New Godzilla is cagier and ragier, with a monster v ‘MUTO’ smackdown that will make it worth your while
GODZILLA: It’s a long wait to see the star of the show, but an extended monster v “MUTO” smackdown on the streets of San Francisco will make it worth your while.
NOW he has turned 60, Godzilla is very much the elder states-monster of the modern creature-feature.
Like countless veteran rock bands, this radioactive reptile has always been “big in Japan”.
Courtesy of almost 30 sequels, spin-offs and reboots, the ’Zilla has never lost his appetite for destruction. Nor his unlikely appeal as a screen hero.
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On many occasions, Godzilla has indirectly come to the aid of millions of us hapless humans. Particularly those held to ransom by everything from rogue robots to insects the size of jumbo jets.
While he might be a heroic brute, Godzilla is also a powerful brand. So it should come as no surprise a major US studio is yet again repurposing his celebrated legend.
This all-new, same-old Godzilla is an aggressively agreeable pile of pulp, both cagier in approach and ragier in execution than the last time Hollywood ventured here. (The 1998 Godzilla starring Matthew Broderick has gone down in history as one of the most dull and inert monster movies of all time.)
The new film proceeds very cautiously at the outset, perhaps with one eye trained too conspicuously on building a solid franchise.
Therefore we have to wait two-thirds of an eternity — in action-blockbuster movie terms at least — to get a good long look at the star of the show a’chompin’ and a’stompin’ as only he can.
That’s right. The first two acts of Godzilla are all about the tease, rather than the shock and awe.
Sure, there are plenty of generous glimpses of the ’Zilla.
Most of the time, he can be spotted getting quite aggravated at a polite distance from the epicentre of the chaos.
But he won’t be making his proper entrance until 40 minutes from the close. By which time, most viewers may have had their fill of the human characters in Godzilla, and their bum-numbing backstories.
Bryan Cranston stars as Joe, a frazzled former scientist.
This bedraggled fellow is quite correctly convinced the world is under threat from radiation-magnified species of ill repute. They have been gestating since all those atomic tests in the Asia-Pacific region in the ’50s.
Naturally, the world thinks Joe is just a crazy conspiracy theorist. Even his son, Ford, (Aaron Taylor- Johnson), a decorated soldier, thinks the old man is a loon.
While this father-son friction stuff is a bit of a snooze, the Godzilla-less portions of Godzilla are still lively enough thanks to the arrival of the creatures that prove Joe is no mad voice in the wilderness.
They are codenamed MUTOs — short for Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms — and they thrive by sticking strictly to an all-nuclear diet.
There are only two MUTOs. One is male, the other female. Yep, you guessed it: soon it will be breeding time.
The unhappy couple appear to heading by sea towards the west coast of the US. So too is Godzilla, arguably more athletically amphibious than many of his fans would formerly recall.
All that really matters is what will happen when these three hit dry land. Thankfully, the extended monster v MUTO smackdown that transpires on the streets of San Francisco justifies the long wait.
This set-piece skirmish (boosted by convincing SFX work and a booming sound mix) is apocalyptic in scale, and apoplectic in temperament.
Anyone who has loved or admired Godzilla in any of his many guises are going to get a major rush from how the majestic mega-lizard handles the mayhem depicted here.
GODZILLA (M)
Director: Gareth Edwards (Monsters)
Starring: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Bryan Cranston, Elizabeth Olsen, Sally Hawkins, David Strathairn
Verdict: Three stars. Old grey champ vs the nuke kids on the block