First off, kudos to the Millennium series for finally nailing a poster. The art for the last two entries was about as bland as the series had ever gotten, so seeing a return to form automatically gives me additional hope.
The easiest way to forget how...well, forgettable the last two Godzilla movies were is simple: watch Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack. The Japanese clearly hate brevity as much as Godzilla hates making a quiet entrance, so from here on out it'll be referred to as GMK. Once again, the Millennium series is rewriting history, bestowing upon G yet another new origin story to go along with his new look and the new looks of his co-starring monsters. Writer & director Shusuke Kaneko came to the series as a veteran of Godzilla's "competition", the titanic terrapin, Gamera. Kaneko helmed all three of the Heisei era Gamera films for Daiei Films. If I haven't mentioned it before, I'll say it again but I have only seen, like, one Gamera movie that I can kinda recall. I did watch a few of them as a kid, but very little of those viewings stuck with me. As a kaiju fan I sort of feel like it's my duty to remedy that, so at some point I'll be buying all of Shout!'s DVD releases and more than likely reviewing them here. My point in all of that was to say I don't know what type of sensibility Kaneko brought with him to the series. Maybe Gamera is steeped in all of this ancient mythology and ritual that pervades GMK.
In this universe, Godzilla appeared once in 1954 and died as the result of the Oxygen Destroyer. When a monster the Americans mistakenly think is Godzilla attacks New York City (one of the best lines in the series for obvious reasons), the Japanese Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) meets to discuss the possible return of the real Godzilla. A nuclear submarine goes missing shortly thereafter, and a glimpsed Godzilla is the culprit. Meanwhile, a truck driver who survived a recent earthquake claims to have seen Godzilla as the monster responsible, but it was really Baragon. And some kids who were partying at a lake are nearly killed by larva Mothra making landfall. An old man who appears wise on these matters determines that Godzilla is the physical embodiment of the soldiers killed during the Battle of the Pacific in World War II; their souls lashed to Godzilla's skeletal remains making him whole once more. The only way to defeat him is by summoning the Guardian Monsters - Baragon, Mothra, and King Ghidorah. We already know Baragon is ready for action since he was the first monster spotted, and judging by his lack of a credit in the film's lengthy title it's safe to assume he won't be winning the battle. But, man, does Godzilla ever stomp a mudhole in his ass before decimating his corpse with a blast of atomic fire. The military sends whatever they can at Godzilla. Nothing has any effect whatsoever, except maybe pissing him off more. Mothra, newly hatched from her cocoon, finally gets in on the action along with a fresh-off-ice King Ghidorah. The pair battle it out with Godzilla in the city, losing quite spectacularly. In fact, Ghidorah gets beaten so badly that Mothra has to sacrifice her life in order for it to absorb her energy and be revived. This leads to a massive melee between the now fully-grown King Ghidorah against Godzilla, once again ending in Ghidorah being destroyed. With all the guardians defeated, the only person left to face Godzilla is the JSDF captain who's commandeering a submarine with missiles capable of blasting a gaping hole in Godzilla... which one does, and when G goes to fire off his atomic breath - POOF - he vaporizes instantly. But that big heart of his keeps on beating, deep in the ocean depths.
This film drew a lot of controversy amongst fans due to Godzilla's portrayal, which is wholly different than any iteration that had preceded or followed. He's looks like a pissed off demon, more or less; brought to life by the dead. To emphasize this, director Shusuke Kaneko had his eyes made up with no pupils, giving Godzilla a blank, horrific visage. That wasn't nearly the only change to his look, though. The Millennium Goji design was entirely scrapped. Godzilla had a modern, stylized appearance that retained his essential features. The black-and-bone dorsal spines were back, looking more like his classic spines and less like the aggro design used for the last two films. His color was back to charcoal black; no more green. The suit itself, dubbed the SokogekiGoji, was intended to be a modern interpretation of the classic '54 design with cues taken from the Heisei series suits, too. I think Kaneko really nailed the appearance, making this the most ferocious, menacing Godzilla seen in the series, period. He's an evil beast, practically indestructible and able to outmatch and outwit any foe with relative ease. The movements of Godzilla are much more aggressive than usual, especially his quick stride which leaves a wake of devastation due to his hefty, thick legs.
Some fans also had concerns with Kaneko's reinterpretation of Godzilla's classic foes Mothra, King Ghidorah, and Baragon. In order of ire, Baragon got a nice contemporary facelift to his design, but fans rightly complained about a lack of any heat ray powers. The only power Baragon does have is his ability to burrow, which isn't too helpful against a hyper-aggressive Godzilla. Mothra has a more angular design, with more pointed wings and elongated legs. Her coloration is also more vivid than ever before, with a kaleidoscope of color under the wings. Her super power this time around is the ability to fire these tiny pellets that apparently have the effect of knocking Godzilla right the fuck out. Finally, we get to King Ghidorah, who underwent more changes than either of the other two. He's smaller. He's not very powerful. He gets his ass handed to him three times. Ghidorah's heads have been updated, but it's not for the better. This new design doesn't elicit the same sense of sheer terror the Ghidorah of old could muster up; this guy just looks like Godzilla could wipe the floor with him. And he does. Once Ghidorah is revived for the second time, he comes back as a fully-grown 1,000 Year-Old Dragon... not that it does much good against Godzilla.
Again, I really didn't have a problem with any of these changes. We're on the TWENTY FIFTH movie in the series; a little shake up of the status quo is a good thing. It certainly helped this entry stand out as one of the most original and inventive of the series. It shows more ambition than most entries can claim, too.
On the topic of ambition, did you know Kaneko originally wanted the three guardian monsters to be Varan, Anguirus, and Baragon. As usual, Toho wasn't seeing enough dollar signs with any of these choices so they insisted Kaneko bring some of the top draws into the fold. Baragon managed to survive the extermination; I wish they'd gone with Anguirus instead. He hadn't been seen in a film since Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla (1974) - almost 30 years ago. Also, I just got a little sad realizing we never got a Heisei incarnation of him. I would have loved to see him be re-imagined for a more modern series. Speaking of long absences, Varan's last appearance was in 1968's Destroy All Monsters! But, yea, sure, let's just keep on using the same monsters we always fall back on, right Toho?
The film's score was composed by Kow Otani, another noob to the series. His work is easily the best of the Millennium series. There's a mystical quality to the compositions, adding to the rich mythology laid out on screen. It's downright ethereal at times. Electronic beats underscore much of the tension, elevating the action on screen without becoming too techno or robotic. Otani achieves a nice balance by adding in orchestral pieces over his beats, allowing the score to encompass both contemporary and classical cues.
GMK is a solid G film, no question. Godzilla is his perhaps the most menacing he's ever been, raining down fire and death everywhere he turns. More than that, his overall design is just a thing of beauty in an evil, twisted kind of way. The inclusion of multiple monsters puts the film over the top by allowing fans to see numerous battles throughout the course of the film. Godzilla fights each monster at least a couple of times, all of which are done with stellar choreography and realism thanks to modern suit technology.
I'd always considered GMK to be the only star of the Millennium series, but a recent re-evaluation of all these films has proven to me that I was wrong, because the follow-up to this film produced a wonderful one-two punch that, frankly, should have ended the Millennium series as a whole. But then they had to go and make Godzilla: Final Wars, which I have always loathed. I am actually quite anxious to watch it again, however, before that can happen we've got two rounds to go with Mechagodzilla!
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