Good Monsters in Godzilla

Mon May 19 15:03:33 EDT 2014

Legendary Pictures and Warner Bros.’ “Godzilla” (our review) did so well this weekend (almost $200 million worldwide) that by Sunday they had already announced a sequel was in the works. And of course, with a massive opening like that, it’s to be expected. The monster movie is a triumph, at the very least, for director Gareth Edwards. His directorial career started with “Monsters, " a super lo-fi, low-budget monster movie about an unlikely pair of strangers trying to travel from Central America to the United States, in a world (and particularly the border of Mexico), now infested with gigantic creatures, that resembles a police state.

Having little to no budget, Edwards had to rely on characters, dynamics, chemistry and inventiveness: the filmmaker and former VFX helmer had to use his disadvantage—not really able to show his creatures—to his advantage. And cleverly he did, only showing the creatures in small bits, from the characters' POV and playing coy with the monster throughout until the very end (and even then you only got dark, rare glimpses of them). It totally worked, and if you’ve seen “Godzilla” and are reading this you’re hopefully thinking, “Damn, that’s exactly what he did for his new kaiju monster film, ” because he adopted the same methodology for “Godzilla.” And good on him for making such a successful leap from small indie to gigantic tentpole; this risk pays off in many respects.

But “Monsters” was Edwards’ baby. He wrote it, directed it, acted as his own cinematographer and was the head production designer on it; this was his world and his vision. Consequently, “Godzilla” is much the same, it feels mostly like a unified vision and from a filmmaker who’s likely going to be ratified with a modern day auteur stamp any minute now if he hasn’t already. But where “Godzilla” drifts away heavily from the filmmaker is in the writing.