I can see American audiences going: do we really need another Godzilla movie? Well, yes and no. No, we don’t need anymore American Godzilla movies, because he’s just treated like another generic pointless monster. But yes, we absolutely need more Japanese versions of the great lizard. Never forget, the OG Godzilla was Japan’s creation; they’ve been aweing him to movie audiences around the globe since 1954. So like the title says, Godzilla Minus One. The one in this case, being no more American Godzilla movies: we dropped the nuclear football on that one.
We’re back in World War II, Godzilla’s first origin for Godzilla Minus One. Pilot Kōichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki) lands on a plane repair island, Odo. After a tense discussion with mechanic Sōsaku (Munetaka Aoki), a giant lizard shows up and attacks the military base, killing many of the men there. Kōichi survives, and is sent home after the war is over. Without much to live for, he finds purpose accidentally: helping raise the orphaned Akiko (Sae Nagatani) with Noriko (Minami Hamabe), as platonic companions in a makeshift family. To make money, Kōichi takes a job disabling leftover mines at sea onboard a wooden ship run by Yōji (Kuranosuke Sasaki) and Kenji (Hidetaka Yoshioka). But that lizard on Odo island has also been at sea…and around all the nuclear testing done by US troops post WWII…
So what makes Japan’s Godzilla movies so much better than the US ones? Well, for one, they actually take the time to care about the characters they write. The human characters in American monster movies are written so broadly and poorly that you end up rooting for the monster to eat everyone. While the monster mash is fun, that’s also about 30 minutes of a 2 hour movie, meaning we have to spend 90 minutes with characters we really couldn’t care less about. That’s not the case in Godzilla Minus One. After the harrowing intro, creator Takashi Yamazaki spends about an hour investing the audience in Kōichi and the people in his world. In Japan, any soldier returning home after WWII bore the shame and guilt of “not doing enough” for their country to win the war. Ryunosuke Kamiki’s performance makes you feel that burden from minute one. Couple that shame and societal betrayal with no clear purpose anymore, and poor Kōichi is basically a shell of a person. That is, until Noriko bumps into him in a crowded market and hands him a baby while she runs from the police. Having lost faith in Japan’s beliefs on honor, Kōichi and Noriko find new faith in each other, crafting an alliance of necessity and rising each other out of their hopeless predicaments. Kōichi’s faith in people grows more on that mining boat, as he shoots the sh*t with his shipmates while learning he’s not alone in his feelings living after losing a war. Yamazaki’s script is pro people: it is through relationships with Noriko, Akiko, Yōji, Kenji, and others, Kōichi overcomes his fears and learns to live for something bigger than him: not government and country, but his friends and family, and they in turn grow as well. So when Godzilla shows up again, and you know the deaths start coming, they actually MEAN something, and more importantly, you’re ROOTING for the people to overcome their giant lizard: a beacon of their mistakes.
And that’s the other big reason Japanese filmmakers should be the only ones making Godzilla movies: the creature as living breathing allegory of Japanese culture. Like the newer Candyman tried to do, Godzilla Minus One better evolves what this version of the lizard means to Japan today. In 1954 and for years, Godzilla was about mankind’s hubris in making nuclear bombs. But recently, filmmakers have turned the lizard into a critique of institutional failure, like Shin Godzilla did. Minus One has pieces of Shin Godzilla in it: in this case, Godzilla’s rise is a result of military escalation and then abandonment: the US helps create the monster, but then cannot help Japan get rid of it, because of the Cold War tensions with the Soviet Union. Inside Japan, Kōichi and all of these former soldiers (especially pilots) are dealing with horrible PTSD, overcome with fear and self-loathing which post WWII Japanese society chooses to raise the middle finger to since these soldiers did not honor the country by dying. The creature itself is also a walking metaphor: the greater the attempt to attack Godzilla, the bigger he gets, and stronger he gets as he absorbs the powers that tried to kill him. I like my walking metaphors best when they shoot heat rays that explode like nuclear bombs that cause the hair on my arms to raise in destructive glee. But while I was enjoying all of Takashi Yamazaki’s incredible action sequences, Godzilla’s constant reminder to the human characters of their fear and failures is also keeping me grounded, reminding me why Godzilla is more than just another cool monster.
While the US continues to make Godzilla fight Mothra, Kong, Mechagodzilla, whatever, Japan constantly shapeshifts Godzilla into something much more interesting and exciting. I can’t wait to see how the allegory will change in 5 years. Godzilla fighting an Mechagodzilla as a warning about the future of AI in Japan? Or a bunch of little Godzilla’s overrun Japan because their birthrate is super low? I’m up for anything and everything, as long as it comes with blue heat rays that make nuclear explosions. That was dope!