King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962)

King Kong vs. Godzilla is without a doubt the most entertaining and commercially successful (adjusted for inflation) of all the Godzilla films. What Sci-Fi plot could be better than pitting Godzilla against Willis O’Brien’s creation? It’s a great monster movie that really hit the money-making accelerator in the Toho franchise and propelled Godzilla into stardom. The film also presents audiences the both monsters in color for the first time.Following this movie, sequel after sequel would be made each year as a result.

     Godzilla was last seen buried on an island covered in ice. At some point between films, a chunk of glacier drifts out to see. As the film begins, Godzilla breaks free after a submarine crashes into the iceberg. Shortly after, the angry dinosaur destroys the sub and levels a military base. The suit design is once again revamped: the three sets of fins are replaced with one row, the torso is much bulkier, and the head is much narrower, giving him an alligator look. Overall, Godzilla looks more reptile-like than previously. Because the film’s mood is lighter than before, his roar is given the more familiar high-pitch, and the fangs are removed. He’s more “kid-friendly” in that sense, even though the monster is still villainous. Kong, on the other hand, is nothing similar to the 1933 version, which is in stop-motion. Here, he is a guy in a clumsy and very fake looking rubber suit, with a mouth that does not move when he roars.

     There’s a scene where Kong battles a giant octopus, which in fact is a real specimen Toho used for production. It’s not a spectacular scene, especially when Kong throws the rocks at it. You can tell the forced perspective animal is nowhere near the rocks as they are seemingly thrown across it, rather than actually making contact.

     But for the most part, the monster scenes are entertaining. Following his raid on the military base, Godzilla falls into a massive hole filled with dynamite by the Japanese army. For a B-Movie, the scene is done well, and adds to the aura of Godzilla’s invincibility. Continuity is erratic though, considering Godzilla is depicted as fearing electricity. In the original film, he rips through the electrical defenses in Tokyo without a problem. Although one should remember these are two different monsters; the original died in 1954.

     While the movie is in no way true to the 1933 film, it does uphold Kong’s interest in women, as he carries around a woman across Tokyo. Kong is also increased in size, from about 30 feet tall to Godzilla’s size. And for some reason he absorbs electricity, in contrast to Godzilla. This is never explained or elaborated. That detail is completely unnecessary and irrelevant to the plot, and makes no sense in any way.

     The final monster battle is amazing, and is certainly the highlight of the film. And because the film is more comical than the previous, it contains quite a bit of humor. Kong throws a rock at Godzilla, which he bats with his tail back at Kong. Godzilla claps his hands together tauntingly in the fight, something he never did before or after the movie. And Kong’s arm length changes constantly from long to short, depending on the scene. Both monsters land hard blows on one another, and the fights carries them into the ocean, from which only Kong resurfaces. A rumor persisted that in the Japanese version it was Godzilla, but it was false. The only difference is that instead of just hearing Kong’s roar in the credits, you hear both monsters roar.

     While this movie is great in the way of monster battles and city-crushing, the human aspect is horrible. Either each of the actors overacts or under acts in all the scenes. The drug company CEO, despite being the film’s chief antagonist, is a silly and obnoxious character. In one particular scene he’s wearing a safari outfit, although he was never in the jungle and is on a ship in the middle of the ocean. There’s also a subplot about a woman searching for her fiancé and getting pinned down in Godzilla’s attack on the train. The whole scene fails to move the plot anywhere. It doesn’t get Godzilla and Kong any closer to confronting each other, nor does it present the military with any solution to stopping the beasts. The scene appears to have been just “thrown” in there.

Allow me to lay out my personal bias towards this movie. It was the first Godzilla movie I’d ever seen, and the first one I owned on VHS. Here’s the cover.

I can’t explain how excited I was to find this movie. It was really glorifying for a seven year old boy. Despite the sometimes horrific acting and cheap special effects, King Kong vs. Godzilla is a fantastically thrilling film. There’s no sadness or real drama in the way of war or politics. If you’re looking for pure escapism for an hour and a half, this is the movie for you!  Four out of four.
~Seth

DIDJA KNOW?

• This film marks the first time either Godzilla or King Kong were filmed in color or widescreen
• Ishiro Honda considered going with stop-motion monsters, a la Willis O'Brien's Kong, but due to budget concerns the idea was scrapped in favor of the standard guys-in-suits
• This film also features the Davy Crockett, a portable nuclear missile launcher built by the United States, which was supposed to be Top Secret. No word if Snowden was around at that time...

Godzilla (1954) aka. Gojira (Japan)

By Guest Reviewer Seth Bradley:

A massive storm blows through an island. The villagers are fast asleep, except one family of three. Something is shaking the house, but it’s not the wind. Finally, in a dead panic, the younger brother bolts outside to confront the invader, with the others remaining in the home, doomed to their fate, as the house crumbles around them. An ancient roar rips through the air, as a bipedal behemoth rumbles through the village. The year is 1954, and Japanese audiences have just met Godzilla.

By far, Godzilla (1954) is the best and one of the most influential of all Science Fiction films. Even if you’re not into the big kiddie camp of the Japanese monster movies, this one is a must see! It follows the resurrection of a dinosaur, reawakened by radioactive weapons testing. Suspense fills your mind as a dark and foreboding animal raids through a village in the dead of the night. This is not a misunderstood creature, like the 1998’s Godzilla. This animal has purposely vaporized ships, killing its crew members, for no reason in particular. Sure, it sounds cliché in retrospective, but remember this is still the early 50’s. The film follows Godzilla as he rips through 300,000 volts of electrical wire, wipes out a tank division, and purposely pulls down a tower full of reporters, who annoy him with flash photography. At one point during the raid on Tokyo, he even breathes his trademark radioactive fire on the highway in front of him for no apparent reason. Clearly, this creature is looking for total destruction of Japan, as vengeance for waking him. No creature sympathy here.

The sadness comes into play in the second half of the film, after Godzilla destroys Tokyo. The city’s survivors are being corralled into field hospitals. As the camera pans over the miserable scene, you hear a baby crying somewhere in the background, reminding viewers that even the innocence of children were destroyed, along with homes and lives.

Before you start to say how silly and unrealistic a guy in a rubber suit looks on screen, I have to say in advance that the director actually made Godzilla look better in a suit than in stop motion, for the suit’s movements are slow and lumber some, as if he were actually a thousand tons.Another cool trick is that most monster scenes are shot with a low camera angle, so the audience feels like it’s looking up at something tall and massive, and not just a six foot tall guy in a suit The pitch-black night sky also casts a little darkness on the suit, hiding some of the less convincing prosthetics. One noteworthy feature is that this Godzilla design sports a pair of blank, crazed-looking eyes that stare down wildly at the fleeing people. It also has a pair of fangs, jutting out from his top jaws, like a viper. Its roar also has a much deeper pitch than the later models, giving it the sense of something powerful and angry. The sound of Godzilla’s roar was conceived by rubbing a pair of resin gloves across a bass violin, then slowing down the sound when the recording was played. 

The big G is the grand-daddy of the many giant-monster-destroys-city genre, and its influence can still be felt, including in the upcoming Pacific Rim.  This dark intro to the series is still the best, and highly recommended. Four out of Four.

(Editor's note: Did you know the director of this film, Ishiro Honda, also directed The Mysterians, as well as many other movies in this category. See the review here.)