TALKBACK #1: Gojira

[Reaper G]

[Psycho Soldier]

I don't know how it happens, but Gojira gets better every time I see it. It's one of the few kaiju films that's genuinely sad and depressing for its entire duration, yet it doesn't forget to entertain its audience. The cinematography, music, and SPFX work all come together to give it a haunting quality that's mostly absent from other films in the genre - for me, only GRA and Gorgo come close to the standard set here. I can forgive this movie's visual shortcomings because everything else is so excellently done. There are more than a few reasons why this is among my top 3 movies of all time (the others, for interest's sake, being The 7th Voyage of Sinbad and the 1982 Conan the Barbarian), but I don't think I'd be saying anything new or interesting.

Well, maybe one thing. It's kind of funny to me that the tanks actually get a chance to escape Godzilla in this movie. They shoot at him, realize it's not working (or run out of ammo) and say, "Gotta go, kthxbye." Not exactly par for the course after this.

EDIT: Oh, one other thing. I keep hearing rumors that you can see a cockroach running around the set at one point, but I have never seen it. I'll double-check this thread once I'm done here, but is anyone able to confirm or deny it?

[MouthForWar]

[jellydonut25]

[MekaGojira3k]

[Psycho Soldier]

[jellydonut25]

[MekaGojira3k]

[jellydonut25]

[MekaGojira3k]

[lhb412]

[The Real McCoy]

I'll have to watch it again, but I always took it as the crowd saw him leaving and then they started cheering, but because of the jets.

[jellydonut25]

[MekaGojira3k]

[eabaker]

Re: the main characters being sidelined for major sections of the movie, to me that adds to the semi-documentary style of the movie. It generally rings false to me when, in a sprawling story of this type, a small handful of people are somehow present for every major event that occurs.

Gojira is told from multiple points of view; we come back to Yamane, Emiko, and Ogata most often, but Hagiwara and Shinkichi are both perspectives that are represented for a good reason.

[Shin_Edda_Robo!!!!!]

[kiryugoji04]

[mr.negativity]

[mr.negativity]

RIALTO PICTURES:

[jellydonut25]

Hmmmm...there's a part of me that would love to go, because I've never been to SXSW and I'd hope that there'd be some sort of extended sequence of the new film shown...

...but I did see Gojira last year at the Alamo Drafthouse, so that would kinda lower my interest, because then I'd be REALLY hoping to see something from the new film or would come away with a touch of disappointment.

[jellydonut25]

Watched the Criterion disc last night for the first time.

I talked a bit about the disc itself in the recently watched movies thread, so I'll just say here that the film itself is near perfection. It's a triumph of the genre and once the destruction scenes kick in, I'm always absolutely GLUED to the screen. You can defend any of the other films as much as you want, and I'll never agree that any of them come close to showing Godzilla's destruction in as hard-hitting and terrifying a way as this film. Not Mothra vs. Godzilla, not G85, not GMK...none of them have as visceral and awful a feeling to them. The shots of Godzilla silhouetted against a fire-filled sky, the woman cowering in fear with her daughters, the military personnel fleeing in terror, it's breathtaking and powerful.

And Dr. Yamane has probably the best reason for wanting to study the giant monster I've seen in a movie. He's less concerned with Godzilla being a dinosaur, and far more concerned with the radioactivity part of it. How and why was Godzilla able to survive exposure to radioactivity? That's a relevant topic for the Japanese in 1954.

Even the little details are awesome, like the people on the train discussing radioactive fish, bomb shelters, Nagasaki, and their weariness after years of war and suffering from radioactive fallout.

If you could take some of the lines from the American dub like: "You have your fear, which might become reality, and you have Godzilla, which IS reality." and two or three others, this movie would be even better.
4.5 outta 5.
0.5 deduction for a couple over-emphasized points of dialogue, and the pretty poor hand puppet.

[Bluejira]

Always amazes me that Toho went from this visceral gut punch of a movie to G vs. Megalon in 20 years.
As to the cockroach who knows but wouldn't surprise me in the least. On a similar note a Kong fan on CHFB recently found a paint brush left by O'Brien for 7 frames when Kong is on the top of the ESB. Found after 81 years.
http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum.yuk ... va2_6go4iE

[jellydonut25]

^Woah. That's crazy!

[mr.negativity]

[mr.negativity]