‘Godzilla Minus One Review: The Best Godzilla Movie In Years
Have you heard about the new Godzilla movie, Godzilla Minus One? If the answer is "no", I don't blame you.
I heard about the movie a few days ago and I make my living as a reporter on movies and TV shows. I was confused at first. There's usually a big marketing push for the next mediocre, star-studded monster movie. But it had a 97% freshness rating on Rotten Tomatoes and I hadn't even seen a trailer or a movie poster yet.
That's mainly because it's not a "Monsterverse" movie. This is a low budget Japanese movie and the best Godzilla movie I have ever seen. It's a bit more individual than any Godzilla movie ever made, but as far as I'm concerned, it blows all the others out of the water, something our heroes will struggle to do with the titular monster.
godzilla vs. Kong cost between $155 and $200 million. The next Godzilla vs. Kong: The new government will cost more than $200 million. Godzilla Minus One had a $15 million budget and I still don't know how they got that. The CGI is fantastic and the title monster is scary and terrifying. Nothing about this film feels low budget.
This is especially true of the plot as it adds a very important human element to the story. In many ways it is a WWII character drama. During the final days of the Pacific War and the years that followed, Japan was rebuilding after the atomic bombs.
I sat in the theater thinking about how God symbolized Japan's national devastation caused by the atomic bomb. Since 1954, Godzilla has represented the horror and destruction experienced by the people of Japan during and after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
As a period piece, the film looks at the horrors of war, the hope for reconstruction, the disillusionment of the Japanese people with their government and their new American allies, and shows us the post-war period and how it is filled with fear and uncertainty . Anxiety. Fill every crack.
The main character, Koichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki), is a kamikaze pilot who quit his job at the end of the war and soon meets Godzilla on a Japanese island. His guilt and post-traumatic stress disorder lead him into a cycle of sadness and selfishness after the war, which prevents him from connecting with his new family, Noriko Oishi (Minami Hamabe), a young woman he finds in the ruins, and the younger Akiko. (Sai Nagatani) ) ) is a child that Noriko is raising.
Working as a minesweeper while searching the seas for Japanese and American mines, Shikishima makes sure to make new friends but keeps everyone around him at a distance. The battle is not over for our young hero. He lives with his shame, but that is not life.
These relationships are what drive Godzilla Minus One, and while the Godzilla material is fun and scary (and our heroes' plans to defeat the monsters are very disjointed and creative), it's the plot that elevates this movie above all recent attempts to Godzilla on Earth. . . Large screen. You forget that a well written script with complex characters you really care about and a $15 million budget versus a $200 million movie that is not well written and left out generic one dimensional characters. movie theater. Another lesson from movie theaters: If you have a compelling story, you don't need big actors worth billions. There are many great actors. Maybe it's time to stop obsessing over big stars and overcooked CGI. (Hey, it worked with Star Wars !)
American research pays particular attention to this. With ever-increasing budgets and constant box office failures in the streaming market, it never hurts to save $185 million every now and then.
Watch Godzilla Minus One This is a great Godzilla movie if Godzilla didn't exist. This is the way.
Check out my video review below:
Have you seen Godzilla Minus One ? Is that what you thought? Let me know on Twitter or Facebook.
