FOXSYLVANIA

I freakin’ love Godzilla, probably because there is still a ten-year-old boy living inside me, and Godzilla Minus One, now on Netflix, plays to that boy. This film is a retro delight, trying to take Godzilla back to his roots, and pity the poor Japanese…they’ve just survived WWII, cities are in ruins from Allied bombings, and now Godzilla is targeting them! The Allies won’t help, either, having too many problems with the Soviets…

So the Japanese are having a really bad decade, but defeating Godzilla is all up to them.  A central character is a surviving kamikaze pilot who had second thoughts, and brought his plane down on an island,  claiming mechanical problems.  Godzilla then attacks the island, but the pilot again escapes death, haunted by guilt afterwards.

While computer-generated. Godzilla is finely-detailed, and looking much more convincing than some dude in a rubber suit, as was the case in early Godzilla movies. The acting is good, and adds emotional content, but I would have preferred more of Godzilla and less humanity. The film is overly-long, and drags a bit in places. Godzilla’s core nature is restored as a force of nature or the consequences of the nuclear age. There are nice touches to his ferocity, too…when he unleashes his lethal breath blast, the spiny plates on his back individually pop up, and glow a lovely shade of blue. Godzilla chomps down on train cars, and even sends a sizeable boat hurling through the air…

I really like this Godzilla, Toho got him right…and while he’s sent to his death in the depths of the ocean at the end, the bubbling of his flesh reminds us that The King of Monsters has great regenerative capacities, and is likely to be ready for a rematch.- – I’ll be rooting for him!