Godzilla, featuring a cameo by Godzilla

Rating: 5/10 (28 May 2014)

The US just hasn't had much luck adapting the Godzilla legend; the latest attempt is better than Godzilla '98 and possibly King of the Monsters, but that's not saying much. Godzilla (2014) pits the title monster against two other giant creatures, Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms, which feed off radiation and pose a threat to humans once unleashed. The story is told from the perspective of an American family, a guy who lost his wife to a mysterious explosion and his son, in the Navy, who just wants to be with his own family.
The movie is somewhat misnamed, as, indeed, Godzilla is barely in it at all. I've heard the director was influenced by Spielberg's Jaws (1975), in which the shark was kept hidden for much of the movie. Except, while we didn't see the shark, the film was certainly about the shark- we very much feel the shark's presence and see what it does to the community. This movie seems to take a while to get to the point, focusing on this family whose characters weren't particularly deep, with nothing particularly endearing. By the time the monsters do show up, it's mainly the MUTOs we see and hear about. And even then, we see far more of the human characters, mainly military characters and scientists outside the core characters we were following earlier, debating how to kill them. The whole point, the billed battle between Godzilla and the monsters, is confined to the climax and feels very brief.
Roger Ebert had a favourite story that comes to mind, about a reporter covering a flood who wrote "God stood on a mountain top here today, and surveyed the damage that His floodwaters had wrought." The editor replied, "Forget flood. Interview God." Forget all this, interview Godzilla.