Godzilla (2014) Review: Mommy, Look, Dinosaurs

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Godzilla is an action-packed suspenseful movie that was entertaining to watch

What Happens in Godzilla?

Godzilla follows the story of Ford Brady, 15 years after a nuclear power plant accident that killed his mother. After returning from deployment, he goes to see his father, although unwillingly, where he discovers that his father, Joe Brody, still believes the government is hiding details surrounding the accident. Joe convinces Ford to return to his childhood home and the location of the accident. Although Joe had theories, he could have never imagined the true cause of the accident.

Who Are The Characters in Godzilla?

Godzilla has two parallel storylines happening, which follow different sets of characters. From the background and science perspective is Doctor Serizawa, played by Ken Watanabe. Serizawa is a lead doctor for Operation Monarch, an international coalition that studies beasts from the time of the dinosaurs.

From the military perspective, the movie follows Brody Ford, played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson. Ford suffered many traumas during his childhood. After a disaster 15 years ago, he tries to repair his relationship with his father and help protect his family.

Godzilla Review

As with many of the older movies we review (though this one isn’t that old) I have seen this movie, and upon my rewatch I found I enjoyed this more than the first time. To be clear the first time I saw this, I was 12 years old and wanted to see big monsters fight and I did not appreciate the science and the mystery of the first half of the film.

The movie really takes its time to reveal Godzilla and it has some really interesting ideas that it introduces. The acting in this movie is pretty solid overall although, as with many kaiju movies, the characters are just to show the human perspective of the destruction the creatures cause.

Joe Brody ( as played by Bryan Cranston) is an engineer who lost his wife in a nuclear power plant meltdown 15 years ago. He believes that something else happened and the government covered it up. He wants to know what actually happened. Cranston gets some really good acting moments throughout the movie as we get to see him at pretty high emotions almost constantly and Cranston does a good job.

Ford Brody (as played by Aaron-Taylor Johnson) is the son of Joe, and he is a soldier who does not believe his father’s wild tales of a government conspiracy. After he witnesses one of the creature’s attacks, he is thrust into this world of monsters while he tries to make it home to his wife and son.

Johnson does a good job portraying someone who found his way into this accidentally and just wants to do what’s right though at times he does not look as shocked as one might expect. The rest of the cast also does a really good job with Elizabeth Olsen and Ken Watanabe being the other standouts.

The scientific aspect plays a large role in this film as we are told how these creatures are older than humanity and how they feed on radiation. Godzilla himself is really built up and when you finally get to see him it is awesome and there is a huge sense of scale when you see how large he is. My only criticism ( which is one I know others have made) is that in a film called Godzilla, we don’t see Godzilla for long and when he is there it is almost always dark. While I know this is corrected in subsequent films, it is still a complaint about this one.

All in all, this is a pretty good movie filled with action and suspense that I’m glad I revisited before going to see Godzilla vs. Kong and I would definitely recommend it to others. So, hop on Netflix and see what you think.