GODZILLA (2014) Move Review

I remember watching, back in my youth, a cartoon Godzilla series. Amazingly, it had Godzilla on call to a bunch of scientists, and he would rise from the depths at the touch of a button to stomp on bad monsters. It also featured his “cousin”, a mini version called Godzooky, mainly there for comic effect and to be targeted by the bad monsters so Godzilla would have all the more reason to turn them into bad monster paste. At the time, this made perfect sense to me, and I was highly entertained. Believe me when I say that the Godzilla cartoon had a better plot than this horrendous movie.

I don’t generally like to spoiler much, but trust me when I say that there’s so little plot it’s kind of unavoidable, and in any case I won’t spoil anything that will alter your enjoyment of the movie. The whole thing starts off really well, with a neat title sequence and an opening piece set in a Japanese nuclear facility that is genuinely dramatic and moving. After that, though, everything goes shit shaped. Ken Watanabe is Captain Exposition, desperately trying to make us believe the absolutely fuckadoodly plot that makes no sense whatsoever.

Here’s the basics:  Because scientists are, apparently, stooped as cabbage soup, they grow a giant insect thing and are a bit surprised when everything goes tits up. When it goes on a rampage after nuclear stuff to chow down on (which takes it to America, surprise surprise), we learn that these might beasties walked the earth millions of years ago and fed on radioactivity. As the earth’s radioactivity reduced, the went to live deep in the ground/ocean/whogivesafuck to be closer to the radioactive core. When the one they hatch goes mental, Captain Exposition (who has known about Godzilla for years), says that he is the natural predator and as such will come and sort it all out. That’s like saying that if your town is attacked by an army of cats, and army of dogs will appear out of nowhere to save you! Anyway, that’s sort of it, really.

We also get, of course, the human element, as soldier Aaron Taylor Johnson blandly tries to get back to his bland family whilst trying not to get squished. Every time the movie threatens to get hot and heavy with monster on monster action it cuts to people doing people things, with the result that the I-Don’t-Care-Ometer goes into overdrive. 

The real, Godzilla sized problem with this movie is that it’s incredibly boring. The two hours drag by like watching someone trying to count the grains of sand on a beach. Even when the monster on monster stuff happens it’s terribly slow and dull, with Fatzilla waddling around like Eric Pickles after a heavy lunch, smacking the other lazily designed creature about for a while before suddenly realizing he has a electro zap type attack that is never explained nor acknowledged. The army and navy are portrayed as being led by retards throughout, constantly throwing logic out of the window like it’s a pile of flaming shit. Ordinary people don’t come off much better, as apparently they, too, haven’t got the sense they were born with and, quite frankly, deserve to be squished. 

I so wanted to just leave before the end, but sat there so you don’t have to. Do not see this film, as it’s shit. It makes the 1998 version look like Shakespeare, and falls so short of the bar set by Pacific Rim it can’t even see it. Go watch the cartoon instead.