Godzilla 2014 Review

Brian Cranston.

Juliette binoche.

Elizabeth Olsen.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson

Directed by Gareth Edwards.

Synopsis: After being awoken by the radiation hungry M.U.T.O. Godzilla returns to combat in a battle for dominance of the Earth.

Opening with a brilliantly conceived twist on redacted historic news reels of the 1950s pacific, Godzilla returns in this human-centric take on the Toho company’s seminal monster movie classic. From its 1954 origins as cautionary postwar nuclear metaphor, Godzilla transitioned in tone from city wasting leviathan to Japanese protector, hero mascot, but it is with Gareth Edward’s directorial hand that the movie lurches towards its darker thematic origins. As with other Edward’s fare, Godzilla begins with a very human story.

Bryan Cranston (donning another utterly distracting hairpiece) plays Joe Brody, a nuclear plant supervisor who is forced to contain a nuclear leak after an apparent earthquake threatens the city of Janjira. His wife and the rest of the containment team (sent to investigate strange readings in the nuclear plant) get trapped inside the Brody sealed, underground bunker. The city is evacuated with Brody’s valuable analysis data being left behind. Fifteen years later, his now grown up son Joe Brody (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) on leave from the military and out of contact with his father, gets a call to bail out his father who has been caught trespassing on the grounds of their ex-home, still in the wider containment zone. The story unfolds, working upon rebuilding the fractured relationship of father and son, fully building bonds when younger Brody realises his father’s search for the truth is not purely born out of an obsession with digging up the past.

Despite reports on the contrary, there is a lot of monster for your buck in Godzilla. Edward’s concentration on establishing scale of the M.U.T.O’, (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organism) helps in focusing the movie towards the human characters in a way that no Transformers film can. Resisting fanboy pressure, Edwards bravely teases the audience with flashes of Kaiju fights (mostly revealing post-tussle carnage) and refuses to fully put out a full monster on monster encounter until the final thirty/forty minutes of the film. The result is surprising, as upon Godzilla and the M.U.T.O’s initial courting periods the fight is portrayed on small screen TV news watched by Brody Junior Junior’s son. Later a door is literally shut on a Godzilla Vs M.U.T.O. fight. This actually all results in a refreshingly dynamic movie which doesn’t feel like an extended theme park ride through the entirety of its 123 minute span. However, Godzilla does much in fan service through the easter egg laden mise en scene, look closely for references to monsters in previous outings throughout.

Expectedly for a modern monster movie, Godzilla looks and sounds incredible. The heft of Godzilla’s presence is glorious complementing his signature roar when he announces his arrival on North American shores (I punched the air). No pixel has been wasted in the production of this movie. The stunning halo jump (featuring heavily in the teaser trailer) is largely experienced through the eyes of Brody, and compliments the build to the climactic conclusion.

It is clear that Godzilla is a one man band, narrowly focusing upon the explosive annihilation of the M.U.T.O. The pitiful military attempts to misguidedly combat Godzilla result in his indifference. Godzilla never retaliates against human forces, purely concentrating on hunting the M.U.T.O. who centralise most of their destruction in North American locations. Edwards has a knack with presenting devastating environments, Las Vegas looking particularly knackered and San Francisco similarly getting the scaly boot.

The arrogance of men is thinking nature is in their control and not the other way around. Let them fight -Ichiro Serizawa 

In the way that Cloverfield made possible, I do wish for a storyline which focuses less on the military angle, which now feels somewhat repetitive, hackneyed, overly Hollywoodised, despite the understanding of the narrative focus towards combat and an enacted military conclusion. Godzilla does however spank the pants off Pacific Rim – the spawn of its own cinematic loins, dealing with its characters in a way that actually matters to an audience.

Gareth Edward’s re-reboot does much to nudge Gojira back to its origins, choosing to present the fresh post-Fukushima anxieties and social complexities of nuclear power in a modern day context. In Edward’s take, nuclear power is dually the catalyst for the monster’s appearance and the solution for their destruction. Despite a potential reading of fence sitting, there is a stronger case to argue the thematic development in Godzilla presents the nuclear oppugnant as blessing and curse, solution and quandary we face today quite perfectly.