TALKBACK: Godzilla (1998)

[Psycho Soldier]

Rifftrax made this movie much more bearable. Even with them making fun of it, though, GINO is still frustrating to watch. Some of the early stupidity is forgivable - there's enough happening to keep me interested - but as soon as Godzilla starts dodging missiles and running away from helicopters, it becomes irredeemable.

[jellydonut25]

[Pkmatrix]

I went to a showing of the Rifftrax version last week. It's been years since I last saw this movie and, honestly, I'm not sure I would've been able to make it through this showing without the jokes. Various thoughts and things I noticed:

1. Wow, I don't remember this movie being so BORING. The RT guys pointed it out a few times, but this movie has LONG stretches where it forgets its supposed to be a Giant Monster movie and turns into a really bad Romantic Comedy. Say what you will about G'14's lack of Goji, at least it never bored me and still had exciting stuff going on throughout the whole film. This movie stops dead so many times it's just sad.

2. Did the soundtrack HAVE to be JP-ish "whimsical" the WHOLE time? Seriously, even in the action sequences the score sounds like the piece from Jurassic Park when the dinosaurs are revealed. It's all whimsy all the time, and it gets really monotonous after a while.

3. OH MY GAWD, MARIA PITILLO. I remember not liking her character much, but sweet Jebus her performance is just awful and her character the most idiotic/annoying female lead IN THE ENTIRE GENRE. SERIOUSLY.

4. Man, I remember liking Jean Reno's character and performance a lot more than this. I didn't remember the coffee jokes, which were just plain dumb.

5. All of the above being said, does anyone else think we might've had a MUCH better movie had Hank Azaria's character been the hero? He's more likeable than Broderick's character and actually does things. Broderick gets shuffled from set to set, never actually doing or accomplishing anything - he's the hero because the movie had declared that he is the 'charming nice guy' hero. Azaria, meanwhile, is the one who grabs a camera and goes after Godzilla. He's the one who takes the initiative to follow Broderick and discovers the French hideout. He's the only reason Maria Pitillo's character is even involved with the third act. I think a movie that focused on Azaria and Reno would've been a lot stronger.

Then again, that movie wouldn't have been a romantic comedy, which seems to be what D&E wanted this to be. >_>

[Rody]

[walshiam]

I can't believe this turd is still being discussed 16 years later. I'm still trying to forget it.

[Jorzilla]

I saw the rifftrax version on Tuesday. While I did enjoy it, I'm ashamed that there are portions of this film that I kind of wish they'd have shut up because I was actually getting into the movie.

The biggest problems with this film, aside from Godzilla's protrayal, are the awful human cast and the baby Godzilla scenes. The Madison Square Garden sequence just went on...forever. Also Audrey is probably the shittiest person in a Godzilla film who still manages to have things go right for her.

The other thing I did...and I couldn't help myself in this regards...was compare this film strengths to Godzilla 2014. This ere is a SLIM margin of what I think Roland Emmerich was able to do well. This mostly has to do with the first 30 minutes, which were executed pretty good (aside from "OH GODZILLA! WHAT TERRIBLE LANGUAGE!" characters). He was also able to do the tease type shots pretty good, but his Godzilla sucked. I think you could take some of the strengths in this film and combine it with the strengths in Godzilla 2014 to have an overall better American Godzilla movie.

[tbeasley]

[Psycho Soldier]

[jellydonut25]

That MIGHT have helped, actually. The pacing of the film is complete garbage.

[XvGojira]

[tbeasley]

The movie is way too long and so awkwardly structured. Admittedly it does build a nice sense of tension up front, but once Godzilla is revealed to be a skittish, hungry parent the movie falls apart. Repeating actions scenes (they lure Godzilla out TWICE with fish) and a cast of all goofy characters in a seemingly serious sci-fi action/adventure doesn't help either. The egg subplot (or plot, as it becomes) really shows Devlin and Emmerich were more preoccupied making their own creature feature (or Jurassic Park knockoff, whatever) than adapting Godzilla.

[mr.negativity]

[jellydonut25]

[Pkmatrix]

Fixing those two points would've helped a LOT, and I'm glad he at least acknowledges those problems.

That the movie never decided whether we should root for or against Godzilla was a MAJOR problem, and is a big reason why the movie felt aimless and tonally lost. Had they just settled on Godzilla being the villain - which is what they clearly leaned more towards - the whole frickin' story would've changed. The "he's just an animal trying to survive" concept is the only reason we have these repeated sequences of Godzilla fleeing from the military, remove that mindset and I think they would've written something a little more traditionally Godzilla.

As others have pointed out, the movie is actually okay during it's Act One - not good, just okay. It's only after Godzilla's initial attack on New York does the movie fall apart. It's like they didn't know what to do after getting him to New York, so they flailed around for a whole act trying to come up with SOMETHING. Since they didn't want to portray Godzilla as the villain they had no antagonist, since they'd already established the military as the good guys. That's why most of the second act becomes a bad romantic comedy occasionally interrupted by Godzilla fleeing from the Army like the Roadrunner from the Wile E. Coyote. It picks up again in its third act, but by that point the story is so far removed from a 'Godzilla' movie (Godzilla is barely IN the movie after Act 2) it may as well be something else entirely.

They needed to make Godzilla the villain and if they wanted to establish these characters beyond what they were in Act One, it should've been in Act One. By not doing so it straight-up kills the rest of the movie and results in a horrifically BORING package. More than anything else, the movie just is NOT entertaining, it bores the hell out of the audience by about the half-way point and leaves us wondering why we bothered watching.

[Benjamin Haines]

Pkmatrix, I agree with what you said a few posts back about making Hank Azaria's Animal and Jean Reno's Phillipe the main characters of the movie. By doing that and either reducing or eliminating the characters of Nick and Audrey, this film's story would have been a lot more focused and a whole lot more compelling.

Dean Devlin is definitely right about how not committing to a role for Godzilla really hurt the film. By refusing to anthropomorphize him, they failed to treat him as an actual character. But on Devlin's second point, I think putting the bulk of Nick and Audrey's character development in the second act was just a bad way of doing the real problem, which was centering the film around those two characters in the first place.

[Hybrid Gojira]

[Rody]

One of the problems I have with the film - which I think relates to the aformentioned script issues - is how the film tries to sell itself as a comedy, without doing so in a tasteful manner. Godzilla, Nick, and Audrey seem to carry the brunt of this. Godzilla, without a clearly defined villain role, is just an awkward creature trying to literally avoid conflict; by extension, the military looks ridiculous because the plot won't allow them to kill Godzilla right away, so they have to be incompetent. Nick is the stereotypical goofy, "nerdy" character who's out of his element but still manages to be the smartest guy in the room, so no one seems completely serious around him. Audrey is - ugh, I don't even know. Actually, I guess she's supposed to offer actual drama to the plot, but her character is so badly written and acted that she's just insufferable.

I totally agree that Animal and Phillipe would have made far more interesting leads.

[mbozzo]

I have n oidea if I have posted about this movie in this forum, but if I didn't, i has to post how much I hate it. The monster wasn't even Godzilla. He may have given the same name, but he sure didn't act like it. The cartoon based on this movie was a little bit better.

[Shin_Edda_Robo!!!!!]

Why has there been a pushback in recent months and years to try and redeem this movie within social media and communities like on tumblr?

I... don't get it..

[Psycho Soldier]

[jellydonut25]

[Benjamin Haines]

[Specium Ray]

I kind of like it? It's a bad Godzilla movie but it's not the worst kaiju movie I've ever seen.

Really, it's more of a nostalgia trip for me. All the older movies became easily available, there were a few cool books that came out, it was just a fun time to be a fan. I don't really want to defend the movie, it's plenty bad, I won't deny it. But I also grinned like an idiot when I saw the ZILLA seal on the back of the Final Wars DVD. You made her canon, Toho! She'll live forever now!

[RaptorG]

I no longer hate this movie as much as I did back then but the one thing that I can never forget is the many phases that I went through for it (and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only Godzilla fans during the 90s that had it). At best I recall it like this:

Phase I: Denial
That one feeling of thinking you weren't sure if you liked the movie or if you did. You try to defend and justify your negative emotions.
Phase II: Anger
You start getting angry from questioning yourself more even though you knew you didn't like it.
Phase III: Submit/acknowledge
You then admit that your original feelings of trying to say the movie was good is false. You knew the movie was bad and you came to accept it as crap/garbage.

I actually gave this movie a re-watch a few weeks ago and I still can't stand any of the human cast. They just weren't lovable and for some reason I couldn't just stand Audrey as a character. I felt like she was the worst character that was written in that whole movie. If I had to draw just one picture to describe my understanding of her character is would be this:

[jellydonut25]

Denial was a big one for me. I saw it in theaters 3 times because I wasn't convinced that I hated it the first time, and then the third time was actually because the second projection broke with like 10 minutes left and they let us all come back another time to see it again. I was 13, a free movie was like...a free movie.