When I was a kid growing up in the Nineties, Godzilla reigned supreme. The king of the monsters was a schlock superstar, and as a disciple, I worshipped at an altar of VHS tapes. It was a good time at the height of Heisei era, with disasterpieces like Godzilla vs. Biollante hitting the American market, and my baby brain was none the wiser that I was mostly being spoon-fed decades-old dubs and reissues of Showa classics. I had a hero! One that fit in nicely alongside green-skinned contemporaries, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. That all changed one day when my dad sat me down to watch his Godzilla – 1956’s Godzilla, King of the Monsters!
That film, itself a re-edit of the 1954 original, ruined everything. It was in black and white. Godzilla was the bad guy. He didn’t even fight other monsters, instead systematically ruining people’s lives until being murdered on the ocean floor. It was devastating. But as I grew older and more capable of grasping nuance, I eventually came around. And as more ‘zillas became available in the DVD era, my ongoing cinematic education led to an important lesson: Unless you’re Roland Emmerich, there are very few wrong ways to make Godzilla.
The beauty of Godzilla is that he can be anything – a shitty dad, a kaiju luchador, a possessed skeleton in a robot body – but the best versions are always just an allegory. As he was in 1954’s Godzilla and again in 1984’s The Return of Godzilla, he began as an anti-nuclear warning to the world and as recently as 2016’s beloved Shin Godzilla, he continued the trend as a catch-all for catastrophic forces of nature with tragic consequences due to the ineptness of our leaders.
And as we near his 70th anniversary, Godzilla returns once again as a message on the horrors and human toll of war, in Takashi Yamazaki’s Godzilla Minus One. And it is spectacular.
Set in the aftermath of World War II, Minus One returns to the setting of the original film for a soft retelling. It follows Kōichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki), a disgraced kamikaze pilot who failed not only to give his life in service of his country, but also to save the lives of his brothers-in-arms in their first brush with Godzilla. Out the gate, it’s clear that this Godzilla will be sad, serious business. Unlike Legendary’s MonsterVerse, which plays mostly in the kaiju wrestling world, some light character work in Godzilla (2014) and Monarch: Legacy of Monsters aside, Minus One is intent on telling a very human story. To do that, it borrows from the best.
It only takes a few scenes viewing Minus One for your brain to register, “That’s Spielberg.” The hallmarks are apparent and numerous, from the romantic and rosy period aesthetic, marred by sadness and a sweeping sense of what used to be. The action sequences are built on ratcheting, razor-sharp tension yet remain neatly choreographed. Taking stronger lessons from Jaws than Gareth Edwards’ 2014 outing, the film never shies away from showing Godzilla, but focuses on more effective use of scope. There’s a scene of Godzilla chasing survivors on what amounts to a tugboat that you’d swear was done animatronic, with the monster’s eerie human eyes locked in a gaze just above the ocean’s surface.
Courtesy of Toho Company, Ltd.
There’s also humor! And hope! Whereas its Reiwa-era predecessor Shin Godzilla played as a black comedy, leaning heavily into the tragedy of preventable loss fumbled by the Japanese government’s response to both the Fukushima nuclear disaster and the 2011 Tōhoku tsunami, Minus One goes for a more optimistic point of self-reflection on the wages of war, with potential for a brighter future. There’s that Spielberg.
And Yamazaki doesn’t deny the influence, having openly stated he drew from Spielberg and Jaws, specifically, as well as a more surprising source. Not just inspired by the 1954 film, Yamazaki also references his favorite film of the series: 2001’s absolutely gonzo Godzilla, Mothra, and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack. But where that film literally imbued Godzilla with the souls of Pacific soldiers to punish Japan for its wartime crimes, Minus One opts for the subtext as this Godzilla haunts its protagonist’s dreams through PTSD and survivor’s guilt. He only believes Godzilla to be the physical manifestation of the souls he failed to save by dereliction of duty. Allegory!
Written during the pandemic at a time when isolation and global distrust of the powers that be permeated the collective consciousness, the film takes aim at the Japanese government for its wanton lack of empathy and devaluing of human lives, both in its WWII-era use of kamikaze pilots and how, fully disarmed by the U.N. in response to their actions, they remained unable to protect their citizens lest they risk tripping up foreign policy. Instead, it’s up to the Japanese people to stand up and fight – against their grief and failures, and for the hope of a better tomorrow.
Courtesy of Toho Company, Ltd.
But it’d all be moot if the characters didn’t resonate. Despite the tone of the original and a handful of others that lean into the drama, most kaiju flicks use the human element merely as filler to connect the dots between monster melees. The MonsterVerse is guilty of this with its rotating cast of paper-thin characters elevated solely by the sheer charisma of its actors. It’s a testament to Yamakazi’s work as both director and screenwriter that Minus One feels like a wartime character drama first, kaiju film second.
As for Godzilla himself, Toho has outdone themselves with a new classic design. A far cry from the cringe-inducing body-horror abomination from Shin – decidedly One Ugly Motherfucker – or even the chonky bruiser from the Legendary flicks, Minus One bears all the marks of a Showa/Heisei era man-in-a-suit monster, complete with thunder thighs and the catlike face us VHS kids know and love. There’s an art to balancing the cool factor of a creature that’s supposed to evoke equal parts awe and malignance, and that needle is deftly threaded each time Godzilla powers up his atomic breath in Minus One. Each instance brings theatergoers from a thunderous, “Oh shit!” down to a whimpering, “Oh shit…,” as our inner child’s enthusiasm slams into the brick wall of adult empathy. It’s a thrill ride into despair.
Rolling into North American theaters at the same time as Apple TV’s Monarch: Legacy of Monsters hits streaming, and in its contractually obligated off-year ahead of 2024’s Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, Godzilla Minus One offers an alternative to shared universe syndrome. It’s an artfully made throwback to kaiju classics and likely the first Godzilla movie that dares to make you cry. See it on the biggest screen possible.
