GODZILLA (2014) - Movie Review (5/10)
Godzilla (2014) kicks off the Monsterverse with a true sense of awe. Introducing the world to the new era of titans, it perfectly manages to capture the scale of the monsters whilst also still managing to ground the audience with decent human characters. They’re not the most interesting but definitely represent the best of this series, especially Bryan Cranston’s character. Essentially, this movie tries to capture this huge ancient fight between the MUTOs and nature’s antivirus, Godzilla. It tries to focus again and again on the fact that Earth is not the planet of humans but of titans, but then still spends most of its time focused on humans. I did enjoy the sense of momentum the movie had – it never stalled too long on a plot point for you to hate it. And the final set-piece comes together quite nice and has a pretty good monster/human balance. As I mentioned before, this movie captures the “awe” factor for Godzilla. We don’t even get a full shot until much later into the movie, as if the camera is failing to adjust to this behemoth. And then it keeps him shrouded in fog as we see glimpses of the brilliant light on its back. So, when we finally get to see this walking nuclear reactor fire off a blast at the end in full glory, it feels so satisfying in its payoff. And the way Godzilla decides to brutalize the MUTO made me say, “Holy Fuck” out loud. All in all, this is a fantastic first entry into the Monsterverse that manages to capture the new normal for the world. As it may be noticed, the human characters are barely the positives in this movie, and sadly this trend only continues throughout the series. But, if you want to watch a good old-fashioned apocalypse movie that manages to have a pretty good payoff at the end, this would be the way to go. 5/10.
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