It’s been about a week since my last review, so I decided to do one more thing Godzilla related before moving on. This time, I will be doing a comparison between the newest movie, the original 1954 film, and 1998. There will be minor spoilers.
Firstly, comparing the Legendary movie to 1998 is not possible. Why? Because 1998 was not a Godzilla movie. It just had the title. It had nothing to make it worthy of that title either. But since it’s America’s first attempt vs its second attempt, I’ll go into detail.
On 2014’s side, we have an unstoppable 400 ft tall prehistoric force of nature with atomic breath and an agenda. On 1998’s side, we have an inconsistently sized iguana with pregnancy problems, no atomic breath, and is taken down by just two small airstrikes. Is there any need to go into further detail? No, but I will because I can.
The 1998 creature is not a force of destruction, it’s just an animal. That ‘realistic’ approach is not what Godzilla is about. Yes, he is an animal, and in 2014, he’s acting on instinct and is hunting down his natural enemies. But still, that animal is more like a force of nature. Just like Ken Watanabe said, “The arrogance of man is thinking nature is in our control, and not the other way around.” Basically, Godzilla is like a hurricane. No way to stop it. It might be an animal, but there’s just no hope. Think Jurassic Park. Life will find a way. They couldn’t control the dinosaurs, and humans got screwed over because of their arrogance. It’s the exact same message, but told differently.
1998 took a big crap all over that and said “Yeah, look who’s in control now, nature!” Yeah, next time a hurricane hits America, let’s all try shooting at it. I can’t BELIEVE we didn’t think of that before! All those lives lost and damage done at Katrina or Sandy could have been prevented if we just stood up to nature and put it in its place! I get it now! Thanks Godzilla 1998! Sure nailed that one! See how wrong that is? That movie completely missed the point. It didn’t take the core of Godzilla seriously, and just tried to have fun with it by making it a B grade monster movie.
2014 Godzilla is portrayed astronomically better than 1998. He IS that hurricane. He couldn’t care less about humans, because he hardly knows that we exist! Some people say that Godzilla is the hero in that movie. He kinda is, but it wasn’t like he said “Mankind is in danger! I must help!” He’s just acting on his primal instincts to kill the MUTO and remain as the alpha predator. Even if humans didn’t exist, he would still technically be saving the world. That’s what I love about this Godzilla.
Comparing the human characters of both films to each other is easy. 2014 wins. 1998’s characters were complete idiots. The military caused more damage than the actual monster did! Sure, the idea in 2014 to nuke all 3 kaiju was pretty stupid, and Aaron Taylor Johnson was a bit bland, but they were still better than 1998 could ever dream of having. They took the situation seriously, and acted like it was a real event, instead of making jokes out of it. I’m not saying Godzilla can’t be fun, or everything has to be Christopher Nolan serious, but the tone 1998 was going for wasn’t the right one for a Godzilla film. It definitely wasn’t right if they were trying to get western audiences to take it seriously. It made people like him less than they already did. 2014 is still a fun movie, but it handled the grim tone well. It’s not cheesy, the effects are not made off of 50 cents and some puppets, it’s not over the top ridiculous, it’s the perfect update for modern audiences. People think Godzilla is a cool thing now. 2014 has healed the wounds left by Roland Emmerich’s piece of garbage. It’s that point in history that we can all forget about that like it never happened. Just leave it be. Let the past stay in the past. It’s done, and we only had to wait 16 years. Yay.
Is the new movie able to stand up to the original Gojira? Starting with the creature itself, on 1954’s side, we have a 160 ft tall metaphor for nuclear destruction. No bombs or missiles can hurt it. Gojira, unlike 2014’s Godzilla, looked like he was deliberately attacking the city of Tokyo, as if it was his mission. The new one never tried to wreck a city, since he didn’t even care to notice us in the first place. Gojira is still a force of nature, but this force is trying to set humankind in its place. It was supposed to destroy everything in order to drive the anti nuclear message forward. Sure, the idea of nature ‘taking revenge’ is a bit outlandish, but the movie does it in a such a way to not make it preachy and annoying, like a lot of other movies do. That’s only one reason as to why it’s a masterpiece.
2014 Godzilla is a little different. He does have nuclear origins, but nothing in the movie really looked like he was the symbol for the danger of nuclear weapons. He was more of a symbol of restoring balance to the world after humans use nuclear weapons without knowing their full power. In the official graphic novel prequel to the movie, Godzilla: Awakening, the kaiju were woken up by the radiation of the bombs that were used in World War 2. They lived off of radioactive energy in the permian period. Technically, that message is, “Don’t use nuclear weapons, or else some prehistoric beasts that feed off of radiation that we never even knew existed will wake up and turn the world to crap,” but it’s not like human’s ignorance with such weapons actually had a hand in making the kaiju. Then again, it could very well be saying that we will only start a chain reaction to destroy the world, or something. But that’s not as tragic and dark as us creating the monsters. That gets the point across much better.
As for the other elements of the films, they’re also very similar, yet very different at the same time. The characters are all trying to cope with the fact that there are huge destructive beasts walking around. There’s a love story in both, there’s the scientist who wants to logically approach the situation instead of going crazy with the military, and of course, there’s the devastation of civilization.
The romance in both films is okay, I guess. There was a little too much drama with the love triangle in Gojira, and there wasn’t a lot of screentime with Aaron Taylor Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen to really make people care too much. Professor Yamane in Gojira wanted to study the creature, and kept trying to find out logical ways of dealing with it. Ken Watanabe, whose character is named after Dr. Serizawa, from the original film, is basically the same character. The only difference is that he’s been studying the monsters for a long time, and knows more about them than anyone. With so much knowledge, you’d think he would have a better plan than just letting the kaiju fight it out! I guess the only reason he did that is because it looks awesome.
That’s fine, and these days, Godzilla would need to be an awesome spectacle in order to get people to watch it, but the destruction scenes of the original weren’t supposed to make people cheer and applaud. It was supposed to make people fear Gojira, and fear the fact that something with the strength of a nuclear bomb could destroy their town. That was perfect for a monster movie, especially with the reputation they have.
I know that not every kaiju movie has to have some deeper meaning, be serious all the time, and can’t have fun with itself, and I personally love movies where it is over the top crazy, like Godzilla: Final Wars. That one was great, even though it didn’t have a message to it. But I’m comparing 2014 to just the original right now. Nothing else.
And in comparison, Gojira is still the superior movie. I honestly don’t think anything will beat the original. But keep in mind, 2014 isn’t exactly supposed to be a direct remake of the original. They’re both different films. As its own standalone thing, it’s fantastic, and as an updated Godzilla movie for modern audiences, it was very well done. I can already tell it’s bringing in new members to the fanbase. Honestly, I was shocked that other big time critics even liked it! It’s one of the few times I actually agree with them on something. At the time this is posted, Godzilla is still in theaters, so go see it if you haven’t yet. It is the best since the original 1954 masterpiece.
That does it for my blog’s whole Godzilla phase. I’ve been doing nothing but Godzilla reviews since early March. I’ve only done about 3 movie reviews that weren’t Godzilla related in that time frame. I’m finally ready to move on. To what, I don’t know. I do know that some time in mid June, I’ll be doing Transformers reviews leading up to the new movie, Age of Extinction. Hopefully I’ll find something to do until then, so be sure to check back here every now and then. If you want (if you aren’t already one of my followers), like my Facebook page for any updates that I may or may not post.
Stay frosty.
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