Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Kaiju Reviews #23 - Godzilla (1998) [Written by skull902]

                                                                                      Alright...let's start this...
                                                                                            Aww, sick! Gross!

                                                                                               Aww, nasty! Yuck!
                                                                                                     Ah, sick!
                                                                                                      Gross!
Yeck!

...You get a pass.

Welp, that's my review. Seeya.



...Okay, that's not really all it. This, my friends, is "Godzilla". Released to American theatres on May 20, 1998. It was released in Japan sometime in July 1998 if I'm not mistaken.

The movie starts with nuclear test footage on the Pacific, as well as footage of at least four different types of lizard (confusing us as to which one turned out to be Zilla), one of which that isn't native to the Pacific. Great job movie, we've only entered the credits sequence and you've already done something wrong.

Anyway, there's some people on this ship or whatever in or around Japan. One of them is eating noodles and watching everyone's favorite, poor-reception sumo wrestling. The ship gets attacked, but by who? DUN DUN DUUUUUN...well, if it isn't obvious, Zilla attacked it. Blah.

Next thing we see is Dr. Niko Tortillapoulos, played by Matthew Broderick. Niko here is collecting some 17% bigger than usual worms for his little experiment. Then he gets pulled away by the US Army (who apparently have taken up a Soviet motif) or something where he is to get started researching the "Big Bad Dinosaur" that has showed up recently. The scene in the Pacific by the way, where Niko gets his orders is one of the VERY FEW scenes without rain in it. If you thought you couldn't get sick of a weather condition by only watching a movie alone, you'd be in for a surprise.

Now we see Audrey. Audrey is trying to be a reporter, but her boss is a dick and her co-worker friends are stupid. So yeah. Audrey's role on the TV news crew is I think a secretary. I don't think it's ever made clear. Anyway, she has lunch with her ol' buddies and they tell her to get mean. Oh and she does later on, lemme tell ya.

So some old guy dies I guess trying to fish out Zilla. Zilla then raids New York City, interrupting a speech by Mayor Caricature. One of Audrey's retard friends (the guy one) grabs a camera and films Zilla, nearly getting crushed doing do. The footage makes it to the news and most now know of Zilla and his wrath and crap. Nobody can find him somehow and it's explained that he's hiding. Y'know, in New York City. Because nobody would notice a giant monster like that. And if it seems like I'm rushing through this shit, I am.

So Turtletapoulos and his buddies lure Zilla in with a lot of fish so they can attack and kill it. The most incompetent military in the world though can't get the plan to work and he just destroys all their vehicles, with casulaties going out to Military Guys #1-6, three helicopters, and the Chrysler Building. Audrey and Niko (who were together in college) meet up again and talk about how their lives have been. Niko finds through Zilla blood, using a HUMAN pregnancy test, that the moster is pregnant and Audrey steals a top-secret tape of how the Zilla attacks got started and gives it to her news station, hoping it'll be her big break. But all is for not, her boss takes credit for the story and Lippy-Tappy-Too-Taatapoulos gets discharged for the incident. Niko is naturally mad at Bitchface- I mean Audrey and is then kidnapped by French Guy (who has been lurking around throughout the film) and hired by the French Secret Service to do a mission, looking for Zilla's eggs. Somewhere in between all that, Zilla gets killed in the Hudson River by torpedos. Like I said, rushing through.

The mission begins while Audrey and Male Retard go on a different route, leading to Madison Square Garden which is in ruins. They find Zilla eggs there, but instead of the expected twelve, they get about...two hundered. Quite a difference. Since these creatures are apparently born pregnant, letting them loose is out of the question. Four of the Franco Secret Service guys who went along get killed because they don't know how to use their guns, and Audrey and Guy Man Thing meet up with French Guy and Tkdn39h9uhthfb8vb8bt76ggv6r3h7b79rn80bnatapoulos. They find a way to broadcast a message to the news station and the military hears it, planning to blow Madison Square Garden up in about six minutes. Less than six minutes later, our heroes barely escape the Garden as it's blown to smitherines, killing all the babies.

But Zilla comes back to life I guess, and fueled by anger, goes on a rampage against our heroes in a taxi. They get nearly eaten during it, but make it out, only for Zilla to finally get killed on the Brooklyn Bridge. Everyone celebrates, Mayor Caricature gets told to fuck off after being a candy eating douche throughout the film, and all is well. Except it's not! One more egg hatches in the Garden so that there can be a non-existant sequel.

What can I say that already hasn't been said? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. But I'll say something anyway. The characters, the story, the presentation, the monster, the disrespect to Siskel and Ebert, EVERYTHING sucks about this movie. Like Kenpachiro Satsuma (the man who WAS Godzilla in the Heisei films) said, "It's not Godzilla, it does not have the spirit." I couldn't have said it better myself. Though I will give this piece of absolute garbage one thing, AT LEAST it got Toho working their asses off to make a new Godzilla film, which was MUCH better than this, and it came out in 1999. Yep. It only took Toho a year, much unlike the five it took for Sony to shove this mess of a movie out. But it is not my place to review that movie. After this I shall be giving my position of Godzilla movie reviewer on this site back to the owner, besides my reviews for the two Heisei films I missed, whenever I can get to them. Until then, I'm skull902, saying goodbye.

Score: 0.2/5.0

Oh, and PS:
Rabid, you're welcome.


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