GODZILLA

Jeri Jacquin, Movie Maven

Coming to theatres this Friday from director Gareth Edwards and Legendary Pictures comes the biggest hero alive with GODZILLA.

This film tells the story of the Brody family. Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston) is a scientist at a nuclear facility in Japan along with scientist wife Sandra ( Juliette Binoche) and their son Ford. On this day Joe has been monitoring a disturbance around the facility but no one is listening to him.

Sending Sandra to check beneath the facility it takes moments before it all collapses – but from what? Surviving it all Joe continues his search and fifteen years later son Ford (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) is in the military living in San Francisco with wife Elle (Elizabeth Olsen) and son Sam (Carson Bolde).

When Ford gets a call that his father is in trouble, he packs his suitcase and heads back to Japan. Joe tells Ford that they need to go back to their old home because there is proof what happened all those years ago will happen again.

Someone else investigating the incident is Dr. Ichiro Serizawa (Ken Watanabe) who made a discovery of a Mutor cocoon beneath the disaster site. When Joe and Ford are questioned by police, Dr. Serizawa listens but – it’s too late.

Now the Mutor has hatched and looking for nuclear power as a food source. The military is called as Admiral Stenz (David Strathairn) sets up a plan of attack but soon he discovers there are two monsters!

That’s when Dr. Serizawa tells the Admiral about Godzilla believing he will put the balance back and rid the earth of the creatures. Ford only wants to get back to San Francisco to wife and son but as he does – the Mutors and Godzilla are already there!

Now, it’s war!

FINAL WORD: Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Ford doesn’t really do a heck of a lot in the film. He comes home, spends five minutes with family, runs off to rescue Dad and then spends the rest of the movie trying to get back to San Francisco. Oh, and a lot of wide eyed stares and a few stunts. Yes, there are a few moments of heroism but it’s blotted by me saying out loud “who came up with that stupid idea!”

Watanabe as Dr. Serizawa just didn’t strike me as a very smart scientist. I mean seriously, if Ford’s Dad could come up with scientific research for 15 years that prove his theory that something big lived underground – why couldn’t Dr. Serizawa do the same with all the massive technology he had. Joe Brody didn’t have ANY of those gadgets! Then the good Dr. spends the rest of the film trying to convince an Admiral that the world will balance with a big monster and more film time with close up of a shocked face. I love you Ken, truly I do, but this film didn’t do you any justice at all.

Cranston is fine as Joe, playing a crazy isn’t difficult for him but this time he gets to do it with hair! Binoche as Sandra doesn’t have anything to offer really. Olsen spends an equal amount of time on the screen with a wide-eyed stare. I hate to say it but the mom-son relationship was totally unbelievable for me. Strathairn, whom I adore as well, seemed to take a role of an inept Admiral. Then again I don’t think I’d listen to a Dr. tell me that a big monster could make things right but the nuke idea – not so good.

Other cast include: Vivienne Graham as Sally Hawkins, Richard T. Jones as Cpt. Hampton, Victor Rasuk as Sgt. Morales, Patrick Sabongui as Lt., Waltz, and CJ Adams as young Ford.

TUBS OF POPCORN: I give GODZILLA three tubs of popcorn out of five. Trust me when I say I had to strain to give it a three. Is it fun, yes! It’s it a lot of fun, no! For as much money as was spent on this film Godzilla deserved much more film time than he got. Instead there’s a lot of mumbo jumbo drama that I just could care less about with a background story that could have been cut in half.

The characters aren’t around long enough for me to invest emotions and the ones that stay around – meaning Ford and Dr. Serizawa don’t have anything important to say. Seriously, it’s just close up of their blank or stunned faces. When a friend asked what I thought of the film I basically said, “Get rid of the humans and its AWESOME!” – I hold to that opinion.

I still stand by the original black and white Godzilla films and probably because they remind me of better times in childhood. I’m quite sure those who have NO idea about these earlier versions will be satisfied with this version which almost, that’s almost, wipes clean the version from a few years back with Matthew Broderick – yea, I don’t even want to think about that thanks.

 That being said, every time Godzilla made an appearance the audience went completely wild. He is everything excited fans wanted! He looks original, he looks menacing, he has awesome breath, he fights and tears up San Francisco and, he plays possum really, really well. I just wanted more, more, more but I guess I can always hope for the return of the big guy with HUGELY more camera time!

In the end – with one roar everyone knows who he is!