Godzilla Minus One (2023)
dir. Takashi Yamazaki
Rated: PG-13
image: ©2023 Toho
Dead fish are the most potent symbols within Godzilla Minus One to signify director Takashi Yamazaki’s successful attempt to reestablish the nuclear anxieties central to the original film in the franchise. Each time the colossal monster surfaces from the deep in Yamazaki’s movie, Godzilla is preceded by a collection of floating dead fish killed by his own poisonous radiation. In the wake of Oppenheimer – Christopher Nolan’s epic examination of humanity unlocking the horrific destructive power of the atom – and the recent threats of Russian madman Vladimir Putin to use nuclear weapons in his deranged pursuit of empire, a return to the original preoccupation of the 70-year-old kaiju franchise is sadly apropos.
Set during the waning days of World War II and in the immediate post-war years, Godzilla Minus One operates on multiple levels. It offers a deeply felt meditation on PTSD and survivor’s guilt, a rumination on the consequences of human environmental destruction, and, of course, it’s a sci-fi action spectacle that thrills with scenes of movie magic devastation.
The opening minutes of the picture thrusts us into the confusion of war as a kamikaze pilot named Kōichi Shikishima lands his plane at a Japanese base on Odo Island. Shikishima was destined to die in a kamikaze attack against the allied forces, but he tells the lead mechanic at the Odo base, Sōsaku Tachibana, that he had to turn back due to technical issues with his plane. After finding nothing wrong with the aircraft, Tachibana correctly surmises that Shikishima invented the technical issues as a ruse to get out of his suicide mission. Tachibana doesn’t get far in confronting Shikishima, because Godzilla appears and attacks the base.
Shikishima survives the attack, but only after fear causes him to freeze up during his attempt to use his plane’s high-caliber gun to take down the giant creature. Subsequently, Godzilla kills everyone at the base save Shikishima and Tachibana, causing the former to feel even more shame for his failure to defend his fellow soldiers.
After the war, Shikishima returns home to Tokyo to discover that his parents were killed during the allied bombing of the city. Amid the rubble, he meets a woman named Noriko, who is caring for Akiko, an orphaned baby whom she rescued. Noriko’s parents also perished during the bombing of Tokyo and, with nowhere else to go, she and the child are taken in by Shikishima; the three form a tenuous family unit. Desperate for money, Shikishima takes a lucrative government job on a boat disposing of the 60,000+ mines laid during the war. One of his coworkers is Kenji Noda, a former Japanese navel engineer.
A primary influence on Yamazaki for Godzilla Minus One was the work of Steven Spielberg. This is particularly evident during Godzilla’s first post-war attack. The minesweeper that Shikishima is working on is instructed to keep the monster occupied so that a battleship can be deployed to kill it.
The resulting action sequence owes a great deal to Spielberg’s Jaws, while simultaneously feeling fresh in its own right and injecting a high level of suspense into the movie. The effort of Shikishima, Noda, and Shirō Mizushima – a green fellow crew member who laments being too young to have served during the war – to lodge a mine in Godzilla’s mouth before detonating it is on par with almost any action sequence on offer in Spielberg’s seminal summer blockbuster.
In addition to the thrills and chills of the action, Yamazaki understands, as Godzilla Minus One makes evident, the crucial importance of pathos in something like Jaws to get audience buy-in when it comes to caring about the characters. We are as invested in the fates of Shikishima & Co. as we are in seeing the main attraction, Godzilla, smash and bash his way through the movie. Without the nuanced interpersonal dynamics, Yamazaki’s movie would feel hollow and unsatisfying.
The director also pays homage to the entire creature feature genre of the 1950s in the character of Noda. The wily scientist characters of that era, who prove themselves more adept than the military or politicians in coming up with a solution to the deadly threat du jour, are reflected in Noda’s inventive scheme involving Freon tanks and quick-fill balloons to end Godzilla’s reign of terror. As Noda, actor Hidetaka Yoshioka’s gray-streaked and gravity-defying wild mane of hair and his slightly off-kilter demeanor combine for a fun take on the outside-the-box-thinking scientist trope.
Yamazaki, who supervised the film’s visual effects in addition to writing the screenplay and directing, pulls off a wonder in his design for the big guy himself, Godzilla. Watching the movie, I was aware that the nuclear-spawned beast is wholly CGI, but Yamazaki and his visual effects team pay homage to the 1954 original Godzilla by making his iteration look and move like a guy in a suit. That’s not meant to be a pejorative statement.
In Godzilla Minus One, the towering monster’s first land appearance, an attack on the town of Ginza, feels like a classic monster movie sequence. From the blaring horns of Naoki Satō’s score that evoke danger and destruction; to the bold camera movement giving us our first full view of the main attraction; to the citizens of Ginza fleeing in terror for their lives, Yamazaki serves up a throwback to the earliest days of Godzilla lore.
In particular, it’s an unsettling experience each time we get a good look into the giant lizard’s eyes. The CGI team that crafted those eyes seemed to have used Quint’s timeless quote from Jaws about a shark’s eyes: “…the thing about a shark…he’s got lifeless eyes…like a doll’s eyes.”
Godzilla Minus One walks a fine line when it comes to heartfelt character development and blockbuster spectacle. As Godzilla approaches the shore in one particularly tense action sequence, we see a battleship come flying in from off screen, pulverizing buildings and a whole city block. The characters we get to know over the course of the film make us think about all the people hurt or killed in a moment like the one described above.
Shikishima is reticent about showing emotion for Noriko and Akiko, at one point even going so far as to express an unwillingness to allow the little girl to mistake him for her father. He does this because of his deep shame and feelings of inadequacy concerning his actions during the war.
The profundity of human connection that Yamazaki is exploring causes the director to make a misstep late in the film. A beautiful act of self-sacrifice on Noriko’s part leads to a soap-operatic turn of events that ultimately feels like a cheap fake-out by the time it’s resolved. There’s one other instance that feels contrived when a sudden flashback provides a vital piece of information kept from us concerning Shikishima’s fate in the final battle with Godzilla.
This year, Toho, the Japanese studio responsible for the original 1954 Godzilla, is celebrating the 70th anniversary of one of the most lasting movie monster characters in cinema history. By teaming up with Yamazaki, the legacy continues in good standing. Godzilla Minus One is a moving addition to that legacy and also a hell of a fun ride at the movies.
Why it got 4 stars:
- A satisfying blend of pathos and spectacle, Godzilla Minus One is the established IP franchise installment we didn’t know we needed. It’s infinitely more interesting than any movie the OG monster has appeared in for the American MonsterVerse franchise.
Things I forgot to mention in my review, because, well, I'm the Forgetful Film Critic:
- I didn’t mention Kōzō Shibasaki’s cinematography in the main review, but it is gorgeous.
- They got the sound of Godzilla’s roar just right.
- The high-caliber gunfire in the movie is thrilling. It creates a you-are-there immediacy to the battle carnage.
- We’ve valorized serving in war so much that it comes almost as a shock when Shikishima tells his much younger coworker, Mizushima, that, “Not having been to war is something to be proud of.”
- In case you’re wondering what the title of the movie means, here’s the explanation (from Wikipedia): “The title, according to the director, has multiple meanings, explicitly referring to how Godzilla's destruction changed Japan's position from a "post-war zero situation" to a "minus". When explaining other possible reasons for the title, Yamazaki said that the film takes place before the original 1954 and that it emphasizes the theme of loss throughout.”
Close encounters with people in movie theaters:
- Godzilla Minus One is currently available on Netflix (which is how I saw it) as well as for rent and sale on most VOD streaming platforms. I lament not seeing it in the theater, as I’m sure the impact of the action sequences are incredible on the big screen. I came close. Rae and I had plans to see it late last year, but a lunch before hand went longer than expected, so we missed it that day.
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The FFC’s political soapbox
This is the space usually reserved for a few explainer paragraphs about how the fascist MAGA takeover of the Republican party is on the march to destroy American democracy. I can save some time this week; all I need to do is quote the headline of the article I’m sharing: “‘War on white America’: Influential Texas group hosting pro-Christian nationalism conference.” Read the Texas Tribune piece here. These people have more in common with Adolf Hitler than Abraham Lincoln.