It was the winner of the Oscar for best visual effects. When at this year’s ceremony Godzilla Minus One took the statuette, it marked a milestone: a Japanese film had never won in that area.
Who did he beat? TO Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3from Marvel, to Mission: Impossible Mortal Sentence Part 1Tom Cruise’s, to Napoleonby Ridley Scott, already Endurance.
And the effects have to be good to beat the Hollywood technicians. It wasn’t so surprising, because during the awards season it had been winning one after another. But it was not enough for it to be released in theaters in Argentina. Now it has come to streaming thanks to Netflix.
And well, even if you have a 60-inch television and a home theater in the living room, it is not the same to appreciate the effects on the TV screen as on a movie screen.
It’s a shame they didn’t release it in theaters here, because the film looks very good, the attacks of the sea monster in the title seem real (except when it steps on land: there it moves like a Minion). And yes: it is a big monster and it stomps hard.
Almost 70 years after the release of the original film, Godzilla Minus One returns the titular beast to its roots as a metaphor for the anxiety and pain of post-war Japan.
The film, which has nothing to do with the Warner Bros. saga that premiered this year Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, begins at the end of World War II, when Koichi, a young kamikaze pilot (Ryunosuke Kamiki) suddenly lands claiming that something was wrong with his plane, which was a lie. Koichi didn’t want to die in vain, but when Godzilla comes out of nowhere, he attacks the place where he is and he doesn’t manage to shoot him, he will want to die.
The film will follow Koichi over a few years, when he meets Noriko, another young woman, who is carrying a baby in her arms, but it is not hers: she took care of it after the death of her real mother due to the Godzilla attack. And when they call him to try to kill the monster, he is capable of destroying ships at sea or collapsing entire buildings with his tail.
Godzilla, as we already know, is a force of nature, a monstrous allegory of nuclear Armageddon. Without the hand of man and the construction of the atomic bomb, it would not exist.
It is a big monster and it is going strong, also at the box office: it grossed more than 115 million dollars worldwide.The curious thing is that the most shocking moments of the film do not only revolve around Godzilla, but also around humans. The monster attack on the city of Ginza, as we watch its devastating atomic explosion, we do so through Noriko’s eyes. As befits a Japanese film, Noriko will sacrifice herself to save Koichi, or something like that.
Godzilla’s Atomic Breath
After Godzilla uses his, let’s call it atomic breath, scales appear on his body. The monster has the ability to regenerate its wounds, making it seem unbeatable. But of course, there is our antihero, who is still grieving for not having saved all the soldiers in that first Godzilla attack. And he will try to redeem himself.
Director Takashi Yamazaki comes from the field of visual effects. Maybe Godzilla Minus One have too many moments in which the melodramatic takes over the screen. But there he is, in the sea, Godzilla to emerge from the depths and create amazement. The director himself supervised the work of the technicians: he himself comes from the field of special effects, one of the reasons why Godzilla Minus One well worth seeing.
Action / Adventure / Drama Japan, 2023. 124′, SAM 13. Of: Takashi Yamazaki. With: Ryunosuke Kamiki, Minami Hamabe, Sakura Ando, Munetaka Aoki. Available in: Netflix.
