Like a giant monster suddenly emerging from the ocean and crushing you like a worm before you can run to safety, Godzilla minus one came across Netflix by surprise. And it’s about time we got to watch it at home, because its six-month window between theatrical release and streaming was significantly longer than most – and, to us kaijumongers, that felt like six years. Despite being the scariest depiction of Godzilla ever made, the film, from Japanese studio Toho, has become one of the most heartwarming success stories of 2023: on a modest budget of $10 million to $12 million , it grossed $115 million worldwide and became a holiday hit in the United States. significantly boosting the career of talented writer/director Takashi Yamazaki. It also not only boasts visual effects that made Hollywood superhero movies with a budget 20 times the size look like the dreckola they too often are, but it also won the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. Two things I should also mention: the film is called this because it takes place before the events of original 1954 Godzilla (and anyone who starts poking holes in timelines, remember that there is a special level of hell reserved for continuity nitpickers). Plus, the human characters achieve something we’ve never experienced before in a Godzilla movie: we love them and don’t want to see them get trampled or obliterated by the big guy’s radioactive garlic breath. It all adds up to a great movie – and here’s why you should start it, pronto.
The essential: The year is 1945, at the end of World War II. Fighter pilot Koichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki) is alive and not very happy about it. Unfortunately, this is how it is for a kamikaze pilot, bound by honor to sacrifice his life for his country. He lands his plane on an island, pretending it is damaged and thus evading his responsibilities. The repair crew shames him, unnecessarily, I might add – he feels enough shame for his sense of self-preservation, seen by many as cowardice. But before anyone can report him, the air raid siren goes off, except it’s not an air raid. No, American planes don’t do that SCREEN her. Godzilla starts tearing everything apart and Koichi comes to the gun in his plane even though he’s not convinced the bullets would hurt Godzilla – note: he’s right, the bullets don’t hurt Godzilla – he freezes in terror and watches almost all the men on board. the base is gnawed and trampled. So now we can add that to poor Koichi’s growing pile of PTSD and guilt.
Next, a strange scene for a Godzilla film: Tokyo in ruins, and Godzilla didn’t make it. The bombing left far too many people orphaned, like Koichi is now. The same goes for Noriko (Minami Hamabe), whom he meets among the rubble, and for baby Akiko, whom Noriko found and takes care of. They hole up together in a leaky cabin next to Sumiko (Sakura Ando), who shames Koichi for not dying in the war as he should have, but eventually comes to him and gives him a bag of rice to that the baby doesn’t do it. to be hungry. They get by for months and form a makeshift family. At this point, we’re so involved in the well-being of these people that we might not really want Godzilla to show up and spectacularly smash things. Captivating human drama. In a Godzilla movie. Wonders. Will they never stop?
Don’t worry, though, the plot serves our needs when Koichi finally lands a regular day job: finding and detonating underwater mines left over from the war. It sounds dangerous, but we’re pretty sure poor traumatized Koichi harbors a death wish. He works alongside Marine veteran Tachibana (Munetaka Aoki), crewman Mizushima (Yuki Yamada), and former Marine weapons specialist Noda (Hidetaka Yoshioka), who go out into open water where I was 100% sure that it was completely safe and there was none. no Godzilla farting, except I was wrong. The beast emerges and they put a mine in its mouth and blow it up and it looks dead for a second, but heals very quickly. It is a problem. Great difficulty. For them, for Tokyo and for everyone they love.
What films will this remind you of? : The big guy in Godzilla minus one has the dead-eyed expression of a wild animal, the likes of which we’ve never seen in its many, many iterations. No celebratory dances or high-fives for his monster pals here – my favorite from the Goofy Godzilla era is Godzilla vs. Megalon; Jet Jaguar 4-ever, yo – so it’s consistent with the creepy, beady-eyed version we saw in Shin Godzillaand of course the original from 1954. (And let’s do the recent barely forgivable American release Godzilla x Kong: The New Kingdom a favor and not bring it into this conversation, beyond stating that its box office success was certainly based on the goodwill and hype surrounding Minus one.)
Performances to watch: The acting here is an evenly balanced balance of quiet, thoughtful moments and amped-up melodrama (and, of course, expository statements when Godzilla is in the scene). Kamiki, Hamabe, and Yoshioka carry the burden of many moments of contemplation here, and do so impressively and effectively.
Memorable dialogues: The braintrust meets to discuss a plan to eliminate Godzilla – and asks way too much of the volunteers present:
Random Man: This plan – does it mean certain death?
Noda: Of course not.
Random Man: So this definitely beats wartime.
Sex and skin: None.
Our opinion : Has Tokyo not suffered enough? What about Koichi, his colleague friends and his pseudo-family? The specter of war still looms over the populace, and now they must face a pest so big that a million million Orkin men couldn’t eradicate its big toe. Godzilla minus one finds significant thematic and dramatic traction in the collective trauma of Japanese citizens, who are wounded and shaken on many levels after being on the losing end of a conflict that was even more horrific and destructive than arguably any war. Now feel free to add subtext about the cruelty and madness of Japan’s dictatorial leaders, who ordered their own soldiers to commit suicide, or in the OG Godzilla themes of atomic bomb anxieties – it’s all here in the script, which is deep and rich and sublimely balances human empathy and anti-war sentiment with the silly spectacle of giant monster movies stomping around. This is a major achievement.
Case in point: The U.S. and Japanese governments are not committing their armies to fight Godzilla, citing tensions with Russia. So it’s up to civilians to defeat the beast, which is as logical as it is ridiculous. And Yamazaki is making the most of this development, with World War II veterans reluctant to take risks again, but coming together in service of the common good to execute a plan So Crazy It Just Might Work, which, not to saying too much, is essentially hey, let’s give Godzilla a major case of turns. Like I said, sublime And silly – and original, at the same time paying homage to the 1954 film, in which scientists innovated beyond bullets and bombs and invented the infamous Oxygen Destroyer. This is one of the many levels at which Minus one is a clever variation on the themes established by the original classic.
In macro, the film shows Yamazaki doing the most with very little. It looks terrific whether it’s deploying CGI, practical effects, or – in solidarity with old films – miniatures. The storyline weaves political and scientific threads into its story of human perseverance and redemption, set against the backdrop of one of the most poignant existential symbols in cinema history, which happens to be a towering dinosaur that spews atomic laser vomit . Can you say that there are points where the plot is contrived? Yes, but if in fact you say that, you are a heartless galoot; the plight of Koichi and his damaged-but-not-broken quasi-family is deep and meaningful, rooted in classic Japanese melodrama (and when Koichi finally reflects on his mental state and admits, “My war is not over yet,” our hearts break). Yamazaki makes many seemingly disparate elements fit together perfectly. Godzilla minus one is an action film, a post-war drama, a monster epic, a character study – and quite possibly a classic.
Our call: The best visual effects? Of course, he really deserves this distinction. But there’s a big part of me that wanted Godzilla minus one to win the best photo too. Spread it.
John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.