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After a thorough viewing, I've decided that I take major issue with 3 things...
A. Direction
Kitamura's direction for this film isn't just wrong for the source material, it's generally wrong for the script as well. The dialogue may not be perfect, but it also doesn't beg for crazy camera angles and ridiculous over-acting. It's just too much. Not to mention the way over-used color filtering...
B. Lack of Monsters
This is basically a script criticism. Godzilla doesn't show up until over halfway through the movie, and we barely get even a few minutes of kaiju screen time by that point. In fact, overall, I think the monster screen time added up to something like 20 minutes or so...and that's for 11 monsters! Totally absurd...
C. Score
Horrible. Totally horrible. Keith Emerson is great in ELP. The score in full is an interesting listen by itself. But overlaying this super-synth/cliche action music over the film just drags it into a whole new level of embarrassment. In fact, I think this is my main problem. I could have almost tolerated the direction and script with a good classical score.
And the worst part is that these are pretty much all Kitamura's mistakes. He (obviously) directed it, he rewrote the script, and he handpicked Emerson (and the other score contributors). And Kitamura's only there because Toho specifically chose him for his "edginess".
I'm sorry. Just needed to get that out. I'm done.
