Godzilla Minus One
released 2024
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“Godzilla Minus One” is a Japanese, sci-fi, adventure, monster film produced by Go Abe, Shuji Abe, Minami Ichikawa, Kazuaki Kishida, Keiichiro Moriya, Hirofumi Sakurai, Hisashi Usui and Kenji Yamada. It was written and directed by Takashi Yamazaki with the original creator being Ishiro Honda and Takeo Murata. It stars Minami Hamabe, Sakura Ando, Ryunosuke Kamiki, Kuranosuke Sasaki, Hidetaka Yoshioka, Yuki Yamada, Munetaka Aoki, Rikako Miura, Michael Arias, Takato Yonemoto, Ozuno Nakamura, Sae Nagatani, Kisuke Iida, Yuya Endo, Miou Tanaka, Saori, Shohei Abe and many others. This film has a gigantic cast of fantastic actors who did a wonderful job.

Godzilla Minus One IMDb webpage

“Godzilla Minus One” is the story of pilot Koishi Shikishima, played by Ryunosuke Kamiki, who is haunted by an act of cowardice from his past. The story takes place on the Japanese island of Odo in 1945 when Koishi lands his plane after which some very frightening events take place. It is discovered that Koishi fled his obligations by feigning technical issues on his kamikaze mission. While on the island a giant dinosaur emerges from the ocean and attacks the base and kills almost everyone. Koishi freezes up again and is blamed by Tachibana for a failure to attack the creature. Koishi suffers a horrible guilt for his cowardice as the years pass and has difficulties living in the moment because of it. That means taking care of his wife and daughter. As the years pass the dinosaur from the island grows and returns as a menace to the entire nation of Japan. Koishi is eventually able to face the monster with a good plan and a courage he did not have earlier.

Behind the dread of Godzilla and the destruction he will unleash is the story of a man working through issues and needing to connect better with his family and community. He has a terrible case of survivor’s guilt and it looks like he will succumb to a wish to join his fellow soldiers in the grave unless he is shown another way.

There is also the world building, sets, customs etc. that are just fantastic. I loved the way we got to see how the ordinary people of Japan lived after the disaster of war. Seeing them living in rubble and rebuilding from scratch, that is to say, putting their lives back together and achieving a kind of normalcy through community was wonderful. I imagine that post war Japan looked very much like what was depicted in the story. This humbler more honest side of the devastation that war brings was a welcomed sight, for me at least. The win / lose model that so many large films portray of war is simply not the truth for most people in a war enduring population.

And guiltily enough I loved such a well portrayed Godzilla. It was just like the one from TV way back when. Seeing a giant dinosaur just tear through a city, a large city like Tokyo is just a fun watch. I only wish that the Godzilla in this film would take a travel across the pond to the US. The cultural differences of how people would react and change of scene would be fun.

Godzilla movies have always been a fun watch that answered the question of what to do with yourself if you wake up and are 50 feet tall with a tail. I think nearly everyone at one point or another in their lives wondered how the person who wears the Godzilla custom got such a good gig. I smell nepotism people.

All kidding aside this is a very well made movie with such likable characters and probably the most internationally well known force of destruction that is actually fun to watch. Yes because like in the TV films you will find yourself excited to see Godzilla arrive and what he is about to do. I loved the way in these movies they never show anyone seriously hurt or crowds of people seriously hurt. It’s never a gore fest. That is brilliant and exactly what we the viewer want not to see. Have you ever noticed that in a Godzilla movies? There are very few casualties and practically no gore. And that’s because these films, this franchise, would not work if we did not suspend our disbelief on that subject of mass destruction.

This is hands down the best Godzilla movie made in decades. Don’t miss it.

John Ink2Quill

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