Celebrating seventy years of the franchise, this Godzilla redux was a critical and box-office hit, and rightly so. It hits the ground running with a sombre Jurassic-styled attack on a remote Japanese island outpost in the dying days of World War II, which introduces our main character (a conscience-stricken kamikaze pilot) and sets the tone and focus for the film on survivor trauma/guilt and PTSD, the aftermath of war and its effects on the citizens. When the Bikini Atoll atomic tests cause the lizard-creature to mutate into the more familiar iteration of Godzilla, which wreaks destruction on the recovering mainland, a team is put together to try to take down the creature. Although the set pieces involving Godzilla are impressively destructive with well-realised effects work, these are integral to the story as opposed to the Hollywood films where they become self-serving spectacle, with the creature used sparingly but impactfully here as a big old scaly metaphor for the (American) war machine. Previous movies have trained audiences not to expect the level of tension and emotion on display here - the third act provides a couple of real emotional wallops in this film - making Godzilla Minus One both a solid creature feature and an enjoyable and moving tale.
No comments:
Post a Comment