By Jack Sargeant, Gill Pringle & Travis Johnson
In Japan, radiation creates monsters, and in America, radiation creates superheroes – or so the recently-minted internet axiom goes. And it’s true: Godzilla, or Gojira to use his proper Japanese epithet (he’s also fond of “King of the Monsters”, and why wouldn’t he be?), is clearly a manifestation of Japanese nuclear anxieties stemming from the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the close of WW2. The legendary Kaiju (Japanese for “strange beast”, and the name given the Godzilla-spawned genre of monsters-on-a-rampage movies) first appeared in Ishirõ Honda’s brilliant Godzilla in 1954, released, like the vast bulk of Godzilla films, by Toho Studios. Towering fifty metres, this 20,000-ton beast lurched through Tokyo, a giant atom age-spawned dinosaur that emerged from the ocean to unleash chaos – a gigantic, radiation-spewing beast annihilating all around him.
While Honda’s first film depicted Godzilla as a dangerous monster, subsequent films would see the gigantic dinosaur’s role transform, until eventually he became a defender of Japan and, as the series grew in scope, the Earth. The first dozen or so films created the wider Godzilla universe, as the gigantic monster, and sometimes his kid, Minilla, would be joined by other Kaiju – equally massive beasts such as Mothra, King Ghidorah, Megalon, Mechagodzilla and Rodan, among others. Godzilla would either face these Kaiju in mammoth battles of city crushing combat, or form alliances with them against newer monsters.
While the first movie maintained a degree of gravitas, the series grew to become far more family friendly, and there is a sense of joyous fun alongside the monster action. By Godzilla Vs. Megalon (1973), the monster fight sequences have taken on both the epic spectacle and physical moves of professional wrestling, with monsters grappling and throwing each other down, and launching themselves into fighting tag teams as they battle. This is what makes the Godzilla series so unique. While in western studios, dinosaurs and gigantic beasts were created using stop-motion animation, in Japan, the preferred method was “suitmation”, namely having actors in rubber suits play the Kaiju. These actors would stumble through model landscapes and trample tanks, crush cars, trash trains, and wreck entire cityscapes.
As the franchise progressed, it saw directors re-imagining Godzilla, beginning in the mid ‘80s with The Return Of Godzilla, effectively ignoring all the previous works except the original. Some fans will tell you that this period saw Godzilla return as a more destructive force, and there’s less of the humour of the Showa era works. That said, the world of Godzilla remains largely optimistic and family friendly. Although Godzilla Vs. King Ghidorah features a notable sequence that features the dinosaur helping save a troop of Japanese soldiers circa 1945 from American troops, this is a rare moment in the cycle of films.
From 1999 on, the Toho Studios movies follow a singular meta-narrative. Released 55 years after Godzilla, the highlight here is Godzilla: Final Wars, which features cameos from all the monsters from the series, and sees Godzilla battling foes in Sydney’s Botanic Gardens. And, fifty years after Godzilla was first unleashed, the “suitmation” aesthetic is still remarkably similar. Five decades on, Godzilla is still about the fun of cities being reduced to rubble by monsters and aliens, about UFOs, government agencies, and Earth’s true hero being a giant monster.
Though the Japanese film franchise of Godzilla boasted one of the most popular movie monsters of all time, US film studios have had limited success reprising that monster magic, most notably with Roland Emmerich’s ill-conceived 1998 reboot, which was justifiably loathed by fans and critics alike. Then in 2014, we got a new American interpretation, simply titled Godzilla, from director Gareth Edwards (Monsters, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story) and Legendary Studios.
Working closely with Toho, the Brit director emphasised how Japan played an important part in the story, which remained faithful to the original concepts. An all-star cast was assembled, including Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Bryan Cranston, Elizabeth Olsen, Juliette Binoche and Ken Watanabe. Thanks to Edwards’ incredible command of scale, we got a Godzilla whose size and sense of menace was truly impactful, and audiences responded – the film grossed over half a billion worldwide, and Legendary has plans to extend the franchise further, pitting the Kaiju against their other giant monster, King Kong, in the next few years.
Meanwhile Toho Studios have forged ahead with Shin Godzilla, their 29th Godzilla film, and the 31st in the overall series. Directed and co-written by Neon Genesis Evangelion creator, Hideaki Anno, in conjunction with Shinji Higuchi, the film is a reboot, and once again draws inspiration from recent disasters threatening Japan, namely the Fukushima nuclear disaster and the 2011 earthquake. Released in Japan on July 29, the film was hugely successful, topping the box office for weeks and earning rave reviews. Now, with the mighty lizard poised to trample international theatres, including Australia, it seems clear that giants will walk the earth for some time to come yet.
Shin Godzilla is released in cinemas on October 13 for a limited time!
