Godzilla

Let's talk about Godzilla. I'm pretty sure this movie I have heard so much about this film and while I never got a formal request, I feel like I've needed to give my thoughts on this movie for a long time. And now I can finally do that as I have watched this film.

I'm gonna come out and say it, I've never been a huge fan of monster movies. This movie, Pacific Rim, any other movies where the world is being devastated by giant monsters, it has just never really been interesting to me. I mean the fact of the matter is that most people go to these movies to see a giant monster spread chaos across a city until its taken down or something. But you can do that in a well edited youtube video or a video game. So they have to add characters, humans that have their own problems and development while the monster is recking havoc.

The problem with that is that any problems that these characters are dealing with really kind of go away and are irrelevant to the fact that there is a giant monster destroying everything they know. Who cares if Aaron Taylor-Johnson has some father issues, or doesn't really know how to be back with his family, its fucking GODZILLA!

So how do you make a compelling story out of that?

The movie starts out in 1999 in Japan. Joe Brody (played by Bryan Cranston) is an engineer on a nuclear power plant with his wife. He's a workaholic and is excited about the research or whatever they're doing but unfortunately, he doesn't always have time for his son Ford.

Well a horrible accident happens, leading to the death of his wife.

Fast forward fifteen years later, and Ford (played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson) is a Lieutenant with Naval EOD. He's returning home from deployment to his wife (played by Elizabeth Olson) and his son Sam. But his reunion is cut short when he gets a call saying that his father was arrested in Japan.

Joe Brody has been obsessed for the past fifteen year of what happened to his wife and continues to break the law to look into what caused the accident at the power plant.

After a lot of confusing twists and turns, the short explanation of it is that Ford and his father find a secret military research base where the accident happened and after some havoc wreaking, and even more confusing twists and turns, we're introduced to the monsters, MUTO (or as I'll call him Cloverfield mosnter) and Godzilla.

And I'll give the movie the credit it deserves. The monsters look fantastic. Godzilla looks great. The other monsters really are cool looking.

The problem is, they were great to look at... when I could actually see them.

My biggest problem with this movie is that I feel like the entire movie was just in the dark. I felt like everything was so dark, and all the great fighting scenes were in the dark so I couldn't totally figure out what I was looking while I was squinting to see the fight.

I feel like this movie is the kind of movie that really only works in theaters but even then, I would like to see a little bit of what is going on when I'm watching it at home.

The other thing that I'm not totally sold in this movie is the utilization of the cast.

Notice how I said utilization instead of just the cast.

Because as a whole, I like the majority of the actors in this movie. I am becoming more and more of a fan of Elizabeth Olson with everything I see her in, she's a really good actress and I think she did a great job in this film, I kind of wish they would have focused more on her and not Aaron Taylor-Johnson. Aaron Taylor-Johnson, while not horrible, just wasn't as good as Olson in this film and that's kind of a trend in movies they're both in (i.e. Age of Ultron).

Bryan Cranston, I love him in this film. He's actually really good and the beginning does create for some good tension between him and Aaron Taylor-Johnson.

But like I said before, its a monster movie, it doesn't really make much sense to spend a lot of time working on these two father son issues when there is a skyscraper monster out there about to destroy San Diego.

And unfortunately, they really under utilize Bryan Cranston. I feel like he could have been a huge part of this movie, he could have made this movie really good... and they just don't use him as much as they should have.

And I don't think I would have minded so much that the acting or story of these human characters wasn't exactly good, if the fighting of the monsters wasn't so boring. I already mentioned the fact that I can't see half of it, but this movie just isn't as fun as other monster movies that I have seen.

Its kind of unfair, but I have to compare this movie Pacific Rim.

While I didn't love Pacific Rim, I walked out of it saying Guillermo Del Toro knew exactly what he was making in this film. While the character performances were fun, he knew that movie was a movie about giant monsters fighting giant robots. If you're not going to give us really compelling characters, at least give us some badass monster fights that we can actually see. Like the dumbest line in the movie says, "Let Them Fight"

And for god's sake, let them fight in the day. I couldn't see shit in this movie! I know I've already said that but you've got these huge monsters that I can't see worth shit because they're grey and in the dark and I am straining my eyes to actually figure out what the hell is going on.

And while the monsters are fighting, I'm watching Quicksilver stumbling around it what really seems like a mission that won't work. I never at any point thought that the humans were making a good enough plan to take down these monsters. So if the humans are worthless, make the fights between Godzilla and MUTO awesome. And I just don't feel like they were.

I could really care less if Gareth Edwards or whoever does a sequel to this movie because its really not that great of a film. I didn't walk out of this one saying, oh I need me some more Godzilla and I don't really think they need to make another one. And if you're wondering if you need to see this movie or not, I would say its probably one you can live without seeing.

But those are my thoughts on Godzilla. What did you think? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts by Following me on Twitter @cmhaugen24 and give me your requests for movies to watch in the future. You can also follow me to get my thoughts on future movies news and reviews!

I'll leave you with this. A lot of what I couldn't say in this review is pretty well said in this How it Should have Ended. Enjoy!