Godzilla Retrospective Episode 2: Godzilla King of the Monsters (1956)

You know how I was with the first episode? All semi-serious and stuff? Yeah, that's going out the window from here on out. "Gojira" was a dark, serious look at the effects of nuclear weapons blah blah blah, and the rest of the franchise doesn't follow through on that much. Of course, not only do you know that already, but you're also here for some awesome kaiju fights. Well, "King of the Monsters" doesn't necessarily have that, but it does have some good American cheese to compliment the gloomy tone of "Gojira".

For those of you who don't know, and by that I mean all two of you, "Godzilla King of the Monsters" was a heavily edited, chopped down Americanized version of the original Japanese film released in 1956. "Gojira" was 96 minutes long, which is a healthy length for a monster movie that takes itself seriously. "King of the Monsters" was made to be presented as a double feature, so its run time was cut down to 78 minutes. This is the first of many signs that this is not your typical import of a foreign film. Not only that, but a lot of the Japanese lines were dubbed over and changed around, and some minor characters from the original were removed completely.

Now you may be thinking "Atlas, are you gonna rip this movie a new asshole?" Well, kind of, but I'll admit I still like it, even though it feels like a butchered version of the original with a Canadian cock thrown in for good measure. Not to mention I actually saw this version way before "Gojira", so it holds some nostalgia value for me.

Since "King of the Monsters" is basically the same movie, but with added and deleted scenes, this episode will be kind of short. But let's talk about Raymond Burr for a second, because depending on how forgiving of a person you are, he either has no purpose being in this movie, or adds a little something extra to it. I belong in the latter category, believe it or not. I think he makes for the best gay-but-acts-straight leading man in Hollywood since Rock Hudson. Although fortunately he never died of AIDS, unlike Rock Hudson. Anyways, Burr is meant to be sort of our connection to the events in "King of the Monsters". He's the closest thing we have to both the main protagonist, as well as the narrator. Other than that... he doesn't do anything. He basically stands there and tells us dumbass 'Murricans what's happening on-screen, which comes off as being rather condescending nowadays.

So back in the days when people didn't butt-fuck monkeys, dubbing was also rare. As I mentioned before, much of the original dialog had been dubbed over, although it's not as bad as you would think. Or at least not as bad as the dubs in later Showa-era Godzilla movies would get, but we'll get to those ones soon enough. I also mentioned that a lot of scenes were cut out to make way for the new Raymond Burr scenes, and this is a very mixed bag. On one hand, it does shorten the movie down to a more digestible level if you're looking to watch it as a double feature with something else. On the other hand, it also takes away from the realism (or rather, attempted realism) of the original cut. To be honest, the insertion of the Burr scenes makes the movie feel more choppy and less well edited as a whole.

Overall, it's inferior to "Gojira", no doubt about that, but it's still a good kaiju film, and a strong entry in the Showa series. Basically most of what I praised the original for remains the same here, but with a lot more flaws.

I give it a B. Next week we'll be looking at "Godzilla Raids Again", which I have not seen prior to this retrospective.