by jamaal7 » Mon May 17, 2004 2:19 am
Godzilla vs. Destoroyah was supposed to bring the whole series full circle and end it. So, it has a feeling, a weighty kind of finality that runs through it. From the appearence of Godzilla in Hong Kong, to the emergence of the crab form Destoroyahs, to the menacing Flying Bat-form Destoroyah that terrorizes Tokyo, GvsD is a film in which it seems that it's all going to end. In one scene, the Super-X 3 pilot, after mentioning their budget for next year, says, "We may not have a next year." Godzilla, who looks like a nuclear fire dragon, is headed toward meltdown, or may explode and take half of Asia with him. GvsD contains a beautiful reference to Daisuke Serazawa, described by Dr. Ijuin as a "superb scientist who is sleeping at the bottom of the sea." GvsD has a great fight waged by the Metropolitan Police as they battle the human sized destoroyahs with courage and enthusiasm. The film reunites Miki with Junior as she spots him at that beach. Junior then fights to a standstill, an opponent who is clearly his superior, saves Miki and Meru, dies valiantly, and then is resurrected, silhouetted in the radiactive mist, ready fight as the newly crowned King of the Monsters. GvsD has Godzilla enraged after Junior's death, and then going after Destoroyah with all that he has left, probably hastening on his own death.
There are some uneven SFX scenes, but there are many others that convince and impress, like Godzilla's face freezing, or the ocean steaming and glowing red around him, or his wading in the bay in Hong Kong. GvsD is a very moving and worthy entry in series just for having Momoko Kochi reprise her role as Emiko Yamane. Her narrative of events forty years before against the footage of Serazawa and Ogata preparing to descend into Tokyo Bay is chilling. That GvsD revisits the very area where the Oxygen Destroyer was used is dramatic and moving, especially with Akira Ifukube's music.