Godzilla: Final Wars (2005)

Strong and Moving!

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

I've only seen Godzilla: Final Wars twice in my life and the very first time I watched it and seen that ball of fire coming to earth, I knew that it wasn't a planet as the Xilions had said it was. I just felt that it was (excuse the pun) more than meets the eye. When Godzilla blasts it and you see that it is indeed a monster, I laughed as I knew who it was right away. If any of you are a monster fan like I am you would've realized that there was only 1 monster that ever came from outer space. you can call it Ghidrah or King Ghidora, but they are one in the same monster. Sure one is green in color and the other is gold in color but when you put 2 and 2 together you get the same monster.

After having trudged through a handful of Godzilla movies and only really finding enjoyment in one (TOKYO S.O.S.), I think I've finally found what is safe to say my favorite: FINAL WARS. Based on the mixed critical and audiences reactions as compared to some of the other classics, I might be totally off-base and my opinion is probably skewed as I've only seen five or six movies in the franchise at this point. Regardless, this movie was more fun (despite its flaws) than any of the others I've seen. It was released on the 50th anniversary of the Godzilla franchise and, as I understand it, is touted as the last in the series. I assume this movie is just the same as any other with the word 'final' in the title and, if there haven't been more released yet, I'm sure we'll see more eventually (not including the 2014 American reimagining). The film opens with a battle against Godzilla in Antarctica where the military manages to trap him beneath a layer of rubble and ice. For a while, the world prospers as mankind has shifted its focus off of war and pollution. Everything's groovy until the world comes under attack from every major kaiju…at once! Anguirus is in Shanghai! Rodan's in New York City! The monster from that horrible 1998 GODZILLA film starring Matthew Broderick is in Sydney, Australia! But wait! A race of aliens from outer space (I hate how the film always feels the need to refer to it as 'outer' space…it sounds juvenile) known as the Xiliens have arrived to save us, and a new era of prosperity is upon us when they make quick work of the world's most dangerous monsters and offer to assist us in destroying a rogue planetoid on a collision course with Earth. It all sounds too perfect and the world welcomes the Xiliens with open arms, but there is something more sinister going on behind the scenes and mankind's survivors might need to awaken the world's most dangerous foe to save us: Godzilla.I'm not sure why reactions to FINAL WARS were so unimpressive. This movie fixed a lot of the problems I've had with the previous Godzilla movies I've watched. If I was going to complain about something, I suppose the most glaring offense is that the movie runs on a longer than necessary. At two hours, it overstays it's welcome by thirty minutes or so and my interest starts to struggle. It's never that the movie gets too boring (though it isn't to say it doesn't try) but it's just overwhelming. There is just so much going on and it rarely lets up from the action. FINAL WARS utilizes the common Godzilla movie trope of an extensive final battle, dominating half the film's running time. Where the other films just hammer you over the head with men in rubber suits duking it out for an uncomfortable amount of time, FINAL WARS is gracious enough to break it up a bit by ensuring that the humans in the film do more than stand aside helplessly watching the battle ensue. The humans in FINAL WARS aren't ready to settle with the sidelines; they're ready to kick some alien butt. In the future society of the movie, the humans have discovered a segment of their society with mutant capabilities and trained them in the art of battle, calling it M Organization. And the Earth Defense Force has created a series of battleships to help fend off monster attacks. While Godzilla does battle with an army of giant monsters, the humans, led by Captain Douglas Gordon (Don Frye, the film's token white man) and the mutant Shinichi Ozaki (Masahiro Matsuoka), bring the battle to Xiliens. As a result, we get a healthy dose of martial arts and stunt wirework to add some extra action flavor.I found a lot to like in GODZILLA: FINAL WARS and it'll be hard to rave about it all in the limited space I've got here, but I'll try and sum it all up. I loved the inclusion of the original GOJIRA theme in the film's opening; as the 50th anniversary film, it's a nice throwback to where it all began. I love the stereotypes the film embraces. To be clear, I'm not referring to stereotypes of the Japanese. I mean everyone else. In New York City, we see a pimp (complete with pink pimp-mobile) being harassed by a foul-mouthed cop while a drunken homeless man laughs at them both before Rodan arrives an obliterates them all. It was like a scene out of an 80's film, except FINAL WARS was released in 2004. We even get a slide whistle sound effect when the wind gusts from Rodan's wings knocks all their hats off. I loved that the crappy 1998 Godzilla (now known as Zilla) has an appearance as a fully-CG monster terrorizing Australia before the real Godzilla arrives and defeats him in less than thirty seconds. I really liked that the filmmakers used CG to enhance a lot of the monsters, giving them a wider range of movement than a rubber suit would generally allow. And I love that the movie introduced me to a wide range of monsters I've never encountered before. For example, King Caesar…what the--? No idea what he is, but now I'm going to have to watch GODZILLA VS. MECHAGODZILLA to see more.GODZILLA: FINAL WARS is far from perfect, but I doubt I'll find a giant monster film that will be as fun as this. I never cared much to follow these movies and only started watching some of them to get some context before going to see the 2014 Gareth Edwards film and because my daughter fell in love with the monster after watching some battle clips on YouTube. After a string of disappointments (with the exception of TOKYO S.O.S.), I was excited to find a Godzilla movie that I wouldn't mind watching again or recommending to others.

Godzilla final warGodzilla bows out on his 50th birthday with the massive multi monster mashup GODZILLA FINAL WAR. Stylishly directed by horror action director Ryuhei Kitamura, GODZILLA FINAL WAR is essentially a modernized remake of DESTROY ALL MONSTERS. Godzilla, the king of monsters, lies trapped under the Arctic ice, but earth is determined never to be caught off guard again by giant monsters. The Esrth Defense Force trains an elite team of soldiers comprising men and women enhanced by a mysterious mutant gene. Led by captain Douglas Gordon, the man who first defeated the legendary Godzilla many years ago, this M-Organisation hunts down monsters across the globe. The discovery of an ancient cyborg creature called Gigan leads to a monster invasion of titanic proportions. Giant beasts appear across the globe, wrecking havoc. Captain Gordon leads his team of mutant monster hunters in the Gotengo, an advanced spacecraft armed to the teeth. But just as the counterattack is underway, the monsters are seemingly disintegrated by human like aliens known as the Xilliens. The Xilliens come in peace, but Captain Gordon has his suspicions. These suspicions are proved right when it is discovered that the ancient cyborg, the mutant soldiers and the Xilliens share the same mutant gene. This same gene allows them to be put under mind control! With chaos reigning from within and from beyond, captain Gordon initiates a plan to turn Godzilla loose on the invaders.Sure we have seen this monster mash up scenario play out across multiple forms of fiction, but only here does it play out under the keen direction of Ryuuhei Kitamura. Kitamura brings a stylish dynamic look to FINAL WAR; visually! it looks on par with blockbusters 10 times it's budget. His direction in action scenes is intense and fast paced, using a good range of camera tricks to bring out the scale and ferocity of the monster clashes. Yet mr kitamura's visual acumen cannot make up for all the other flaws of this movie. First and foremost being the story, which manages to rip off Star Wars, x-men, the matrix, universal soldier, and many other far superior Hollywood films. The unoriginal premise and plot comprises a range of over acted characters trying to be "edgy". The actors turn in fine performances with nothing entirely cringe worthy, but the fault lies in the writer who pens some truly cheesy lines right out of bad fan fiction. I do however appreciate the diverse ethnicity of the characters, under utilized though they may be, which gives the movie a broader international feel. You may recognize Kane Kosugi, Hollywood actor and son of the classic ninja actor Sho Kosugi, as well as Don Frye channeling the best of middle age macho through his character of Captain Gordon. Being a 2004 movie, one should not expect too much in terms of special effects. Is it then too much to expect for special effects to improve just a little bit from the mid 1990s? Sure the movie is in HD but the miniatures, monster costumes and pyrotechnics look just as good (or bad) as Godzilla movies from the 90s. Basically, the more elaborate a monster design, the stiffer it moves. More agile monsters like King Caesar, Gigan and Monster X look like something's out of power rangers. Godzilla himself looks leaner but has a weird tiny head, rat like ears, a perpetual squint and moves just as stiff as most millennium era Godzillas. Unlike other Godzilla movies where the big G gets up close and personal to deliver the beat down on enemy monsters, Godzilla in FINAL WAR is a living deus ex machina overusing an over powered nuclear breath to solve every conflict. This fight strategy of blowing away enemies with a giant mouth laser soon becomes real old real fast. So the creative team throws in some truly hilarious scenes like having Godzilla play soccer with 2 other monsters while using another monster as the ball. It is instances like this, and much of the hammy human dominated scenes (not to mention every appearance of Godzilla's baby Minila) that makes this movie more like a parody than a serious blockbuster.No doubt that GODZILLA FINAL WAR was an ambitious project, but the skills of director Kitamura and the film's actors were hampered by an insultingly bad Japanese script (and a laughably horrid English dub), an unoriginal convoluted story with too many sub plots, weak special effects, and a synthesizer soundtrack right out of some old video game. This would be the movie that drove the Godzilla franchise into a 10 year hibernation until it's revival in the 2014 Hollywood remake.

This is one of the worst Godzilla movies ever made. I cannot believe that Toho just ripped off their own history to make this travesty. The story, cribbing from better movies like Invasion of the Astro-Monsters, Destroy All Monsters and Atragon, is simplistic and silly. Godzilla as well as the SFX are below par compared to the 90's films. Godzilla looks silly, the Xillians should be called Sillyuns and the story is just terrible. Using the lame US version of Godzilla gave me a laugh, but the Godzilla from Destroyah would have kicked everyone's rears. Final complaint: Why oh why bring back the terrible looking Minilla from Son of Godzilla? A terrible idea that nearly undoes all the great Godzilla's from the 90's. Pass on this terrible insult to Godzilla.