GODZILLA (a.k.a. Gojira) is the roaring granddaddy of all monster movies. It’s also a remarkably humane and melancholy drama, made in Japan at a time when the country was reeling from nuclear attack and H-bomb testing in the Pacific.
Its rampaging radioactive beast, the poignant embodiment of an entire population’s fears, became a beloved international icon of destruction, spawning almost thirty sequels.
Director
Ishirô Honda
Cast
Takashi Shimura, Akihiko Hirata, Akira Takarada
Rating
Year
2024
Country
Japan
Language
Japanese
Main Trailer
Reviews
- "Not that Honda's original GODZILLA is a message movie first and foremost. It's a horror flick, and an ingenious one at that, with visual effects so vivid that gimmicky spin-offs became an enduring staple of popular film."
- Christian Science Monitor - "Can now be appreciated not just as a minor classic of tragic destruction, but also as a somber exploration of conflicted postwar emotions."
- L.A. Weekly - "As crass as it is visionary, GODZILLA belongs with--and might well trump--the art films "Hiroshima Mon Amour" and "Dr. Strangelove" as a daring attempt to fashion a terrible poetry from the mind-melting horror of atomic warfare."
- Village Voice - "Its images of the destruction of the cities is far more powerful than in American films, where the cities are trashed for the pure pleasure of destruction, without any real sense of human loss."
- Washington Post - "GODZILLA is still the most awesome of tacky movie monsters."
- Entertainment Weekly - "The images are crisp. The story is restored. And there's no sign of Raymond Burr."
- Washington Post
Awards
- Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Awards
Festivals
- Berlin Int'l Film Festival
- Tokyo Int'l Film Festival
- Japanische Filmwoche Düsseldorf
- Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute
- Melbourne, Japanese Film Festival
- Sydney, Japanese Film Festival
- Kaohsiung Film Festival
- Miyazaki Film Festival
- LA EigaFest
- Japanische Filmwoche Düsseldorf