Review of Shin Godzilla (2016) by Art S — 05 Apr 2018

Ayako watched this with me and I am certain she got a lot more out of it. To me, it was your typical disaster film, although amped up for the 21st century. Godzilla comes out of the water and then progresses to destroy parts of Tokyo while the armed forces of the world and numerous scientists try to stop him.

However, to her, it was very nearly a satire on the bureaucracy of the Japanese government (and relationship with the USA) with a lot of jokes that sailed over my head (or were lost in translation) and a clever use of particular character actors to tweak the audience.

I could see there was some comedy and the editing and music were used to good effect to keep things moving; nevertheless, at 2 hours, the film started to feel long. Godzilla himself was digitized but they used motion capture to keep him looking like a man in a rubber suit.

When he gets fully going with lasers coming out of him everywhere, it was pretty impressive (especially when seen in context in the middle of Tokyo). However, unless you are Japanese, I'm not sure I would recommend.

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