extend it again, but I wouldn't take the risk if I were you.)
Go see it. You’ll regret it otherwise. I’m seriously considering going again this weekend.
That’s it for this rant. Stay tuned next week for a down-on-his-luck stallion discovering his true calling, Rainbow Dash and Angel Bunny calling a truce, and the compelling adventures of Equestria’s greatest toaster repair pony.
Need some editing done? Working on a story and not sure how it’s shaping up? I’m now doing editing and critique commissions! Check here for more information and PM me if interested.
Godzilla's janky walking is easily explained by the fact that he is primarily an aquatic creature. Even when we first see him on Odo Island, he came from the sea. So it didn't bother me too much.
I'm still hoping for a sequel for Godzilla's proper 70th anniversary next year. The ending all but says outright that this war has only just begun.
I think it says a lot about how much I've checked out of paying attention to the MonsterVerse (to be honest, I stopped being checked in after Godzilla: KotM – a debut film I liked and a sequel during through that barely counts, does it?) that, while I knew there was another film coming, I didn't even know it was another Godzilla vs Kong bout, nor the title, nor even the release date. How utterly, utterly telling.
The film isn't out here until next week, but I am so happy to see it cleaning up at the box office for a Japanese-language Godzilla film (like, it's going to be close to its Japanese gross!), and all the adoration in the responses from people and critics alike. Godzilla himself looks so impressive in the visuals for this kind of budget, and everything I've heard suggests it's absolutely a case of every moment he appears having huge and deliberate impact that, coupled with the strong human story, you don't mind one bit of his proportional screentime (which is frankly true of the majority of Godzilla films – even in the ones that are just committed to being dopey fun, monster screentime is often more limited than people assume, though there, it's not to good effect, and produces the sensation that the non-monster content should have been trimmed up to make the film as a whole shorter).
I look forward to having something of an out-of-body experience with how tense and struck this film is likely to leave me viscerally feeling. And the Big G as a proper villain too! The audience will still sympathise with him, because that is in our nature with movie monsters, but playing up the terror and horror, good for them. One point you didn't mention but I've heard in a few places is that it is often something of a direct (and successful!) riff on Jaws, and hey, I'm down for that.
The point about this film working even if you took out Godzilla is interesting, because in quite a lot of the older films, you can tell the people behind it really wanted to switch things up and do other things instead of the monster movies they were being paid to do. Alas, it usually tends to be closer to them staving off their boredom and making the resulting films a bit dissonant. The '84-95 run has something like half its entry do long riffs on particular 80's American action movies that were big hits in Japan (Terminator, Aliens and Indiana Jones are the obvious ones, though I think Top Gun gets in there too). And 2004's Godzilla: Final Wars, ostensibly a showcase for the Big G to fight dozens of his Rogue's Gallery, instead devotes far more running time to a fusion of Star Wars and The Matrix with wire-stunt battles against humans-as-aliens that is a blatant waste of time and attention.
You evidently watch a lot of video reviewers, my friend! I dunno, myself, between my fast reading speed and how insubstantial most of them are, I've largely checked out of such things. Least for new-release films; there's the odd personality I like doing really great stuff with older stuff where they don't have to be cagey about spoilers, and some of that still works for me. Still, these days I largely prefer to read the things. But I suppose, like anything that can be primarily listened to, they make for great "listen on the side" content.
Myself, I wouldn't call myself an overt Godzilla fanboy either, but I've seen enough of the flicks that I think I can recommend which prior Japanese-language ones would be worth your time. You may have already seen some of these, I don't know (in all cases, I'm talking subbed – how much the dub changes it varies from film to film, but the older especially are often cut all over). After the '54 original, 1964's Mothra Vs. Godzilla is considered the 2nd best in the franchise in most circles (that may have changed with Minus One, it's too early to say). Others from the early 50s-70s era I'd suggest as good movies period, if one is willing to roll with dopey fun to even just a small degree, would be Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster from the same year, and skipping way ahead, the duo of Godzilla Vs. Mechagodzilla and Terror of Mechagodzilla (context: from '67-'73, the series became largely kids' matinee junk food with desperately impoverished footage, to the point of recycling footage from earlier films quite a bit, but these two brought back some key personnel and almost fully transcend all that). If you like really weird stuff with unique energy, Godzilla vs. Hedorah from 1971 is trying to be psychedelia for children and ends up swerving between comedy and horror for much of its runtime (the series' regular producer was in hospital and that allowed its director to do whatever he wanted, for which he was expelled from future entries come the premiere).
The Revival Era from '84-'95 (one entry excepted) has a baseline competence of mediocrity (they are far darker than the earlier era, generally) but by the same token, only two films from that era are properly good. 1995's Godzilla vs. Destroyah is the top pick, but it also comes at the end of the series' only sustained experiment in serialised storytelling. I saw it first without any prior films, so it works regardless, and the points one benefits from knowing going in is rather small (I could rattle them off in less than a hundred words), but still. Also, emotionally, it does require knowing the '54 original quite well to land. So I'll default to 1989's Godzilla vs. Biollante there, quite a stellar flick in its own right. The Millennium Series can be skipped altogether: even the two films there I like are largely just reheated leftovers from older ones.
I got to see this movie with my dad last week, and I don't really need to say much about its praises cause holy emperor this movie was amazing from start to finish.
This particular Godzilla was just absolutely terrifying, especially when the atomic breath scene dropped, just the utter devastation it left behind was just unreal.
A solid 10/10 in my eyes
5758272
There's a "MonsterVerse?"
Which leads into an odd story. I've seen a few of the old movies and they were fine, but nothing that really grabbed me. I think I only learned the term "kaiju" when somebody mentioned it in connection with Pacific Rim (which I never saw). So I'm obviously not even a casual Big-G fan.
But it seems like everybody has been going freakin' nuts for "the new Godzilla movie", so I thought I'd give it a look. I haven't been in a movie theater since Covid, and I kinda preferred that, so my go-to was to see if I could stream it. Oh yeah, there it is... Shin Godzilla. Wait... Nobody mentioned this was political satire. Modern Tokyo? Is there going to be a flashback to 1945?
Oops. wrong movie.
But I had paid my $3 bucks to rent it, so I let it run. And... I didn't hate it, particularly when it went completely goof-ball off the rails* during the final battle. But I couldn't help thinking, right at the end, "Boy, I sure hope they keep the CMC the heck away from him!"
----------
* Yes, that is an intentional play on words, which only people who have seen the movie will understand.
5758268
I both do and do not buy that excuse. It's a good excuse, and it would make perfect sense... if it were demonstrated consistently. But more than once his movements in Tokyo felt a lot more fluid and graceful than later when he's doing the robo-walk thing.
But y'know, I could be wrong. I'm going to watch it again this weekend, Having already gone through it once I'll be able to pay better attention, and maybe I'll stand corrected.
Honestly, I'd prefer if they didn't make a direct sequel. I have little faith in anyone's ability to pull off the same level of moviemaking gold twice in a row. But I've been surprised before, so...
5758272
Actually the new movie is going to have Godzilla and Kong team up against some new threat Legendary has pulled out of their asses. It looks spectacular...ly dumb. Amusingly, their "highlight shot" in the trailer, the moment in the movie that is apparently supposed to draw the most viewers, has the two of them charging at the camera in a blatant attempt to recapture the feel of, say, Avengers. I see it and I'm like "Really, guys? Really?" They've not made near enough movies, characters, backstory, and emotional investment to warrant anything close to this, but here they are, trying to fly before they've learned to walk.
I sure as hell didn't. He was the bad guy, he was clearly the bad guy, and I'm not inclined to sympathize bad guys just because they're kaiju. And the movie doesn't do anything to make Godzilla sympathetic. The most it offers in that regard is when he gets hit by the bomb at Bikini Atoll, which A) is a scene that lasts for about three seconds, and B) was never indicated to have been a reason for Godzilla being such a jerk. At no point is there any statement about him "getting revenge" or "angered by what was done to him" or anything like that. He's just a really big and really mean monster, end of story.
So no, I did not sympathize with him. In fact I found it odd when some video reviewers out there remarked about how "it's horrible, but also still kind of cool" to see him destroying Ginza. No, it was not cool. All props to the special effects team for making it look great, but surprisingly good special effects on a shockingly modest budget doesn't make what we were seeing "cool" or something to cheer for.
That being said, I don't blame anyone for coming into a Godzilla movie with such expectations. I mean, seriously, it's a Godzilla movie. Who would expect anything else? This attitude is the result of stupid moments like in Godzilla 2014, when he and the M.U.T.O.s more of less annihilated San Fransisco in their battle and then the city reappears, magically damage-free, and the news headlines call him the savior of the city. Talk about movie magic at its worst.
Actually, no. In general I don't watch them at all, unless you count gimmick shows like Dead Meat's Kill Counts. But after leaving the theater I had nobody to gush to, so the next best thing was to go on YouTube and see what everyone else was saying about it. Some of them were good, like the ones that analyzed the film in relation to past Godzilla films, or spoke about the themes or the technical elements. But then you get the pointless ones, like the ones that say they're going to review the movie but 3/4ths of the video is them just recapping the events of the movie. It's like, c'mon guys, anyone who has seen it doesn't need the recap, and anyone who hasn't seen it doesn't want the recap. This is how you know someone's in it solely for the clicks.
I dunno, I've always been hesitant to get fully into the franchise. I feel like the older movies wouldn't really 'click' for me. I do want to see Shin Godzilla someday, just because everyone says it's one of the better ones. Still, I might be willing to give some of those a go.
5758273
I know, right?
5758292
What, you haven't seen any of the Legendary Godzilla movies? Eh, I don't blame you.I was fine with Godzilla 2014 and Skull Island, but after that it felt like they were overcompensating for their shitty storytelling ability with CG monster fights (which, to their limited credit, do look amazing).
I want to see Shin Godzilla someday, even acknowledging that the way they defeat him sounds pretty dumb. It just seems like such a different take on the character.
It seems like they're trying to move away from "straight-to-streaming" releases now and go back to the theatrical release as the mainstream (pun not intended). Don't know if they'll be able to do that. People have gotten pretty comfortable with hiding in their houses for the rest of eternity, and supposedly the cinema is really struggling as a result. But when Godzilla Minus One does eventually, inevitably end up on streaming platforms, definitely give it a go. I guarantee it's like no Godzilla movie you've otherwise heard of.
5758326
I did say the audience, and not me, for a reason, bud. You should know by now that my choice of words is always deliberate!
Ah, well, I stand corrected. That context wasn't inferable from your post anywhere.
Yeah, pretty much this. Chris once put it somewhere (I think it was when Logan started doing Text Review Roundup for people who reviewed/gave their thoughts on the latest FiM episode), that when most reviews spend 80% of their time faffing about and provide only 10-20% of actual content, and even then he can read it quicker then he can listen to it, why bother?
Oh, believe me, that was apparent. Hence me picking the cream of the crop, the ones I feel should work one way or the other, or at least be a good litmus test. Even if you did like them, the intention isn't to further get you to watch more. I'm just suggesting the ones I think can work for anyone.
And Shin Godzilla, whatever its weird attributes and somewhat nonsensical ending, is unquestionably a very strong flick. Really, it, the '54 original and this new one are kind of off in their own corner from the rest, where even when serious they tend to be shallow and just genre films. But these three, that have the Big G as a villain and lean properly into horror and tragedy, are their own things altogether.
5758328
Oh yeah, Godzilla Minus One is definitely on my must-watch list, but I'm pretty sure I will wait for streaming.
5758268
Just got back from watching the movie a second time, and I take back all I said about the land movements. On second analysis, he can turn pretty fast but his forward momentum is never that good. So yeah, the land vs. water distinction works.
I myself got back from seeing earlier, holy hell it was phenomenal. I've been a fan of Goji my whole life, I've seen a good 20 Godzilla films and hell this one tops even the original film, which always held #1 for me until today, also the scene where Godzilla destroys that boat with his atomic breath is one of my favorite shots in a Godzilla film period
5760485
You watch it and it's like "holy Ghidorah on Ice, I gotta tell people about this!", right?
5760496
exactly