Shin Gojira (a.k.a. Godzilla Resurgence)

[Ray]

Have you ever noticed how Anno movies (at least his live action ones) are so weirdly staged? Well it's because he approaches live action the same way he approached animation, storyboards first.

I wont say its good or bad. . . it's just weird. . .

[kuribo-04]

Didn't Hitchcock do the same?
I think it's a good method.

However after the filming of Shiki-Jitsu, Anno did say he was't limited by the storyboards and would try new things if a possibility surfaced.

[Gendo'sPapa]

Original Godzilla aside - which I love & have watched over a dozen times - what would people say are the best Japanese Godzilla sequels? Haven't seen many of them & want to see a few before catching Anno's film next week. Thanks!

[BlueBasilisk]

The ones I frequently see in recommended lists are Mothra vs. Godzilla, Ghidorah the Three-Headed Monster, Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla, Terror of Mechagodzilla, Godzilla vs. Biollante, Godzilla vs. Destroyah, and Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All Out Attack.

I personally like all the films in the Millennium series and would recommend those since they're all direct sequels to the original and only two are in continuity with each other. Godzilla X Mechagodzilla and its sequel Tokyo S.O.S. are definitely Eva influenced and pretty fun.

[FreakyFilmFan4ever]

Original Godzilla aside - which I love & have watched over a dozen times - what would people say are the best Japanese Godzilla sequels? Haven't seen many of them & want to see a few before catching Anno's film next week. Thanks!

From the original series:

Godzilla vs The Thing (aka, "Godzilla vs Mothra")
Destroy All Monsters
Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla
Terror of Mechagodzilla

From the 80's - 90's:

Return of Godzilla
Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla II
Godzilla vs Destroyah

From the 2000's:

Godzilla 2000
Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (Some possible Eva references, if you know what you're looking for.)
Giant Monsters All-Out Attack

If you gotta choose just a couple movies from that list, I recommend Destroy All Monsters and The Terror of Mechagodzilla. They'll be out of context at that point (well, more so than usual), but Destroy has the most fun with its monsters and sci-fi elements, and Terror has probably some of the best fight scenes with a nearly pulpy-yet-operatic human narrative intertwined with the monster fights. Also, they were both directed by Ishiro Honda, the director of the original 1954 Godzilla movie. Honda even directed the special effects production in The Terror of Mechagodzilla, so it's probably his most pure Godzilla film outside of the original movie.

Edit: Also, Return of Godzilla is significant because it's the only Godzilla movie outside of the original film and Anno's new film that has Godzilla as a solo monster smashing Japan. In all of the other movies, he's fighting some other monster.

[movieartman]

Original Godzilla aside - which I love & have watched over a dozen times - what would people say are the best Japanese Godzilla sequels? Haven't seen many of them & want to see a few before catching Anno's film next week. Thanks!

84 is great & vs Biollante is a must watch. (84 is a direct sequel to the original film & Vs Biollante is a sequel to 84 that picks up mere hours after)
Biollante is easily the most fleshed out origin having villain of the franchise & has a solid message against bio weapons & genetic engineering.

Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack is awesome, adds supernatural elements to explain "why Japan?"

The original vs Mothra film & terror of mechagodzilla film are the best of the 60s-70s films.
KEY NOTE - See the uncut original Japanese version of Terror of MG because the American cut edits the ending into oblivion which ruins a emotional human element.

EDIT - Also at some point see the 90s Gamera trilogy they are phenomenal & some of the best Kajiu films ever made. Each is better then the last.

[Gendo'sPapa]

Thanks for the recommendations everyone!

I'll try to see some of these as soon as I can!

One week to a new Hideaki Anno movie!!!!

[hui43210]

https://gaming.youtube.com/watch?v=uxElq1GXav8

Cinemassacare review, seems Funi gave them a advance screening. Sounds good so far!

[Zeta_One]

I never understood the love for Return of Godzilla or its American edit. Felt like Gojira (1954) with a less interesting human element and most of the tension/emotion excised. Always came across as dull and uninspired to me. Although I'll give it credit for its atmosphere and score.

Anyway, other than the original film, I recommend:
- Mothra vs Godzilla (1964)
- Ghidorah: The Three Headed Monster
- Monster Zero
- Godzilla vs Hedorah
- Godzilla vs Biollante
- Godzilla 2000
- Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack

The dubs are solid up until Godzilla vs Hedorah. For anything post-Hedorah you should stick with the original Japanese track.The sole exception to this rule is Godzilla 2000. Sony's version of said film is better paced and scored.

[movieartman]

I never understood the love for Return of Godzilla or its American edit. Felt like Gojira (1954) with a less interesting human element and most of the tension/emotion excised. Always came across as dull and uninspired to me. Although I'll give it credit for its atmosphere and score.

For me personally...
54's original cut is superior to the KOTM cut (but both are worth seeing in my book) but 1985 is superior to the Japanese cut of Return84 for several reasons.
-The returning Raymond Bur is cool & adds a nostalgia factor.
-The nuke sequence is edited VASTLY better (in the original they cut away from the payoff and return to it as after thought, destroys the tension of the sequence)
- The music from DefCon 4 added by New World fits in with the Japanese score perfectly & adds a lot to certain sequences.
- Indifferent to the change to the Russians intent.

Other aspects of 84 I like...
-As your said the atmosphere & music is great all around.
-84 & vs biollante both have a sleek modernized asthetic, light years from the style of the Showa films, the city sets look phenomenal.
-I love that despite being larger then any prior film the 84 Godzilla is still much smaller then many of the modern skyscrapers of Tokyo.
- Love the various military engagements & the Super X.
- Human characters are standard fare but I liked them well enough especially the older scientist.
- Great G suit with the best spine placement of the franchise in my book.
- The Cybot has problems but it's mouth & curling lips look great & life like.
- Great ending.

- Godzilla 2000

Very underrated film in the franchise.

The dubs are solid up until Godzilla vs Hedorah. For anything post-Hedorah you should stick with the original Japanese track.The sole exception to this rule is Godzilla 2000. Sony's version of said film is better paced and scored.

I'd say the dub for 84 & Vs Biollante is good enough.
But yeah 2000 for sure needs to be seen in the American cut for the superior editing & such, agreed.

[Sachi]

I just bought my ticket. Luckily the showing closest to me landed on my normal night off. Date night with myself!

[robersora]

^
Lucky you! Still no dates for German-speaking-EU

[KRandMJ]

https://gaming.youtube.com/watch?v=uxElq1GXav8

Cinemassacare review, seems Funi gave them a advance screening. Sounds good so far!

I hope that the subtitles are not too fast to follow; like how AVGN described...

I got tickets for a Thursday screening. luckily I got my brothers and cousins to tag along, some friends might join us as well.
I assume that most of the people on this forum will be watching the film on Tuesday, do you guys think that the theaters will be packed or sparsely populated?
The theater that i'm going to only has one screening a day from Tuesday-Thursday at 7:30pm. Anyone else experiencing something similar?


I hope I don't get spoiled before watching the film on this site.

[movieartman]

Matt Frank artist on many of the IDW Godzilla comics, audio reviews Shin here.
http://oneofus.net/2016/10/highly-suspe ... -godzilla/
Note: If the other review comes off as mocking him over his fandom, its not maliceful, they have been friends for years, I followed the other reviewer from the now Defunct Spill.com and they had Matt on their geek podcast "The League of extremely ordinary gentlemen" several times.
Frank gave it 4 of 5
Chris gave it 3 of 10
One consensus they agree on is is REALLY not for American audiences.

[hui43210]

One consensus they agree on is is REALLY not for American audiences.

Good

[Ray]

^how politically charged is it? I mean Japan has had a lot of extremely nationalistic, or even outright anti-American themes in a lot of their TV shows and movies lately.

[BlueBasilisk]

The reviews I've read sound like it takes shots at those types of politics and the administration that handled the Fukushima disaster (I'm not sure if it's the current one or not).

It doesn't sound like it's overly nationalistic since

SPOILER: Show

the JSDF even says they're useless against the monster and would be better off helping civilians and it takes an international effort to bring Godzilla down.

[Tumbling Down]

It's almost time. I wanted to see this on opening day, but it's starting to look like my local theater that does just about every Fathom Event won't be showing Godzilla Resurgence, so I might need to wait until I can get a ride farther out.

Anyway, good news and bad news.

http://www.the-journal.com/article/2016 ... nst-the-US

The good news is that this is turning into the Japanese equivalent of Rocky Horror/Repo! the Genetic Opera/The Room, and I love all three of those things, not only as theatrical experiences, but as movies.

The bad news is that this movie might be lowkey racist. Why? Well, I've spoiled myself far too much on the story, because I couldn't resist. I'll put the reason in spoilers, though.

SPOILER: Show

I am a conservative, nationalist-type guy who loves my country, though I do often disagree with their decisions, and I imagine the Japan love their country the same way, so I have no qualms with Japan being the good guys in this movie and America being the bad guys, especially if America is portrayed as being misguided and not outright malicious. There is, however, a quote that really troubles me.

"The arrogant American comes around to the side of the good guys," Schilling said, "not because she sees the light as an American, but because she has Japanese blood in her."

I don't know if this quote is going to strike other people as immediately, obviously racist, but it is to me. There's an academic strain of racism called "race realism," which is based in the idea that culture and values don't come from where and how you were raised, but instead, from what race you were born as. I've been exposed to their rhetoric a lot as a result of my participation in the alt-right*, and this person's quote is, well, literally an example of their rhetoric.

It is quite possible that Schilling was misinterpreting the film. I don't see Anno as a racist. Asuka was German, after all. (Or half-German? I don't really know or care.) Anno might have wanted to tell a story about an American who does, as Schilling says, see the light, but due to a lack of non-Japanese actresses in his casting pool, wrote her as a Japanese-American.

*Don't ask me whether or not I'm alt-right because I don't truthfully know. I'm just a conservative who likes dank memes from 4chan. According to Breitbart, that makes me alt-right, but according to actual "alt-right" websites, that makes me a poser/cuck.

But to respond to the above few posts, I don't think there's anything wrong with nationalism, so I don't care how nationalistic/pro-Japan/anti-American this movie is. I just worry about potential racism.

Good

Oh, you hipster, you.

[Gendo'sPapa]

Got a chance to see SHIN GODZILLA on a huge screen a day early. It was phenomenal! More thoughts to follow when I get a chance to share!

[FreakyFilmFan4ever]

^ That's awesome! I can't wait to see what you though.

As for everyone's fear of Japan becoming nationalistically realized, this movie is in context to the 2011 tsunami disaster. Anything it has to say politically is within the context to how certain countries respond to the naturally untamable, and probably doesn't do a whole lot with how counties think of one another specifically.