Godzilla Resurgence Movie Review

 Last 2014, The US rebooted their version of the super popular daikaiju (giant monster) Godzilla and the audience were kind of disappointed that the titular monster itself doesn't have a lot of screen time. Japan, the "mother" of Godzilla, who created the monster last 1954, rebooted the franchise for the third time (the first was 1984 and the second was 1999 in Japan) under Toho studio.

Godzilla Resurgence was known as Shin Godzilla in Japan, meaning, new Godzilla. The movie depicted the origin of Godzilla which was all the same to all of Godzilla's portrayal. The difference in this movie was how they executed the story. The development of Godzilla's origin in this version was gradually revealed to the audience, rather show it on a prologue, they cleverly inserted it within the story. This story progression made you, as the audience, to have interest on the monster itself rather forget about it as the movie progresses. The US Godzilla focused only the story around the people during the "attack" of Godzilla which led to the limited screen time of the monster, while on this version, Both the monster and the main characters were on the spotlight.

I like how this movie portrayed the chain of command in the Japanese government as well as their value for civilian life in contrast to US films were there's always collateral "damage". I also liked how they justified every action of the military instead of the there-is-a-monster-let's-fire-all-we-got. This made the movie a lot more believable. The details from how the Japanese government reacted and how the citizens behaved during the movie will make you feel that the tragedy was really happening in real life. The film was co-directed by Hideaki Anno and Shinji Higuchi who directed Neon Genesis Evangelion which explains the epic scenes akin to the Eva franchise.

What I don't like in the movie was a kind of nitpicking anyway. some scenes need not to be included because it was not really related to the plot, but that didn't got in the way of the build up to the climax which is good in a way.

Overall, watching this movie will make you love Godzilla all over again, even though he can destroy your country in an instant. This is Japan's way of telling the US to stop effin' up with their franchises and this is how it's done.

I give this movie a rating of 4 out of 5 stars, it may not be perfect but the heart and soul of a kaiju movie was all present.