A Highly Mixed and Overall Disappointing Reboot of the Classic Franchise

Rating: 4/10 (29 May 2014)

This film was easily my most anticipated release of the year, as a huge fan of the classic Toho franchise. My anticipation was amplified by the release of the excellent Pacific Rim last year, showing that the Kaiju genre can survive with modern special effect techniques. Sadly I was disappointed and I found this reboot to be a jumbled mess that failed to satisfy. As the film is highly inconsistent, I will evaluate both the positives and negatives of this production.
The Good: -Bryan Cranston offers a fantastic performance, helped by the fact that he is given the only developed character with an arc. -The effects on the Kaiju are great, particularly Godzilla who himself looks fantastic. -Perfect Sound design with a top-notch soundtrack. Particular praise must be given to Godzilla's iconic roar which is lovingly recreated, yet slightly modernised. -Finally the cinematography, set design, lighting and overall mise-en- scene is strong here.
The Bad: -The majority of the cast is awful (The only notable omissions are Cranston and a child featured during a sequence on a public train). They either fail to emote or have nothing to do. Particularly awful is Aaron Taylor-Johnson, who's expression almost never changes and has no emotional range at all. A truly terrible lead. -Bryan Cranston's character dies within the first 15-20 minutes. He then leaves a hole that the film totally fails to fill. -There is barely any actual monster action in this. Every time a fight begins, the film haphazardly cuts to the human characters, usually one of the many children heavily featured in the film. Compared to Pacific Rim, which featured satisfying action from start to finish, there is only one, short fight scene in the entire film. -There are far to many child actors in this film and most are terrible and cannot emote. The worst offenders are a little girl featured in the Hawaii sequence, and the main characters young son. This little boy is easily the worst part of the film due his unbelievably wooden delivery. -The films pacing is awkward. Slow for the majority, and then hyper- accelerated towards the end.
In conclusion, the film is a mess that fails to deliver. It doesn't offer anything unique and proved to lack any satisfying Godzilla action. The staring human characters are vastly terrible and the film devolves into a crappy melodrama.