Special effects in movies hindered by Toho?

[Andrew Nguyen]

[TerranigmaFreak]

[zekend01]

[walshiam]

Given some of the last Godzilla films made, particularly the MechaGodzilla films, the effects were top-notch. I would challenge Hollywood to do as good without screwin' it up.

[TerranigmaFreak]

[the_candidate]

For some reason Toho's Millennium series effects looked very weak, especially the monster suits. I don't know what happened between 1995 and 1999 but somehow they forgot how to make suits that looked convincing on-screen. Even GMK's suits have that stiff rubbery look to them, especially Ghidorah.

Out of the three series, I would argue that the Heisei era has the best visual effects by far, if only because Koichi Kawakita had to work on an incredibly small scale. Remember, the Heisei Godzilla was almost twice the size of Gamera and the Millennium Godzillas, so the miniatures had to be extremely small. He did some truly impressive work, especially in Biollante, King Ghidorah, and Destroyah. Also, his suit effects have never been topped.

[jellydonut25]

[MekaGojira3k]

[Legion]

I've never heard anyone say the miniature effects were better in the Heisei series than the Showa films. Most times I'll hear people say that upping Godzilla's size to 80 meters and then 100 meters hurt the miniature effects more than it helped.

Look no further than the asteroid field and the miniature city at the climax of Space Godzilla for evidence.

[the_candidate]

Mekagojira3k: I suggest you read A Critical History and Filmography of Toho's Godzilla Series by David Kalat, as it goes into detail about the production of the first 22 Godzilla films. If you notice after 1964, there were hardly any major city sets, with the exceptions being Tokyo in DAM and Tokyo again in ToM. Mostly this was due to budgetary constraints. Monster Zero mainly took place in the countryside, and the next two films both took place on islands. Godzilla's Revenge was almost all stock footage, and Godzilla vs. Hedorah, Godzilla vs. Gigan, and Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla only used very tiny city sets for brief moments.

It wasn't until 1984 that fans got a proper lengthy city destruction sequence, and while Nakano's effects were obviously inferior to the work Kawakita did in the next two films, his model Tokyo looked good overall. The biggest problem was the change in Godzilla's height from 50 meters to 80 meters, because not only did the suit have to be much more detailed to look good on camera, the city itself had to be scaled down considerably. Not only that, but Tokyo as a city had changed drastically in the previous couple decades, and it had skyscrapers that towered over Godzilla even at his highest. This is why I find your comments about shingles baffling; how many skyscrapers have shingles?

Tokyo was no longer a flat city, it looked much more like NY (probably due to the American government investing millions in Japanese infrastructure theoughout the decades). The same goes for many other Japanese cities; there was a huge economic boom in the 80s that really built Japan up and modernized it. When Godzilla's sized increased again in 1991 to 100 meters, the model cities needed to be even smaller. Godzilla was now twice the size of the original, and the miniatures- which were already hard enough to build- had to be twice as small, and even more complex. Not only that, but the cities needed to be much more expansive; take a look at Osaka in Godzilla vs. Biollante, it's far bigger than any previous city set.

In 1995, Godzilla's sized increased yet again to 120 meters, and the film was made on a lower budget than the previous two films. In addition, Kawakita had said that the production was extremely rushed. Once again he not only had create a new Godzilla, a Godzilla Junior, and all the Destroyah forms, he had to create a portion of Tokyo. Godzilla was more massive than ever, and the Haneda Airport set had to be almost miniscule. Kawakita had the toughest job of any Godzilla effects director, because he didn't have the luxury to set his films on islands or in countrysides. He needed to create new cities for each film, and the cities had to be insanely detailed and extremely tiny. The reason why Toho kept bringing him back was because he could do good work on a small budget and rushed schedule, and he accomplished a lot with what little he had. I'll upload some screenshots from the Showa and Heisei city miniatures to show what I mean.

[Legion]

Eh, I'll take the miniature effects and sense of personal urgancy they gave films like GMK and the Kaneko's Gameras over the sets in the Heisei Godzilla series. The 50 meter scale works in a way that the 80 and 100 meter scales don't. While I understand why they decided to make Godzilla bigger in the Heisei films, I think it worked against the miniatures.

Tsuburaya still did it best though.

[the_candidate]

The miniatures in GMK are indeed fantastic, but there are so few of them. The Bonin Island miniatures look good, as well as the house that the jet crashes into. Kaneko didn't take full advantage of the Yokohama set, however. The buildings are great but not enough of them get destroyed; at times it looks as if the monsters are walking on pre-determined paths "between" the buildings; the most glaring example of this is when Ghidorah arrives and "rolls" towards Godzilla and hits nothing. In fact, most of the Yokohama battle takes place in the harbor.

What brings the Millennium Series down is the CGI. During the 90s, Toho really wanted to use CGI for their monsters, but it just didn't look good. They tried animating Biollante with computers, but the effect was very poor and the scene was deleted (it can be seen on youtube, however). Of course, CGI was still being perfected throughout the early to mid 90s, so they probably couldn't have used much of it anyway. Once 1999 hit, however, CGI was a staple of sci-fi films in both Japan and the US, for better or for worse. Unfortunately, Toho never utilized CGI properly. The monsters that are rendered with computers look horrible; the birth sequences of Ghidorah and Mothra in GMK stand out the most, but the swimming Godzilla in G2K and quite a few effects in GFW are bad as well.

Even five years after GFW, its computer effects look downright embarassing. The same goes for all the Millennium films, where the CGI is on par with what Asylum makes. The scene with Tachibana and the Satsuma sub inside Godzilla in GMK is just painful to watch. During the 2000s, Toho was obviously trying to keep up with Hollywood's CGI, but they never had the budget to pull it off. In addition, Toho began outsourcing their practical effects work, which is why a lot of the monsters look very stiff and rubbery. If you compare the Millennium Godzilla suits to the Heisei ones, the Heisei ones have a certain anatomical look to them. Godzilla has both feline and reptilian qualities. The Millennium Godzillas just have the standard "giant monster" look. It doesn't look good on camera.

One other huge advantage to the 90s films was the use of animatronics. The Millennium films, aside from GMK, did not utilize animatronic Godzilla heads. Godzilla barely does any emoting in the Millennium films; he walks around, stiff as a board, and just stares. The Heisei films, meanwile, had great-looking animatronic Godzilla heads that could blink, snarl, rotate, growl, and sneer. Close-up shots of Godzilla firing his heat ray looked excellent, and his movements were very life-like. Aside from GMK, the Millennium films had nothing like this, and it's baffling why Toho didn't invest in more animatronics.

[Robert Saint John]

[MekaGojira3k]

[Legion]

There were stop motion vines and a traditionally animated Biollante (neither making it into the finished film), but I'm almost 100% positive that Kawakita never attempted to create the monster using computers.

In 1989 the most they were doing with computers were wire frame simulations. Believe me, if at any stage of production there was a CGI version of Biollante we'd know about it. At the very least Ed probably would have mentioned it in that Biollante issue of Japanese Giants.

[Robert Saint John]

I'm certain the_candidate knows what he's talking about. He seems like such an expert. After all, he's read A Critical History and Filmography of Toho's Godzilla Series by David Kalat.

Please, tell us more of this hereto undiscovered clip!!!

[the_candidate]

The original ending for Godzilla vs. Biollante was to have Biollante devour Godzilla anime-style. They shot the Biollante suit and then had him transform via graphics into an animated Biollante when he bit down on Godzilla.

[Robert Saint John]

But that's not computer generated.

[Legion]

That's traditional 2D cel animation. Not CGI.

[Robert Saint John]

I'm bummed out now. Here an expert was promising me CG Biollante, and all I get is animation.

I wonder if there are other things he says that may not be true??

[MekaGojira3k]

[Legion]

[the_candidate]

[Legion]

[the_candidate]