GODZILLA (2014)

Godzilla Movie Review

It's 1999, and a nuclear plant in Japan is destroyed by an unknown source. Fifteen years later, American Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston) and his son Ford (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) return to the scene to attempt to discover what caused the disaster that took the life of the mother of their family. Soon an ancient monster known as a M.U.T.O. is released and officials must figure out if they should use weapons of mass destruction to destroy the creature, or something even more powerful.

This guy

I saw this in theaters when it came out in 2014 and decided to pop in the DVD to give it another look today. Let me just  say I grew up a huge fan of Godzilla. Some of my favorite memories as a child are of watching Godzilla films with my family, and nothing they have done has managed to kill off my love of this monster--I even enjoy the 1998 film and am not ashamed to admit it.

Don't look at me like that

This movie is very strong in character development and the acting is largely good throughout. Cranstan and Taylor-Johnson turn in good performances, and Ken Watanabe (Inception, Batman Begins) steals the show as Dr. Serizawa. I still very much love the guy in the rubber suit Godzilla, so every time I see the King of Monsters done in any other way I am hesitant, but he truly does look impressive here. M.U.T.O. is a little less impressive, but still looks like a cool combination of Mothra and Gyaos from monster movies of years gone by.

Look, here's M.U.T.O. now

While the monsters are not in the film much, when they are all hell breaks loose--there's lots of destruction, chaos, and the final battle scene is one for the ages--when Godzilla unleashed his atomic breath I may or may not have shrieked like a teenage girl. Naturally the movie does have its drawbacks. A LOT of the film is so dark it is difficult, if not impossible, to see what is happening. Unfortunately, this tends to happen at the worst times and the frustration level grows as the movie moves along. Some scenes are a bit redundant, making the final running time of over two hours about ten or fifteen minutes longer than it needed to be. And yes, while I appreciate the build up and anticipation of FINALLY seeing Godzilla, once he arrives he gets very little screen time. These minor annoyances aside, this movie does a lot of justice to the legend of Godzilla, and I am excited to see what comes next.

On A Scale Of One To Ten: 8

Godzilla Movie Trailer