Various Godzilla Versions in Movies
Today saw the release of the new trailer for Godzilla, the
reboot that is to be released in May 2014. It stars Bryan Cranston, Aaron
Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen. I must say that it is extremely strange to
see Cranston sporting a longer hair style after his outing in Breaking Bad, where
we were accustomed to seeing him without any hair on his scalp.
Anyway, the trailer starts off with a speech from David
Strathairn I presume, where he speaks to a group of soldiers who jump off a
plane into a smoldering city. This sequence was exceptional, where a wide angle
shot allows the storm of dust and debris Godzilla has created to be caught. It truly
looked like an apocalyptic nightmare. Then we move into the first person view
and witness the carnage from the perspective of one soldier as he descends into
the city from the skies. The teasers are set up perfectly here, as we can only
see a glimpse of Godzilla’s spiky back through a screen of filthy air and fire.
The teasing continues, with us only being able to see the
destruction the Kaiju monster creates until the last few seconds of the trailer,
where we once again see his spiky back, as if massive shards of glass were
jutting out, and then we see his head. Unlike the 1998 model of the monster
which was more like a T-Rex, this version has a shorter snout (I hope it’s the right
word). I wanted to look at the various versions of the creature that had
appeared in film, since its inception in 1954.
The 1954 film was made by Japanese film company Toho and
decided to have a monster that was a combination of a Tyrannosaurus Rex,
Stegosaurus and an Iguanodon. Filming for the first film relied on a scaled
model of Tokyo and it was a man in a suit (Haruo Nakajima) that played the role
of the Kaiju monster. As of today, Toho has released 28 Godzilla films with the
last being distributed in 2004, so I’m not going to go through each iteration.
Instead, I wanted to compare the original monster with the
ones in the American productions. I was first introduced to Godzilla through
the 1998 American film when I was 3 years old. Naturally, I hold this film in
high regard despite universal objection by the masses. What can I say, kids are
easily impressed by anything surreal. This version seemed to specifically focus
on the T-Rex look for the monster, opting to discard or minimize the influence
of the other dinosaurs that served as inspiration for the original Japanese
film. Hence, we got a longer pout and a faster creature.
And now, with the 2014 reboot trailer being released, I can
honestly say that it is more faithful to the original than the 1998 Mathew
Broderick film. What stood out to me was that massive, plated back and the
shorter pout, features that were present in the 1954 Japanese original. The monster
in the upcoming feature also appears to be larger than in the 1998 feature, but
much slower. This makes sense since a larger creature generally tends to travel
at reduced speeds.
The problem for me is that I’m partial towards the 1998
monster, simply because it was the first Godzilla movie I watched and I love
the T-Rex in general, so it created a stronger impression on my mind. While the
upcoming version of the reptilian hybrid looks more intimidating, the shorter
pout makes it look slightly comical. As of now, I’m conflicted about which
iteration had the most awesome-looking monster. I think it’s the 1998 version, but then again,
we’ve only had teasers of the monster in the 2014 movie so we can certainly
expect more to come.
Godzilla in 1998
Godzilla in 1954
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