Godzilla 1998

I recall seeing this in the theater on opening day. I was so fired up. An American Godzilla movie! Over the weeks that followed, I tried to convince myself that it was better than it was, but on yet another re-watch, it's entertaining as an over-the-top '90s action film but nothing more.

The effects are decent for the time it was made and the scale of "Zilla" is well done. Everything is filmed in the dark and in a torrential downpour and it's probably to hide the shortcomings of some of the CGI. But to be fair, "Pacific Rim", made some 15 years later, kind of did the same thing.

Godzilla itself was nothing more than a giant lizard, though I noticed a bit more personality while watching it again. Zilla's interactions with Dr. Niko Tatopoulos (Matthew Broderick) were at about the same level as Ford Brody's up-close-and-personal encounters with Godzilla in director Gareth Edwards's 2014 version. I do think a major drawback of the plot is that the monster is just looking for somewhere to lay eggs! Really...eggs?!?! The movie even goes so far as to try and recreate the raptors in "Jurassic Park" with its own version...with baby Godzillas!!! Reproduction is just not a direction that I prefer a Godzilla movie to take.

The actors play the characters as practically spastic. It's annoying that everyone is shouting at each other. I do think that the rekindling of the romance between Dr. Niko and Audrey is nice in a cutesy way. This movie also has too much humor. Comedy entered into Toho's Godzilla series with 1964's "King Kong vs. Godzilla" and continued throughout the mid-'70s when the Showa Godzilla movie era ended. The Showa films were often juvenile and cornball, and Emmerich's "Godzilla" attempts the same trick and only partially succeeds.

A few bright spots: Jean Reno is really fun here even though the coffee jokes get old quick, and the final cab chase is one of the most ridiculous action scenes ever, but um...it's entertaining. The death of Zilla is more impactful in a sad way then I thought it could be. Matthew Broderick does a really nice job in the lead role.

I've been hot and cold with this movie over the years, but I've pretty much settled on my opinion that it's just a dumb but very big action movie. And a lot of the time, that's just the kind of escapism that I'm looking for.

HERE THERE BE SPOILERS

This version of Godzilla is a difficult one to give a simple overall rating. Honestly, if Hollywood had just made this into a generic monster movie, kind of the way they did with Cloverfield, it would have easily been an above average movie, possibly even breaking into 4 star territory. The acting is above average (including the must-have flavor of the month, Jean Reno), the F/X are excellent for 1998 and the plot actually makes sense.

Nevertheless, the failure for this movie is that it was made by people not familiar with the franchise and/or what Godzilla means to his fanbase. Godzilla is to the people of Japan what Batman and Superman are to Americans, what Dr. Who and James Bond are to the British and what Shaft and the Black Panther are to the Black Community.

The demotion of Godzilla to that of nothing more than an over-sized animal working wholly upon instinct instead of the more humanistic level of intelligence that we in the fandom have come to know and expect was a slap in the face. Furthermore, the final scene where Godzilla is killed (a blasphemy only seen two other times in his 60 year history (Gojira (1954) and Godzilla vs. Destoroyah (1995), the later being the planned end to the franchise in its entirety) by only three F/18s and a total of 6 missiles when entire armies have done nothing more than irritate the King of Monsters was beyond belief. For those not familiar with Godzilla's accomplishments and reputation, imagine the outrage that would come from the respective communities if James Bond was taken out by a mall cop or Superman was killed by 3 six-year-old brats with baseball bats. Now you understand why Japanese movie-goers were storming the box-offices DEMANDING a full refund for this insult and why Toho quickly resurrected their dearly departed Kaiju less than one year later for probably one of the best movies in the entire franchise, Godzilla 1999 (Godzilla 2000 here in the United States).

All in all, as a monster movie, Godzilla gets 3.75 stars. However, for a Godzilla movie, it gets a 1 star rating. I'll cut the difference and meet them somewhere around the middle with a 2.5 star final score.

My first Godzilla movie I ever saw. I loved this film as a kid, then my father introduced me to the Japanese films with Final Wars and I much preferred that movie over this. But I only ever had these two to pick from. So I still loved it. For a while, I thought maybe I liked this film as a guilty pleasure. But now... I'm extremely grateful for my father knowing better.

This movie is terrible. It's action schlock for people who just want to lay back and see things go boom. It's something you put on amidst the middle of your 90s Michael Bay movies and other films with explosions.

I've recently started writing notes while watching movies, and this movie made me write the most. It's a long list of complaints that I can't fit into this review. But I'm going to list a few.

Matthew Broderick is horrible for this film. His voice is annoying here and I can't stand him. The other actors aside from Jean Reno are all annoying and incompetent. Jean Reno is the only one I liked, and even he is still stupid too in some scenes.

Nothing in this movie makes sense. Matthew's character Nick is supposedly an expert, but you place him in a giant footprint and tell him that you should start studying. Which he has been digging in mud as previously shown for a while now. You'd think he would internally wonder what he could mean and then get to work. But no, he yells out that he can't see the sample he's meant to study. Over and over again until his brain starts working again. It's so stupid. I could go on and on like this movie does with all the stupid choices the characters make here but I'll just stick to that example and the fact that the military is so incompetent that they allow like 15 helicopters to fly in one street side-by-side and in front of one another while firing missiles. So stupid.

There is also the infamous "That's a lot of fish" line which is followed up by nothing and adds nothing whatsoever to the scene. Just a punch in the gut reminding you that yes, this movie sucks and why are you still watching it?

I found myself so numb during this movie that I actually wrote down some things randomly to keep myself entertained. Like how the looters look like they came fresh off the set of The Matrix or me thinking "Noooo not The Continental, where will John Wick put his feet up now?". This movie didn't make me laugh like it thought it was going to, so I had to do the work myself.

Some ironic things I found too is that the movie uses the line "I call this America" when a French character answers why the coffee is bad; and when a character yells to correct a reporter on the TV that "it's Gojira, you moron!" is just so funny when no right-minded Godzilla fan would call this adaptation of the monster to be at all respectful of the source material.

Point is, you can find a thousand things wrong with this movie, be it common sense to incorrect adaptation. But, this a big-budget project, and there are things to highlight that are good and even great.

The opening is haunting and captures the right tone for a serious Godzilla movie. Gets you in the mood really well. It is followed by a good scene with Japanese fishermen being attacked by Godzilla. Still retaining the haunting feeling as they can do nothing and we see barely anything as they do. It really reminded me of 'The Return of Godzilla' (Godzilla 1985)'s opening. But this is then ruined by cutting to Matthew Broderick's character Nick who is singing "Singing in the Rain".

The fishing boats who get dragged down is also a good scene, still encapsulates the fear of what Godzilla is. Really builds the suspense well. This is followed by a scene where a survivor from the first ship tells what he saw. Good stuff here too.

A bit later we get a scene where an old New Yorker is going fishing in the rain (oh yeah this whole movie takes place while it's raining), he catches a bite, which turns out to be Godzilla. Who then comes closer and closer just under the water as the waves get bigger and bigger. Crashing into the dock while the old man runs for his life. This scene is iconic and is probably the best in the whole movie. It perfectly cements what Godzilla is, and that no one is off the hook for the damage dealt. After that though. There are no more compliments aside from the low-angle camera work and CGI looking good sometimes. (Really good sometimes, especially in the bridge scene when filmed from a low-angle).

This brings me to my final complaint. This movie sets up that it is about fixing the wrongs of nuclear testing. Yet! it does nothing of the sort besides killing Zilla. It is never once addressed in the film after Jean Reno's character says it. In the end, they just celebrate and all is good. Nothing was learned here. There is no lesson. The movie is pointless, and so is talking about it any longer.

2/10