In the dying days of WWII Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki) is a kamikaze pilot who has rejected his duty and lands on a remote island for repairs. Unfortunately a local giant reptile called Godzilla attacks and all the mechanics are killed when Shikishima freezes when he is asked to shoot the beast with his plane’s cannon.

Wracked by guilt he returns to his old neighbourhood only to find his parents have died in the air raids and his neighbour holds him in contempt. By sheer chance he is left holding the baby by Noriko (Minami Hamabe) who is surviving on her wits and was asked to care for the child by her dying parents and she has no idea how to do so.

The group starts to make a new life in the ruins, but the only job Shikishima can find is on a dangerous mine clearance boat off Japan as the pay is good even if it is dangerous. Unfortunately due to the tests at Bikini Atoll in 1946, Godzilla has mutated from radiation and become huge. This is a nice counterpoint to the Legendary Pictures Monsterverse where they were trying to destroy the monster in this case they created it.

Shikishima meets the new crew which include a navy scientist who is an expert in naval weapons, Dr Noda (Hidetaka Yoshioka), a hard-bitten Quint-like captain Akitsu (Kuranosuke Sasaki) and a youngster who never fought in the war but is eager to help. About a year or so into their work, the crew is given a new job to delay the monster until backup arrives but only Noda is told this and they are sworn to secrecy. The monster attacks and both boats of the mine sweeping crew engage, one is destroyed immediately and they only barely survive temporarily wounding the beast by exploding a mine in its mouth, which immediately regenerates. A heavy cruiser arrives and attacks but is destroyed by the Godzilla’s heat ray.

Awaking in hospital, Shikishima is worried about evacuating civilians only to be told the government is not telling people and the USA does not want to get involved to avoid escalating the conflict with the Soviets. The crew have been told they have to keep what happened a secret.

Shikishima returns home and finally tells Noriko why he still has nightmares as his war has not yet ended. He feels Godzilla is the ghosts of the people who died on the island come for revenge. She tells him if he has survived the war he is not meant to die now.

Godzilla then attacks Ginza where Noriko works and unleashes his heat ray, in the ensuing nuclear blast she pushes him to safety into an alleyway at the last moment and he swears revenge by any means necessary. Dr Noda prepares a civilian defence plan to destroy the monster as the military is not taking action with several backup plans, but Shikishima has a plan of his own and will not be talked out of it. Will it succeed? The very future of Japan is at stake.

At first glance this appears to be another Godzilla reboot like the Legendary Pictures storyline but with some important differences. In this case I could actually jive with the non-big lizard scenes and did not just like them to be over like with the English language version. They are an integral part of the story in this case and I don’t know if the original Japanese setting gives it more pathos but it seems to have more weight behind it.

Death means something in this version of the story. When people die they are gone and do not come back and Godzilla is a stone cold wild animal in this one with no redeeming features. The Showa era of Godzilla did get quite silly towards the end but there is no sign of that here.

Not going to spoil the end but it did remind me of the original movie somewhat and you can have another big lizard come back and still be called the same thing.

For the price that this cost to make it manages to look better in some scenes than the hundreds of millions of dollars version by Legendary Pictures which is video game cutscene at times and has a lot of dumb stuff in it. Everyone is playing super serious here and it shows.

The music does its job well and there is a return of the classic Godzilla theme at pivotal points in the movie and during the end credits.

In countries other than Australia this movie is opening on more screens, but in my city I could only find it screening at one cinema. It is a shame I could not see it at IMAX as it would have been quite an experience. The screen I saw it on was quite small in comparison.

You don’t really need to have seen Shin Godzilla or any other Godzilla movies at all to enjoy this as it is its own thing and doesn’t link to any other movies. There may be a sequel given the success of this one but it will have different characters in it and a new story. Not sure if they are going to redo the Showa era or do something different. They can jump around in the timeline and it would still work.

Well worth your time and definitely go see it if you get the chance.

Rating: 5/5

Film details:

Director: Takashi Yamazaki

Screenplay: Takashi Yamazaki

Starring : Ryunosuke Kamiki, Minami Hamabe, Yuki Yamada, Munetaka Aoki, Hidetaka Yoshioka, Sakura Ando

Cinematography: Kōzō Shibasaki

Music by: Naoki Satō

Company: Toho

Country: Japan

Language: Japanese

Length: 124min

Trailer: