Godzilla (2014)

Brian Cranston is well cast as a man searching for answers after his wife is killed in a nuclear accident. He was the Chief Engineer at the same facility and had to watch his wife die when the reactor was breached...by something.

 

Years later his adult son pulls him out of a Japanese prison and the two of them continue the search for answers when evidence that 'something' huge is moving in the waters off Japan. Something larger than has ever been seen before.

Since we all know that 'something' is Godzilla, the secret is pretty much out before the movie begins. We are not given any footage of the beast for at least an hour into the story and I felt that involved me in the characters in a way that few of these huge budget blockbusters have in years.

 

I hate that once again everything has to be filmed in the dark to accommodate the 3D effects because everything cool is hidden behind smoke and flickering light. That being said, there are many spectacular set pieces here and when the action does start up, things come at you fast and furious.

Godzilla and Friends could be the title of the Saturday morning cartoon based on this movie. I have already written the first season in my head. Think of all the toys tie-ins.

The last movie from this director Gareth Edwards was Monsters. It's a spectacular monster movie itself that was made on the cheap with effects, writing, and acting that looks like it came from something that cost 1000 times as much - like Godzilla. I like many of the things that Edwards did with a larger budget because he still used some of his old visual tricks. We never really get a good look at any of the creatures in Godzilla until very late in the film. We see them through the eyes of others who themselves only catch glimpses as they are running for their lives. That was the way it was in Monsters. This director believes that 'less is definitely more'. He finds dozens of fresh ways to shoot the action and that perspective from a filmmaker is thrilling. It's strange to find myself writing that about a Godzilla movie but there you have it. The human drama was as interesting as all the creature drama which is what you need in a good monster movie. I thought Godzilla was a good monster movie.

I liked all the stuff around what I couldn't see and didn't know. The shots of the creatures tearing apart cities were so much more effective when they are shown on television in the background of other scenes than they would have been if they had appeared non-stop on-screen. The chaos caused by just ONE monster was impressive. Now imagine 3 of them all converging on San Francisco. That is just good storytelling. I imagined living in that world and watching the coverage of the impending battle from the relative safety of the Cave of Cool. The whole planet would be tuned in to see the outcome and the Internets would explode.