← Back to Reviews
in
Synopsis:
In 1999, Janjira Nuclear Plant Engineer Joe Brody and his Wife Sandra are working on fixing a rather troublesome electrical fault inside the Plant that is seemingly caused by seismic activity of an unknown source... however Sandra is killed in a tragic accident when the fault breaches the Plant’s protection protocols.
The Nuclear Plant then goes critical, and the entire area is locked off and declared a Death Zone.
15 years later, Joe is still trying to uncover what he thinks is a cover-up by the Government… and his Son, Ford, who has moved on from the death of his Mother Sandra, is dragged back into his Father’s conspiracy theory driven lifestyle.
Review:
Hmm, for a Summer Blockbuster, Godzilla, the Godzilla, should hit all the right buttons and give thrills and monster driven spills galore.
What we have though, is a pretty bland an uninteresting set of circumstances that revolve around dirty and grimy sets and way too many cutaways when the action does actually start.
The major problem with the action of Godzilla, is that there’s very little Godzilla. There’s also very little monster action in general too, and the director seems to have taken the idea of keeping the creatures hidden (ala-Cloverfield) and made it just way too cutaway-ish.
You get a glimpse of the creatures about to go head to head, and just before the monsters clash with each other, boom! there’s no payoff. We get either a hard cut to another scene, or something like a bunker door closes in front of the camera and we don’t get to see the rumble.
Then, toward the end of the movie, there is a big showdown… which lasts all of 8 seconds. Yes, really.
The other part of the movie, well, the main part of the movie, is the human side of it all. Running and hiding while buildings are being knocked over by the monsters (which we don’t get to see fighting).
Sadly, the human characters seem to made of wood and cardboard with very, very little connection to the audience. Our main hero in Ford, played by Aaron Taylor-Thomas, is really just a generic soldier type who does very little throughout apart from run a bit and occasionally says something that moves the story along when things are getting slow in the plotline stakes.
The rest of the human side is simply more generic scientist types, some military types and a lot of cannon fodder for building rubble to fall on and squish while the monsters are fighting and apparently knocking the surrounding buildings down (which we don’t get to see).
I’ve already mentioned Aaron with his generic role. He plays it well, but this actor, and character for that matter, should not have been the lead in this movie.
Elizabeth Olsen plays Aaron’s Wife… and she’s more a non-character. I’m not even sure why she was in the movie tbh.
The treatment of Juliette Binoche is similar too. She’s Sandra, and her death is the plot driver in the first 20 minutes or so.
Ken Watanabe seems to be confused as to what his role is.
Bryan Cranston as Joe Brody though, is the best on show. He absolutely steals his scenes, robs the limelight from everyone around him, makes this movie exciting… and then gets killed off 30 minutes in.
After his death, the movie just becomes a generic (yes, using the generic word again) and boring destruction movie.
The action and effects are really what it’s all about tbh as, like I said, the characters and actors involved weren’t utilised or written greatly. Which is a shame, as like I said, the characters take up most of the movie.
I’m likening this film to Reign Of Fire (remember that Dragon movie with Christian Bale?)… the CGI and sets are tremendous… and it’s great to see the proper looking Godzilla get a big budget turn on the big screen after Roland Emmerich went in favour of a T-Rex looking Godzilla.
However, with the bad writing, and keeping it all so lacking in terms of monster footage and having them bashing heads together, the great effects and small handful of well choreographed action and fighting are just, well, wasted.
The new creatures seen in the M.U.T.O monsters is a nice touch though, it does add an air of freshness to proceedings knowing that the big G is fighting something we’ve never seen him fight before.
All in all, this movie should, not could, should, have been so much more.
Badly written, confusing at times in terms of actual story, especially on first watch, and for a Godzilla movie, there’s not that much actual Godzillary Monster Madness.
The film overall, is of a poor enough standard that I’m actually going to recommend watching Emmerich’s 1998 big budget outing before giving this big budget outing a go.
The 1998 movie, also being character driven like this one tried to be, at least utilised its characters… and still managed to get the big G seen on screen.
My Rating: 58%
Review #241, Movie #312
Year Of Release
2014
Director/s
Gareth Edwards
Producer/s
Thomas Tull, Jon Jashni, Mary Parent, Brian Rogers
Writer/s
Max Borenstein, David Callaham, Toho
Cast
Aaron Taylor-Thomas, Ken Watanabe, Elizabeth Olsen, Juliette Binoche and Bryan Cranston
Year Of Release
2014
Director/s
Gareth Edwards
Producer/s
Thomas Tull, Jon Jashni, Mary Parent, Brian Rogers
Writer/s
Max Borenstein, David Callaham, Toho
Cast
Aaron Taylor-Thomas, Ken Watanabe, Elizabeth Olsen, Juliette Binoche and Bryan Cranston
In 1999, Janjira Nuclear Plant Engineer Joe Brody and his Wife Sandra are working on fixing a rather troublesome electrical fault inside the Plant that is seemingly caused by seismic activity of an unknown source... however Sandra is killed in a tragic accident when the fault breaches the Plant’s protection protocols.
The Nuclear Plant then goes critical, and the entire area is locked off and declared a Death Zone.
15 years later, Joe is still trying to uncover what he thinks is a cover-up by the Government… and his Son, Ford, who has moved on from the death of his Mother Sandra, is dragged back into his Father’s conspiracy theory driven lifestyle.
Review:
Hmm, for a Summer Blockbuster, Godzilla, the Godzilla, should hit all the right buttons and give thrills and monster driven spills galore.
What we have though, is a pretty bland an uninteresting set of circumstances that revolve around dirty and grimy sets and way too many cutaways when the action does actually start.
The major problem with the action of Godzilla, is that there’s very little Godzilla. There’s also very little monster action in general too, and the director seems to have taken the idea of keeping the creatures hidden (ala-Cloverfield) and made it just way too cutaway-ish.
You get a glimpse of the creatures about to go head to head, and just before the monsters clash with each other, boom! there’s no payoff. We get either a hard cut to another scene, or something like a bunker door closes in front of the camera and we don’t get to see the rumble.
Then, toward the end of the movie, there is a big showdown… which lasts all of 8 seconds. Yes, really.
The other part of the movie, well, the main part of the movie, is the human side of it all. Running and hiding while buildings are being knocked over by the monsters (which we don’t get to see fighting).
Sadly, the human characters seem to made of wood and cardboard with very, very little connection to the audience. Our main hero in Ford, played by Aaron Taylor-Thomas, is really just a generic soldier type who does very little throughout apart from run a bit and occasionally says something that moves the story along when things are getting slow in the plotline stakes.
The rest of the human side is simply more generic scientist types, some military types and a lot of cannon fodder for building rubble to fall on and squish while the monsters are fighting and apparently knocking the surrounding buildings down (which we don’t get to see).
I’ve already mentioned Aaron with his generic role. He plays it well, but this actor, and character for that matter, should not have been the lead in this movie.
Elizabeth Olsen plays Aaron’s Wife… and she’s more a non-character. I’m not even sure why she was in the movie tbh.
The treatment of Juliette Binoche is similar too. She’s Sandra, and her death is the plot driver in the first 20 minutes or so.
Ken Watanabe seems to be confused as to what his role is.
Bryan Cranston as Joe Brody though, is the best on show. He absolutely steals his scenes, robs the limelight from everyone around him, makes this movie exciting… and then gets killed off 30 minutes in.
After his death, the movie just becomes a generic (yes, using the generic word again) and boring destruction movie.
The action and effects are really what it’s all about tbh as, like I said, the characters and actors involved weren’t utilised or written greatly. Which is a shame, as like I said, the characters take up most of the movie.
I’m likening this film to Reign Of Fire (remember that Dragon movie with Christian Bale?)… the CGI and sets are tremendous… and it’s great to see the proper looking Godzilla get a big budget turn on the big screen after Roland Emmerich went in favour of a T-Rex looking Godzilla.
However, with the bad writing, and keeping it all so lacking in terms of monster footage and having them bashing heads together, the great effects and small handful of well choreographed action and fighting are just, well, wasted.
The new creatures seen in the M.U.T.O monsters is a nice touch though, it does add an air of freshness to proceedings knowing that the big G is fighting something we’ve never seen him fight before.
All in all, this movie should, not could, should, have been so much more.
Badly written, confusing at times in terms of actual story, especially on first watch, and for a Godzilla movie, there’s not that much actual Godzillary Monster Madness.
The film overall, is of a poor enough standard that I’m actually going to recommend watching Emmerich’s 1998 big budget outing before giving this big budget outing a go.
The 1998 movie, also being character driven like this one tried to be, at least utilised its characters… and still managed to get the big G seen on screen.
My Rating: 58%
