GOJIRA (1954)
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Capsule: This is the original film that
started the series almost fifty years old. It
also surprises by being a fairly intelligent
look at some very serious themes. Certainly it
is the most adult of any monster film ever made.
Made with a minimum of resources, this film
still packs quite a wallop. Rating: 8 (0 to
10), high +2 (-4 to +4)
With the release of GODZILLA 2000, there have been a number of reviewers mentioning the first Godzilla film, both the Japanese version GOJIRA and the re-cut American version GODZILLA, KING OF THE MONSTERS. The web has, however, very few reviews of the original film.
GODZILLA really has to be seen as two very different films. You have to see the film as it was released in the United States, and you have to see through that to the original Japanese film. The Japanese film, made as an imitation of THE BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS, turned into a fairly serious allegory of the close of the Second World War and the fear of nuclear weapons. This was in part because of timing. The film was made just after a Japanese fishing boat had strayed into the waters where the hydrogen bomb had been tested. The fish they caught were radioactive but were still allowed to be sold in Japan. When the Japanese found out that dangerous radioactive fish had been sold to unsuspecting citizens they blamed the United States and they called the incident Americas third atomic attack on Japan. The script is also is an exploration of the theme of the responsibility of the scientist to the world and an indictment of the developers of the atomic bomb. So the plot of BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS, the indignity over the fishing incident, and festering anger over the use of nuclear weapons in the war all came together into a story of a primordial evil coming out of the sea.
The American version crudely interpolates American reporter Steve Martin (played by Raymond Burr) into the story. The scenes with Burr are obviously of a different film stock and have no overlapping characters whose faces are seen. Actually the characters of Emiko Yamane is both in scenes with Martin and without, but when she is with Martin her back is to the camera and her blouse is a different plaid. Clearly another woman stood in and the filmmakers could not quite match the blouse material. Martin appears to be in several of the key points of activity as the Japanese react to the attack of the monster, without ever really participating much in the action except to throw in occasional comments like "I can't believe what just happened."
For the plot here I will describe the American version, though there are some differences in order of events. (For example, the Japanese version is not told in flashback like the American version is.) The film opens looking at the destruction that has been wrought on Tokyo. It looks like it was intended to suggest that a nuclear blast has taken place. That was probably not the intent of the original film, since it does not have this opening sequence. Journalist Martin was on his way by plane to cover another story. During a layover in Japan to visit a school friend, Dr. Serizawa, he is called in and questioned if he saw any anything unusual from his plane. Ships from the Japanese fishing fleet have been disappearing. Sometimes they get off distress calls that say mysterious things like the "ocean has exploded." (That is actually a very powerful image, by the way.)
Soon the mystery seems to be centering around Odo Island, near to all the disasters. There the natives have worshiped a terrible god who has lived in the sea. They call him Godzilla. Scientists go to Odo Island to discover if there could be some connection between the island and the disasters. While they are there something very like a storm destroys half the island. But it is a funny kind of a storm that is oddly destructive. It destroys their helicopter as if it were a toy (which with the low-budget special effects is exactly what it looks like). The natives think the island was attacked by their deity.
A ship full of scientists, headed by Emiko's father, paleontologist Dr. Yamane (Takashi Shimura), comes to investigate the island and discover radioactive remains from the storm. Finally the island deity shows himself in clear weather, a four-hundred-foot dinosaur, a survivor from two million [sic] years ago. (The Japanese version says he is two hundred feet.) He has lived in the sea for all human memory, but now nuclear testing has goosed him up, made him radioactive, and he wants to wreak revenge on the world.
Godzilla dodges the depth charges of the Japanese fleet and makes his way to Tokyo harbor. Then he comes ashore twice, laying waste to the city in two very nicely filmed sequences. Up to these sequences we have seen little of the monster and after we will see little, but these two sequences are supremely powerfully filmed.
Meanwhile we learn that Emiko has been promised to Dr. Serizawa but is actually in love with Ogata, a young navy officer. Serizawa has his own problems and is not very interested in Emiko. He has developed a powerful weapon that could kill Godzilla, but to use it would mean revealing it to the world. Being a moral Japanese, unlike immoral American scientists, he believes that the discoverer has responsibility to be certain that his discoveries are not used for evil purposes. Serizawa has revealed the weapon to Emiko and she has told Ogata. Serizawa must weigh his fears against what Godzilla is already doing to Tokyo. (Ogata argues that Serizawa should use the weapon. You have your fears, which may become reality. And you have Godzilla, which is reality.) Serizawa must resolve his moral dilemma.
Sometimes the lack of a budget can work in the favor of a film. GODZILLA certainly benefits from the low budget of some of its production. The scenes of the attacks on Tokyo have a sort of crudeness that in black and white, a little fuzzy, gives them an almost documentary quality. Scenes of the great beast are almost always shot from a low angle, looking upward. Why this approach was abandoned in later Godzilla films is unclear, but the size of the creature is emphasized in a way that would be difficult in a color film. Filming in color at eye level just does not convey the threat and no other film has ever made a giant monster as frightening.
Some of the best effects were found by chance. The model steel towers melted under the hot studio lights. They were remade and the effect of their melting was combined with an aerosol spray in Godzilla's mouth to create the effect that his fiery breath was causing the damage. The sound of the great beast's heavy footfalls were created by a drum. I personally never associated the drumbeats as being anything but mood music, but the sound works that way. On the other hand, the sound of stroking the strings of a large cello- like instrument with a leather glove, then slowing it down and playing it backwards, acts as the groans of Godzilla. It sounds like steel girders giving way in hell. The effect is just about perfect. The musical score is crude with its military marches, but somehow they seem to work.
When the effects work they are terrific, when they do not work, they do not work. All too often the effects are just a bit on the cheesy side. There are scenes when we are obviously looking at a hand-puppet. Even that would not be so bad, but we then see what is supposedly a photograph of what we had just seen and it looks nothing like the puppet version. There was a similar problem in THE BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS. Another problem is with the Godzilla suit itself. Godzilla has what can best be described as an A-line figure. He has very heavy massive legs and gargantuan feet, but his trunk is not commensurately large. His legs also have and unfortunate tendency to have folds on a way that a jacket might but an arm would not. The crudeness of the filming conceals the fact that Godzilla has external ears in a way that reptiles do not. The producers at Toho thought that people would assume Godzilla was deaf if they did not give him obvious external ears. Of course a parrot has no external ears and hears well enough to repeat sounds he hears. The film also features a traveling matte of a view directly into the face of the beast as seen from Tokyo tower. It is one of the worst jobs of matting I ever remember seeing. Some of Bert I. Gordon's matte jobs look good by comparison. In most scenes the beast is shown moving in slow motion to accentuate his size, but when he bats away missiles, he moves at normal speed and spoils much of the illusion. However, it should be remembered many of Universal's classic films have their moments when they do not show consummate visual craftsmanship. DRACULA, for example, has some very silly scenes including a silly scene of a bee coming out of a bee-size coffin. In some ways we cannot be really sure where some of the errors crept in. We are told a disaster at sea occurred at 3:30 AM, but when we saw it earlier the crew was on the deck and the sun was shining.
Where THE BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS had just showed its monster in the streets and people running from it, GOJIRA looks more at the emotional effect on people. What made it to the American version is fairly effective, but what was cut out are some very impressive scenes. In one scene of the Japanese film only, a mother sits at the base of a building near where the monster is rampaging. She sadly tells her children that they will all be with their father soon. This tone is surprisingly bleak for a monster movie. The whole population of Tokyo seems to mourn the great losses wrought by Godzilla. Themes of sacrifice, honor, and suicide seem to accent the bleak tone of this film. Other imaginative scenes include a view of the monster ravaging Tokyo with a cage of birds seen in silhouette in the foreground. In other scenes we see Godzilla walking and the dust his huge feet kick up.
It is never easy to judge acting ability of someone who is speaking in a language you do not know. This film does have the second-best-known international actor from Japanese film. Dr. Yamane is played by Takashi Shimura, the star of films like IKIRU and THE SEVEN SAMURAI. Unfortunately the actor who dubs his lines in the American version is not very good. Particularly noticeable is his inability to pronounce the word "phenomenon" which he says "phenonemon." To have such an educated man making that silly mistake is unintentionally humorous.
This is a film with some very nice visual imagery and it has become a favorite film. It is not so much a good film as a weak film with some very good moments. The American version I would have to give only a high +1 on the -4 to +4 scale. The Japanese version is probably a high +2 film.
It should be noted that also that this is the most influential film ever made in Japan. It was Japan's first international cinematic success. It spawned the Japanese genre of "kaiju" films. "Kaiju" is Japanese for "monster" and the continuing Godzilla series, Japanese anime, and even Pokemon are direct descendents of this film.
Mark R. Leeper
mleeper@lucent.com
Copyright 2000 Mark R. Leeper
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