Godzilla

Director: Gareth Edwards
With: Aaron Taylor-Johnson. Ken Watanabe, Elizabeth Olsen, Juliette Binoche, Sally Hawkins, David Strathairn, Bryan Cranston

I've always been a buff of disaster films and I remember loving Roland Emmerich aka King of Disaster's Godzilla as a kid when I watched it back in '98 with the whole family. I just learned by now that critics actually thought that it sucked balls and this year's Godzilla is the immaculate one which redeemed the Godzilla franchise. I'm not in sync with them. Gareth Edwards' version didn't do it for me.

But to be fair, the only Godzilla movie I've watched prior to this is the Emmerich one. Ha! And I've always been a fan of Emmerich's style. It's still vivid in my memory but I thought the scene where the guy right on Godzilla's footprint was epic. As cheesy as he can be, I always dug his mainstream approach to his disaster films. The Day After Tomorrow and 2012 are two of my favorite films of all time. LOL. So there goes my taste.

Edwards' take felt a little too serious and less silly for me. It's story-oriented but I always prefer the survival aspect of the main characters in films like this. There's no sense of danger and worry for the characters. There were few but they're not as startling and epic as I thought they would be. Same with the action scenes, there's only few of them and they're not so badass, except for that one defining moment of Godzilla. But other than that, they're dull for a giant monster as the subject. Made me miss Pacific Rim.  It doesn't help that Godzilla didn't appear until the second half of the film and worse, I find myself more excited with Alexandre Desplat's score than the scenes itself.

As for the fatty Godzilla, Fatzilla, I have no beef with him. I thought they made him as humongous as possible and it was translated well into the screen. The visuals are glorious but it pales in comparison to the visual-effect heavy movies of our generation.

For what it's worth, it has a good premise and the twist to Godzilla as 'King of the Monsters' is an awesome finishing touch. My favorite aspect overall is Seamus McGarvey's well-utilized camera techniques capturing a mood that's perfect in every scene. It really is the strongest point of the movie.

Also, I'm one of those Pinoys who's always delighted that his country is part of the setting in a mainstream film so yay Philippines! It's a pleasant surprise.