Godzilla Minus One

Official Australian release date: 1/12/23. Viewed: 11/12/23.
Director: Takashi Yamazaki
Actors: Ryunosuke Kamiki, Minami Hamabe, Hidetaka Yoshioka, Kuranosuke Sasaki
Genre: Action / Drama
Rating: M

‘Godzilla Minus One’ (or ‘Gorjira -1.0’) is probably the 35^th Godzilla film overall, but the first Japanese language one I’ve seen in a while. It’s definitely a little different to the last 3 Hollywood versions of Godzilla we’ve seen over the past 10 years, and not just his actual less-bulky design. The CGI’s not bad – just different. This film is set in Japan during 1945–1947, so there’s plenty of post-WWII trauma and themes at play.

We follow failed Kamikaze pilot Koichi (Kamiki) as he comes to terms with the devastation of Tokyo, his family and his survivors guilt. He’s then joined by Noriko (Hamabe) and daughter Akiko (Nagatani) and the film spends a lot of time with this complicated relationship. Koichi eventually gets a job clearing sea mines with Captain Yoji (Sasaki) and Dr Noda (Yoshioka). They just survive their first encounter with Godzilla.

As with all monster movies, I find it’s a very fine line between seeing too little of the monster/creature and not enough. There’s probably an hour in the middle of this film where we needed to see more Godzilla. That being said, the film’s don’t work if there’s absolutely no plot or sympathy for the lead characters – which there is here. But it’s sometimes a bit too melodramatic. It also makes it confusing – am I cheering for Godzilla to kill all these people? Or are we cheering for the humans to kill Godzilla? Bittersweet either way. Some great large-scale set pieces here, but a little too long.

Overall: Bigger = better?

Gav's Rating: 3 stars