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43 of 48 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Monsters, Monsters, and More Monsters, February 14, 2006
This remake of the classic Destroy All Monsters maintains the wonder of all those monsters but is darker in nature. Monsters are springing up all over the place attacking civilization. Then aliens arrive and eliminate the monsters. Are they our saviors or something much worse?
Eventually the truth about the aliens is learned and all out war ensues. The monsters return and it is up to a small group to go to Antarctica and release the imprisoned Godzilla. Hopefully Godzilla will handle the monsters while the people can handle the aliens. Monster mayhem ensues.
This movie is far better than Tokyo SOS. We see Manda in a more active role than previously as well as a number of other monsters from the early years of Godzilla. We even see the American Godzilla and an upgraded Gigan. There is a montage that shows Godzilla through the ages. The only thing I didn't like was seeing King Seesar as a villain. Seeing the alien leader have fits when things don't go right was almost priceless. All in all this is the Godzilla movie that really delivers what all the hype promised. Check it out.
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79 of 101 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great way to celebrate 50 years of Godzilla!, October 8, 2005
I'll just get this out of the way right now: Ryuhei Kitamura is one of my favorite directors. He's the Japanese equivalent of our Quentin Tarantino or Robert Rodriguez. He has an eye-catching visual style, the talent to write entertaining dialogue, and nobody in Japan does action better. He's also able to take pure cinematic cheese with elements of other genre films and meld them together in exciting ways that seldom fail to entertain, even if you occasionally roll your eyes. I'm also a lifelong kaiju fanatic who grew up watching Godzilla and Gamera on Saturday afternoons and saving up my shoddy allowance to buy the films on VHS. Ah, memories...
That said, my excitement level over this film was naturally huge. I consider the millenium series of Godzilla movies to be among the greatest, boasting decent special effects and serious storylines which past kaiju films were known for lacking. This movie takes all of the improvements in those areas and throws other aspects waaaaay back to the sixties and seventies, when the movies weren't afraid to not be taken seriously. The funny-dressing aliens we all remember are back with a vengeance, looking like cosplayers at a Matrix convention. Hilarious. Speaking of "The Matrix", Kitamura flaunts it's influence on his filmmaking shamelessly throughout this movie, creating a team of mutant humanoids that could have stepped right out of the film and have all of the over-the-top abilities we saw in that series. This makes for some very exciting non-kaiju fight scenes; a first in a Godzilla film. The characters are also among the first truly memorable heroes and villains in G-film history. After this, I might get into some minor spoilers, so if you want to see the movie without knowing anything about the plot, now's the time to leave. Just trust me, the movie's good. Check it out.
Now, onto the monsters. Every major (and most minor) classic era Godzilla foe puts in an appearance (except for Kong, Megalon, and Mechagodzilla). As a bonus, the infamous American Godzilla even gets a guest-starring spot. Needless to say, he doesn't last long against the real thing. Then again, neither do any of the other monsters, aside from the uber-powerful Monster X. There is also a hilarious dig at long-time Godzilla competitor Gamera in the film that made me laugh out loud, but don't blink or you'll miss it. Godzilla is largely absent for most of the film after being buried in Antarctica in the first scene. But once he's unleashed as humanity's last weapon, following a kaiju-powered alien invasion resulting in the destruction of all civilization, he wastes no time leveling every single foe in the film, one after the other. The fights are short and occasionally riotously cheesy. There is one shot reminiscent of "Shaolin Soccer" that I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it. I giggled about that one shot like a schoolgirl for, like, 2 days afterwords. As I have stated before, Kitamura embraces the cheese in the best possible way. The lead villain is also a riot. The guy throws an honest-to-god hissy fit nearly every time his monsters lose, which is always. It's hilarious to watch. He's also pretty much insane in typical Kitamura villain fashion which just adds to the entertainment value. However, this film isn't perfect; the pacing is off and many scenes feel like they were slapped together too quickly, a common problem in the budget and deadline-plagued Japanese entertainment industry. The balance between kaiju action and human action becomes hectic to in the second half of the film with so much going on. Some of the kaiju battles could have been a little cooler, too (Ebirah and Hedorah come to mind). Also, Mothra looks extremely good in this film but her performance as Godzilla's only non-human ally leaves much to be desired. Altogether, this is pretty much a no-brainer for old-school Godzilla fans and new-school sci-fi fans alike. Despite it's flaws, there is just too much damn fine entertainment in this film to pass it by. This isn't the ultimate Godzilla film (in my opinion, that's GMK); but as a celebration of 50 years of Godzilla stomping Tokyo, kicking ass, and taking names it is a rousing success.
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17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Awesome as Hell, March 6, 2006
As you may have gathered from my title, this movie is awesome. I suppose I'll get my two complaints out of the way. First of all it's not got quite the proper ratio of monster violence to other stuff. There's a whole lotta monster mashing, yes, but at 2 hours and 5 minutes it could've stood to have a little more, or just have been a bit shorter. The monster's generally look great, and they are, as a whole mostly of the rubber-suit variety, though there is quite a bit of CGI too, particularly for Zilla and the flying monsters. Still, they usually tried to use conventional fx so long as they were feasible, and they generally allow for the best results. I dunno about you, but there's just something about watching two dudes in rubber suits have a fist fight that makes me very, very happy. The only notable absence with regard to the monsters is the lack of Megalon, but what ya gonna do. Ya got Rodan, the Seamonster, Anguirah, King Ghidorah, Gigan, Mothra, the G-Man himself and more. I also would've liked to see a bit more city smashin'. If there's anything that I like more than watching to rubber-suited men duke it out, it's seeing a besuited man smash a miniature city. Particularly the tanks, definitely needed more tank smashing. My other major complaint is the lack of classic Godzilla music. The modern stuff is okay, generally, but I love the classic Godzilla themes, so they shoulda had more of that stuff. Nevertheless, these complaints are lost in a sea of deliciously cheesy dialogue, costumes, sets and monster action. Seriously, how anyone could watch this movie and not have a helluva good time is beyond me. Yes, it's got a bit too much people, not quite enough monsters, but that's always been the way with Godzilla movies, from my experience. And the non-monster stuff here is generally a whole lot more entertaining than what you'd find in other Godzilla movies.
The movie does have a lotta hand to hand action, generally of the 'Matrix' knockoff variety. (This was directed by the dude who directed 'Versus', so this should come as no surprise.) It's pretty damn over the top, but that's the manner of the whole film, of course, so I can't knock it too much. It's got amusingly hammy performances too, particularly from the main villain with evil eyebrows and the American captain.
Again, this is a very goofy film, but it's goofy-fun rather than goofy-moronic, so it works very well. Personally, despite the very modern nature of most of the film, I still think it manages to have the same basic tone of an older Godzilla film, which makes it a fitting enough anniversary feature.
Yeah, this is fun. Check it out.
Grade: B+
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