Shin Godzilla [Blu-ray] [DVD]

Another Godzilla film for my son's ever increasing collection, he's happy!

LUv how disgusting GOdzilla is

I was very disappointed to discover that this is an English dub. It has caused it to have poor sound quality and harms one of the aspects of an enjoyable film. It being a dub should be made clear, it should not be advertised as the original film but as something else.Once I got over that, it is a good enough film. I found it difficult to get very interested in the characters, mainly because it was hard to tell the difference between them, but the story told was nonetheless interesting. The main character, Godzilla, was terrifying. An interesting take on Godzilla.

This is another side of the gojira story, it is a great fun and action packed movie. Many thanks to seller.

So, I'm a middle line Godzilla fan. I generally enjoy the campy cheese of them, rarely will get through one without falling out from my seat giggling at the sheer absurdity of some of the stuff that's put on screen, and occasionally will even get invested in the stories. I picked this up on the reccomendation of a friend, forcing myself to ignore the fact that it was made by the same Lunatic who made Evangelion. And thankfully it wasn't a miasma of prentious symbolism thrown in hapazardly because the director thought it would look good, and there was absolutley no scenes of Shinji doing anything nasty over the unconcious body of anyone else. Wasn't a film that I would admit to being particularly wild about however.The plot is... that Godzilla plot. Pretty much the 1950s one. Big scaly thing comes up out of the sea, wrecks tokyo. There are twists on the usual formula- the first is that the Big G (or should it be the scaly G, as Genghis Khan contests that title, and as popular as Godzilla is, he doesn't have people worsipping him as a god) comes up as worm, then as a... joyful faced abomination that bounces down the streets.. then stands up, then wanders off for ten minutes before coming back in his final form, in a glorious moment with the original musical que from the first film playing. (I will admit it felt almost meme like). The second twist is that the focus is primarly upon the Japanese government and their response to him, rather than a few disposable human characters trying not to get stepped on. Ultimatley, I had mixed feelings about both of these.I'll get the first out of the way quickly- The Godzilla constantly mutating thing felt like a bit of a gimmic. It would probably have been more suited to a villain (Or should I say more villainous) monster for him to fight, rather than the scaly boy himself. Maybe it fits with his more anatagonistic role in this plot, but it felt a lot of the time like it was just trying to "Up the Ante" without really utilising it very much. The evolution up to his "final form" is kinda cool, but beyond that it goes nowhere, beyond an excuse for him to suddenly have anti air abilities. Also, if we are talking design, I liked the longer tail that he seems to use to propell himself along, but his whole body seemed weirdly rigid. He has absurdly fat thighs which, in all honesty seem to take up about half his body mass, and the whole upper body seems very small and spindly by contrast. I suppose it's good for looking unnatural, bad if he ever has to fistfight Ghidora in the sequels. I will also add, that despite the somewhat grotesque appearance, Godzilla never feels to be that much of an antagonist. He mostly seems to be just determined to take a stroll through the downtown Tokyo area, and any destruction is a result of his sheer size or in response to the poor military actually managing to hurt him. I guess it's understandable given that he's inevitably going to become a protagonist as the sequels come out, but the earlier series were always able to have him be destructive and evil in the first film, and then raise the stakes by pitting him against worst monsters, or exlain it away as him being "another godzilla". Maybe more rational plotting, but it means we don't get (Excepting one scene which I will come to later) the usual levels of death and destruction that we normally see in the first of a series.The focus on the Japanese government is an interesting take on it- we see all the petty infighting, experts and bureacrats with no idea what is going on throwing their weight around, government incompetence and red tape hamstringing the response to Godzilla when he's still weak. It's a fascinatingly different look at him in truth, and it largely treats Godzilla more like a force of nature, a walking natural disaster that happens to have teeth. And atomic breath. The issue with this becomes a bit more prevalent in the second half of the film. Every character presented is largely a talking head. They don't really have any personality or character beyond the actions or dialouge that the story gives them (This wouldn't be a problem so much in a book, but with the film's limited run time it severely bites). I think only one of the characters even lays eyes on Godzilla once in the first hour and a half of the film.Both of these things, for me at least changed from novelty to annoyance in the second half of the film (I will be going into some spoiler territory here) The film for me peaks at the point when he finally gets into Tokyo- Most of the "smashing stuff" scenes up to this point have been somewhat underwhelming, but that turns out to be buildup, as he's provoked into using his atomic breath... and immediatley lays waste to the entire centre of the city inside three minutes. It's a beautifully shot and scored, and a pretty harrowing scene. The problem is, this happens only about the 1 hour 10 mark into the film. There's still 50 minutes to go.. and well, he has a nap. For no less than a month in narrative, and almost the entire second half of the film, at a point where it feels like the writer suddenly realise that Godzilla was too overpowered, so had to contrive a reason for him to not do much to give the Japanese time to actually be able to win. It's rather jarring to say the least, and it really makes the whole mutation angle feel somewhat forced, simply to give this part of the plot a reason to exist. The whole second half of the film is largely the talking heads plotting to take him down, whilst at the same time consenting to the U.S dropping nuclear bombs on Japanese soil if they can not stop the monster. As outrageous as this last point sounds, it's actually argued very logically. The problem is, the whole second half of the film is somewhat dull. There's no sense of building tension like the first half, it's just people discussing stuff, then a very happy montage about the japanese people recovering their confidence and beating the monster with teamwork. The finale itself is pretty underwhelming bar a few nice shots, and most of the effects are noticeably worse than the rest of the film (I'm guessing the budget was running low when they got this far).While I don't regret watching it, I would be in no hurry to sit through the second half again. It's too much buildup for too little payoff, and whilst the discussions are often pretty decent, they aren't enough to keep me tided over for the whole 50 minutes. It's a case where I will say that I recognise it's a good film- but, as an Irishman instead of a Japanese man, I'm honestly out of the loop about a lot of the poltical stuff. I honestly don't know whether a lot of it is satrical in nature or not, or even if it is a reflection or commentary on the real life Japansese government. Naturally, not being from that cultural background, a lot of the stuff about the nation getting back on it's feet leaves me very cold and uninvolved. Ultimatley, whilst I can't call it bad, I'd be in no hurry to watch it again, but that is largely down to the fact that, it's really not made for me. And that's ok. It's a good film, just not one that I'm particuarly enthused about.

First and foremost I'm extremely angry that I can't get a refund after playing the thing for under two minutes. I know there's a warning, but for some reason I thought this had a watchtime limit or something that would give you more leeway than just disallowing a refund the second you press play. I didn't even know there was a dub of this movie, and there being an English option isn't the problem. I didn't even think that a feature on a basic DVD - you know - language selection - would not be available on this streaming service because I guess everyone in the UK speaks English and nothing else. There's not even an option to have subtitles on which is a lot of trouble for me because I have auditory issues and the poor audio mixing makes it hard to tell which voice is coming from what character, which is a huge problem for a movie where there's frequently lots of characters talking at once.I love Shin Godzilla, but I prefer to watch it in Japanese. I suppose the dub and the original are different productions, but I'm very disappointed. From what I did end up watching because I can't refund it anyway, the dub job here is poor and it sounds like a clean audio book slapped over the film, even in scene where there's supposed to be people talking in the background in the subway - it makes a very serious film very cheesey and unappealing. Voice for the main character really does not fit well. Acting quality is standard but the mixing is very flat and makes it hard to tell who's talking because I find a lot of the voices similar. I would honestly love a refund, if it wasn't for the very predatory refund policy. Waste of money, and it's a massive shame, because I do love this film otherwise.

Great find lm nearly as good as minus one

The film came in perfect condition minus what appears to be remnants of a sticker that was taken off (I was able to clean off the rest fairly well though) and the film played easily without any glitches or stutters.

Increiblemente bonita, con esa caja de color rojo. Tan bonita que en lugar de tenerla en hilera con el resto de peliculas la tengo mostrando esa portada como si de un cuadro se tratara

While this movie offers a new perspective on a story told many times, this version is rather boring. It tells the story through the view of the government and all it's bureaucracy. This doesn't make it bad, absolutely not. It's interesting. But not a Friday night popcorn movie interesting.

Buena película, y pensar que era verdad que se notaba la diferencia de una adaptación Americana de la Japonesa.

Superbe film, le meilleur Godzilla depuis longtemps.