[wushuliu]

Pretty frickin' awesome. For once I get to feel like the comic book fanboys who get all excited about their Marvel movies. I grew up on Godzilla. I've seen every one of the old school films.

This version does the big guy justice. Total devastation? check. Slow build to awe-inspiring entrance? check. Puny humans feeling like they are not the masters of nature they think they are? check. Godzilla throws down against another [deleted]? check. Godzilla's special halitosis on display? check. Scientist making really grave and portentous observations? check.

Oh man, I loved it. The sense of scale is breathtaking. Godzilla is HUGE and the special effects are incredible for both creature design and urban devastation. The [deleted] villains are impressive. A lot of thought went into their sound design and creature design. Really unique monsters. The radiation angle was handled cleverly with a twist I did not expect.

As for the puny humans we are supposed to kind of care about: my gf says Aaron Taylor Johnson has rapey eyes and I kind of agree. He is a little creepy and not who I would have chosen for lead but since he's not the real star I didn't care. Bryan Cranston was Bryan Cranston, so great but since he wasn't the real star I didn't care. That Japanese guy who is a great actor but can never remember his name was in it making really grave and portentous observations. He knew what movie he was in. He was awesome. David Strathairn was hilariously cast as a general. Don't know why, love the guy, but a military man is the least believable role for him, but since he's not the real star I didn't care.

Random Juliette Binoche sighting. Fortunately her stunning beauty and presence were short-lived, allowing me to focus on the real star:

Godzilla.

No 'realistic' iguana on steroids crap. This Godzilla was GODZILLA. Massive. Earth-shaking. He came to drink some beer and kick some ass - and looks like we were out of beer... Best of all they managed to make him the protagonist, which I did not expect and they pulled it off. How?

Well all the ads and commercials left out who the bad guys are. I only happened to read some spoilers so I kind of knew what was coming but I was still surprised when they appeared. I thought this movie was going to rehash the original Gojira and just be about the big guy stompin' around. Nope.

All I can say is that I can not wait for the sequel, cause if they were willing to take it this far for this outing then next time they're probably going to up the ante. I'm guessing Ghidorah and trippy mod aliens with ray bans. Sweet.

Edit: special kudos to the opening credit sequence which was very clever and creative - they display the cast names as part of a caption from a file with the words being up for just a second before being redacted and leaving just the name. It was a small thing but well done. Some love and care went into this movie.

[JohnR]

 

Gotta see.

[ArthurDent]

Cool, always been a fan too. So maybe we'll get to see Mothra, Rodan, MechaGodzilla, & more down the road as well. Nice to hear they gave the big guy the respect he deserves. Looking forward to seeing it. 

[smargo]

cant wait to see it as well - my favorite movie was "king kong vs godzilla" when i was growing up

[Atlplasma]

Pretty frickin' awesome. For once I get to feel like the comic book fanboys who get all excited about their Marvel movies. I grew up on Godzilla. I've seen every one of the old school films.

This version does the big guy justice. Total devastation? check. Slow build to awe-inspiring entrance? check. Puny humans feeling like they are not the masters of nature they think they are? check. Godzilla throws down against another [deleted]? check. Godzilla's special halitosis on display? check. Scientist making really grave and portentous observations? check.

Oh man, I loved it. The sense of scale is breathtaking. Godzilla is HUGE and the special effects are incredible for both creature design and urban devastation. The [deleted] villains are impressive. A lot of thought went into their sound design and creature design. Really unique monsters. The radiation angle was handled cleverly with a twist I did not expect.

As for the puny humans we are supposed to kind of care about: my gf says Aaron Taylor Johnson has rapey eyes and I kind of agree. He is a little creepy and not who I would have chosen for lead but since he's not the real star I didn't care. Bryan Cranston was Bryan Cranston, so great but since he wasn't the real star I didn't care. That Japanese guy who is a great actor but can never remember his name was in it making really grave and portentous observations. He knew what movie he was in. He was awesome. David Strathairn was hilariously cast as a general. Don't know why, love the guy, but a military man is the least believable role for him, but since he's not the real star I didn't care.

Random Juliette Binoche sighting. Fortunately her stunning beauty and presence were short-lived, allowing me to focus on the real star:

Godzilla.

No 'realistic' iguana on steroids crap. This Godzilla was GODZILLA. Massive. Earth-shaking. He came to drink some beer and kick some ass - and looks like we were out of beer... Best of all they managed to make him the protagonist, which I did not expect and they pulled it off. How?

Well all the ads and commercials left out who the bad guys are. I only happened to read some spoilers so I kind of knew what was coming but I was still surprised when they appeared. I thought this movie was going to rehash the original Gojira and just be about the big guy stompin' around. Nope.

All I can say is that I can not wait for the sequel, cause if they were willing to take it this far for this outing then next time they're probably going to up the ante. I'm guessing Ghidorah and trippy mod aliens with ray bans. Sweet.

Edit: special kudos to the opening credit sequence which was very clever and creative - they display the cast names as part of a caption from a file with the words being up for just a second before being redacted and leaving just the name. It was a small thing but well done. Some love and care went into this movie.

As a Godzilla fan, you probably should read this article by Andrew O'Hehir (http://www.salon.com/2014/04/17/the_original_godzilla_still_king_of_the_monsters/) about the original film (minus the Hollywood additions).

[Stuart]

British director, it shows!  did not allow the  stupid dumb ass clowning around acting that is in a lot of the other big name action movies made by American Directors. Hollywood always spoils these movies by stupid acting and treating the audience like idiots. I wish more movies could be made like this one. James Cameron is the only American Director that seems to get it right Aliens 2  and Avatar, just serious hard core Science fiction that worked.

[tull skull]

"History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men"!

Go Go Godzilla!

[charmerci]

Hmmm. Funny, my friend saw it and said it was bad.

To each their own, I guess.

Here's a photo that my Dad  took Oct. 1954 in Tokyo at the first release of Godzilla.

 

[wushuliu]

Hmmm. Funny, my friend saw it and said it was bad.

To each their own, I guess.

If you're not a Godzilla fan then it probably won't do it for you unless you're a kid. It will just seem like some overblown monster movie.

[randytsuch]

I always check rotten tomatoes for movie reviews, somewhat surprised to see it got 73% there.
Seems like a good theater movie, so I may go see it this weekend, or sometime soon.

[Rocket]

Hi Guys,

I went and Godzilla on the weekend and I enjoyed it.  I was surprised that the basic theme of the story wasn't change from the one I remember as a kid.

Regards Rod

[ajzepp]

It's scoring well on RT, but I've come across some really negative opinions/reviews and I just don't get it. I thought this film was very well done. I loved Garreth Edwards' "Monsters" - particularly the ending - and Godzilla met and even exceeded my expectations. On top of that, it's pretty rare that I opt for the 3D version, but the 3D image at my local AMC theater was bright and beautiful. Very good use of these effects, varying from subtle to intense in terms of scale. The low end was phenomenal and I felt overall it was a very strong film. Loved hearing that two sequels are already being planned for down the road. Also loved that Garreth was chosen to direct one of the upcoming Star Wars spinoff films. This guy just has a very fresh eye and you can tell that he's passionate about his projects.

Really enjoyable flick, IMO.

[wushuliu]

The low end was phenomenal

Yes. Really, really impressed with the sound design.