A forty minute movie with padding

Rating: 6/10 (24 May 2014)

I gave this a 6 out of 10 because the effects were great and Bryan Cranston gave a decent performance that kept me interested.
In the end it looked like they made a good forty minute movie and then thought "Oh no, this movie needs to be at least 2 hours, what can we do to pad it out?" As others have pointed out the movie goes downhill after Cranston's character ends up in a body bag after 30 odd minutes. The moment they zipped him up I felt that any chances the movie had of being great got zipped up with him.
The military characters were a complete waste of screen time. Perhaps they were there because the armed forces gave some assistance to the production of the movie. Maybe the military sponsored parts of it to boost recruitment or maybe they needed to pad things out before they reveal Godzilla. I have no idea what they thought they were doing but every time the movie cut to the soldiers I felt the movie deflate. I don't wish to single out actors but Aaron Taylor-Johnson's character was so flat it almost killed the movie stone dead. I am not sure what was wrong but something was definitely missing there. Maybe he was told to play it flat in contrast to Cranston who played his father but I think that I may be giving him too much credit.
You could almost tell where the studio executives stepped in and messed with the movie. "Hey, we need a wife and kid, the dog has to escape and the 'lead' character has to save another kid (to show he cares and he is a good father figure). Delete the scene with Akira Takarada (no one knows who he is anyway) and show Elizabeth Olsen working in a hospital (she is a caring female character so please care about her)). Don't spend time with the monsters show a halo jump that leads to nothing. Don't show the monsters but have a ticking clock on a nuke that goes nowhere. Hire Ken Watanabe and have him do nothing too" The movie was very frustrating. They had fantastic special effects and could have showcased Godzilla as never before but they simply teased the audience and wasted a golden opportunity because of the Hollywood desire to push family values, pets and the American military.