Overrated!

Rating: 5/10 (10 February 2019)

Godzilla 2014 is a big disappointment for me. The film is a decent movie but, in my opinion, not a good Godzilla movie and just a lackluster film in general. There is barely any Godzilla in the film and instead focuses mostly on the human point-of-view. That is not necessarily a bad approach except that the human characters are not that interesting. When we see Godzilla and the other monsters wreak havoc it is awesome and there is some good action and great effects. However, when we finally see Godzilla wreak havoc and fighting the other creatures it is short-lived until the very end. Plus, the film is very padded out.
The film is not god-awful. There are a lot of things that the film does very well. The effects are amazing. This is probably the best looking Godzilla movie so far. The movie, especially at the end fight has a very grand and epic feel to it. Everything just feels so huge and when the action scenes happen they are epic from the great effects, to the action, to the great set pieces. This must be an amazing film to see in 3D. I did not see it in 3D though.
I also really like the design of Godzilla as well as the other monsters. Of all the films I have seen I think this one has my favorite design of Godzilla. Fans of the original Godzilla from Japan will be happy to know that this film stays true to the original film and lore right down to Godzilla's look. A good chunk of the film also takes place in Japan. For me personally, I do not care about that as much.
Unlike most people I was introduced to Godzilla through the 1998 film and grew up on that, so I will always like and look to that movie first. I know I am in the minority but I enjoy the 1998 Godzilla movie. Honestly, I even like that film more than this film. I am not asking for anyone to agree but that's how I feel. I like the characters more, I like the action scenes more (though they did not feel as epic), and I like that Godzilla was used much more. The film felt a lot more like a Godzilla movie because he was in it much more and felt like a more realized character. I actually felt for Godzilla in the 1998 film, while in this one it was hard to get invested in Godzilla because we do not see him enough.
One of the big issues I have with the film is that we barely see any Godzilla. The most we see of him is his spikes sticking out of the water. We do not see Godzilla in his full glory until near the end. We see the other monsters more and even then not much. When Godzilla or the other creatures wreck a city when he is fighting the other creatures we only see a little bit of it then it cuts away and then you see the end result until the end fight, which bugged me. When we see the monsters wreaking havoc it looks amazing, so I wish I could have seen more of it. When the trailers hinted that other monsters besides Godzilla would be in the film I was expecting something along the lines of Pacific Rim with lots of monster action, but that is not what we get. I do not want to hear people say: "A movie with lots of monster action is not realistic." This is a movie that has giant monsters. What is realistic about that? What I like about the 1998 film is that they have fun with the monster.
The entire film is from the perspective of the humans which is not always bad but it is in this case. The human characters are not interesting enough to keep me invested for the entire film. The characters in the 1998 film, whether you like them or not, have more personality and are more memorable than the people in this. The only interesting character in the film is Brian Cranston's character. When he was there I was more invested and I thought he was going to be the lead considering he was marketed as the main character in the trailers. However he is killed off halfway through the film and the lead role shifts to his son Ford (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and there is nothing to this guy. He is not interesting and has only one expression on his face throughout the entire film. He just looks very bored even when everything is coming down around him. The other characters are extremely forgettable, if you can even call them characters. The only other somewhat decent character is Dr. Ishiro played by Ken Watanabe. However, most of his screen time consists of him standing around not doing anything so it does not matter.
Overall, Godzilla 2014 is sadly an underwhelming movie in my opinion. It can be considered a good or even great movie to fans of the original Godzilla. For me it was a disappointment. There are things the film does well or even amazingly well. I guess I was expecting a somewhat different film then what we got. You don't have to think that way though. I think many people will enjoy the film. Many people who have seen it did enjoy it.