Takashi Yamazaki’s Kaiju movie gets its titular monster just right but doesn’t forget its human characters either. Here’s our Godzilla Minus One review.
Godzilla fans have been feasting lately. Not only have we seen a glimpse of the giant lizard in Monarch: Legacy Of Monsters, Godzilla Minus One finally arrives on UK screens with plenty of hype around it, after it went on to gross over $50 million worldwide against a reported budget of $15 million. However, director Yamazaki has implied their budget was far less than that, making the film even more impressive.
Godzilla Minus One effortlessly lives up to the hype surrounding it and even exceeds it. Most Kaiju films, especially Godzilla films, have struggled to balance out the human emotion with big Kaiju action, but Yamazaki makes it look so easy here.
The story is set in the 1940s (Godzilla has always been linked to nuclear attacks, especially those by Americans against Japan) and we witness the action through the eyes of Kōichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki), a former kamikaze pilot in the war who still grapples with a strong sense of guilt. Shikishima encounters Godzilla early on, but sees a way to redeem himself by helping defeat the monster, which now terrorises mainland Japan.
If Monarch: Legacy of Monsters suffered tremendously from not having enough Kaijus, Godzilla Minus One has no such issue. In the first 30 minutes alone, you get two major scenes with Godzilla and for a film with such a limited budget, it easily tops Marvel’s latest films with its CGI. Some of the filmmaking choices on Yamazaki’s part come across as a little clumsy and rudimentary, but Godzilla Minus One is without a doubt one of the year’s best action films.
As for the big guy himself… This Godzilla is a proper monster, a horrific, terrifying creature with ear-shattering roars. Yamazaki challenges the idea we’ve collectively accepted since Jaws that when it comes to monsters, less is more. No! More is more and we want it, we want it now! Much care has gone into Yamazaki’s version of Godzilla; the way the creature charges its famous atomic breath, clicking each of its tail and back spikes into position and pausing for just a moment before unleashing the deadly heat ray which annihilates anything in its way. Just writing about it is giving me goosebumps.
The human characters have always been the weakest link in Godzilla films. Focus too much on them and the audience feels cheated out of Godzilla, but focus too much on the supercharged lizard and your story has no emotional base. The human characters in Yamazaki’s film are deceptively simple, but fully fleshed. Shikishima’s motivations are simple, clear and relatable and his character is developed through the inclusion of Noriko, a young woman he takes in with an orphaned child, Akiko. Their relationship is never at the forefront of the film, but it gives us someone to care for, someone to root for as Godzilla destroys the city around them.
Godzilla Minus One doesn’t exactly reinvent the wheel with its storyline; the film comes with a degree of predictability, but I found myself not bothered by knowing where the film is going due to the sheer amount of fun I was having. I was surprisingly moved by the last 15 minutes, more than I was expecting to be in a film of this scale. The plotting on Yamazaki’s part can be a little mechanical, but he’s able to create and sustain tension masterfully.
This feels like a proper, old-school Godzilla film where Godzilla is allowed to be the villain of the story again. The human characters are compelling, but never steal the thunder from our favourite atomic lizard. If Monarch: Legacy Of Monsters left you wanting more Godzilla, Godzilla Minus One scratches that itch and then some.
Godzilla Minus One is now in cinemas.
