Godzilla: King of the Monsters Is More of a Pauper Among Modern Monster Movies

The greatest enemy Godzilla can never seem to defeat is not King Ghidorah nor Biollante nor Baragon. No, it's boring human characters, even the rightfully iconic 1954 Godzilla movie that introduced the world to this gigantic lizard couldn't evade the problem of having the majority of its human characters be dull. Why they don't just let Godzilla and the other monsters take the spotlight in these movies, I'll never know, but here we go again with Godzilla: King of the Monsters, which ramps up the amount of monster mayhem compared to Godzilla (2014) but ends up devoting way too much screentime to an overstuffed cast of disposable humans.

Son of Godzilla Is A Goofy Trifle About Gigantic Monster Father/Son Bonding

The very first Godzilla movie is a relatively serious affair meant to provide social commentary on the dangers of nuclear power in the mid-20th century. Naturally, subsequent follow-up's would look at such a grim allegorical set-up and proceed to take the gigantic lizard monster into more goofy directions that would eventually involve Godzilla duking it out with a massive gorilla. I'm not sure anyone behind the original Godzilla feature could have predicted where the Godzilla saga would go tonally but Son of Godzilla shows that there is merit, albeit heavily flawed merit, in taking the Godzilla mythos in an unabashedly silly direction. 

Just Try Not To Be Beaming Throughout Happy-Go-Lucky

SPOILERS FOR HAPPY-GO-LUCKY FOLLOW

Happy-Go-Lucky feels like an interesting precursor to the pair of Paddington films that its leading lady, Sally Hawkins, would go on to appear in, in that both the Paddington films and Happy-Go-Lucky are British features centered on protagonists who are upbeat and kind to everyone in the far harsher world around them. Hawkins, unlike in the Paddington movies, get to be that chipper lead character in Happy-Go-Lucky, which is entirely focused on a schoolteacher named Poppy and if you've seen Hawkins in any movie besides Godzilla (where she was bizarrely relegated to an almost dialogue-free part as Ken Watanabe's generic assistant), you know she's got more than enough talent to pull off such a role with finesse.

The Original Godzilla Has Some Weak Lead Characters But An Impressively Realized Ominous Tone

If you had told any of the members of the cast and crew of the original 1954 Godzilla film that what they were working on would end up being one of the most influential features of the 20th century, they likely would have thought you were batty at best. But that's just what happened, as a somber exercise in contemplating the consequences of nuclear warfare through the prism of a monster movie turned out to be something that resonated with audiences across the globe to such a profound point that the monstrous Godzilla is still making new movies in both his home country of Japan and in the United States of America.

A Night At The Opera Has The Marx Brothers Changing The Studios They Work For But Not Changing The Quality of Their Comedy

A Night At The Opera signaled a new change of pace for the acclaimed Marx Brothers in that they were now making their comedic motion pictures at a studio that wasn't their longtime home of Paramount Pictures. They were now working at MGM, who dictated some changes to the brothers work compared to their prior efforts. In contrast to their earlier films, A Night At The Opera has, among other differing factors, a much more elaborate plot, one that involves a love story between two protagonists who aren't The Marx Brothers. While recent years have seen many claim the film to be wildly inferior to their earlier efforts, for my money (as a relative newbie to the world of Marx Brothers comedy, to be fair), A Night At The Opera more than maintains the high-quality of the Marx Brothers.

Another Brick In The Wall

Truth in advertising still exists it seems, as The Wall very much does indeed focus on a wall. I have this wish that more modern-day Hollywood movies would use more inventive titles and eschew these shorter generic titles running rampant in modern cinema but at least the more truncated title of The Wall is pretty accurate to what the actual movie entails. The only way it could be more accurate is if it somehow managed to cram in the names of its two lead actors and its primary location (Iraq) in the title, though at that point I suppose the title would become quite unwieldy at that point. I doubt they could even fit that on a poster in a satisfying manner.

There's Lots to Unpack And Contemplate Over In The Phenomenal Monster Movie Colossal (SPOILERS!!!!!)

This review contains massive spoilers about Colossal. Seriously, do not read this before seeing the movie. Just know it's an amazing motion picture and you should see it pronto. 

K?

OK, let's get on with the review.... 

Monster movies are usually dismissed as dumb cinematic fodder, stuff reserved for gifs and children only. And, yes, it is hard not to chuckle at the fun gifs emerging from goofy monster movies of yore (King Kong feeding Godzilla a tree will always make me laugh), it's worth noting that many of the biggest monster movies have underlying themes to them that lend weight to the seemingly shallow proceedings. The original Godzilla was all about the nuclear age, the first King Kong movie is all about the dangers of man trying to exploit animals while a more modern day example can be found in Cloverfield was an incredibly prophetic movie about how we react to the unbelievable in the modern day world.

Editorial: Avatar May Not Be 100% Original In Storytelling, But It Is Original In Its Majesty

Nathan Rabin of The Dissolve wrote an article in his Forgotsbuster column (which centers on films that made a ton of cash but wound up being forgotten) today about Avatar, the number one movie of all-time and a film always worthy of discussion, mainly because great reviews and massively positive responses from audiences have been drowned out by members of the internet who have disdain for the film.

Box Office Analysis: 2014 Has Been Rough For Family Movies

A lot of things have gone over spectacularly in 2014 cinema, but weirdly, family movies have been having one of their worst years in recent memory. It's not that any of them are tanking in a "Lone Ranger" style, it's just that they're certainly underwhelming mightily compared to years past. The main problem is the huge amount of lazy sequels made this year.

Summer Movie Memories: No Monkeying Around For This Franchise

Up until Labor Day, I'll be looking at seven different summer movies from Summer 2014 and analyzing what really made them stand out this summer, for reasons both good and bad. Obviously, SPOILERS for Dawn of the Planet of The Apes, as well as Godzilla, lie ahead. 

Summer Movie Memories: How Godzilla Got His Groove Back

Up until Labor Day, I'll be looking at seven different summer movies from Summer 2014 and analyzing what really made them stand out this summer, for reasons both good and bad. Obviously, SPOILERS for Godzilla lie ahead. 

The List!!!: Five Of 2014's Most Underrated Movies So Far

In The List!!!, I do a list that just reeks of being click-bait, analyzing a particular topic or subject that pertains to something major occurring in pop-culture. This week, in honor of Noah hitting Blu-Ray, I take a look at five films from the first seven months of 2014 that deserve more recognition. 

Editorial: Why The Inevitable End of Home Video Is Good For Fans of Home Video

SO HIDEOUS

For years now, people have been calling out home video as something that's on its last leg, just gasping its last breath before being replaced by Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu and the like. Unlike other similar declarations, that actually does seem reasonable, considering how much home videos sale have dipped in recent years. And interestingly, studios seem to have also gotten the memo things are gloomy for the home video department, because their upcoming home video releases for their numerous summer blockbusters are...unique, let's say.

Box Office Analysis: Small But Mighty! The Status of Indie Movies This Summer

Jon Favreaus film Chef has been one of the many indie movies this summer
to drum up big business

 It's actually been a pretty great summer for movies. 22 Jump Street was hilarious, Godzilla lived up to expectations and them some, and Dawn of The Planet of The Apes somehow improved on its predecessor to create one of the best movies in recent years. There's also been several movies debuting in art house cinemas that the major moviegoing public might not be aware of, but definitely deserve some recognition for their box office achievements. Without further ado, let's take a look at how the numerous smaller releases have done so far this summer.

The List!!!: Five Classic Reboots

In The List!!!, I do a list that just reeks of being click-bait, analyzing a particular topic or subject that pertains to something major occurring in pop-culture. This week, in honor of Dawn of The Planet of The Apes, a sequel to a reboot, I look at five classic reboots

In the internet community, the word reboot is as filthy as a towel used by Jabba The Hutt. Surely, all a reboot brings is the tarnishing of the original movies, while only serving as a cynical cash-grab. In reality, reboots vary in quality, but they hardly ever do damage to the beloved original movies (which must not have been that beloved if all it took to ruin its reputation was a poorly made reboot) and in fact, several reboots have turned out to be fantastic movies themselves. Here are five particular reboots that, in my opinion, aren't just good reboots, but great films.

Editorial: Why These New Star Wars Directors Are So Awesome

God those are gorgeous covers.

I told myself I wouldn't be posting rumors on this site. I wouldn't bring you endless rumor updates like"Lupita Nyong'O was seen eating frozen yogurt, so she'll be playing the Star Wars version of the Spaceballs character Frogurt in Star Wars 7!" solely for pageviews (though I'd likely think differently if I had any ad revenue coming from this site) That being said, the fact that the subject of this rumor has posted a video on Twitter that seems to indirectly confirm it, I'll give this one some credence.

Edge of Tomorrow Review

Those Mech-Suits they're wearing are awesome by the way

Few times in my life have I been more surprised then when I heard the good buzz for Edge of Tomorrow. Critics were loving the film, which looked like a Source Code knockoff. And yet, the buzz kept mounting, making its disappointing American box office all the more surprising (internationally, it's in much better shape) Plopping into my seat of my Monday night screening of the film, I was intrigued; would the film truly live up to it's lofty reputation?

Box Office Analysis: What May Movies Tells Us About The Rest Of The Summer

Well, May 2014 sure was huge. With 4 movies hitting $60+ million openings, it was the 5th biggest May on record and a rollicking start to the summer movie going season. Going forward, it must be said that there are certainly more larger tentpoles in the back half of the summer than last year, with Transformers: Age of Extinction, Dawn of The Planet Of The Apes and Guardians of The Galaxy still likely to rake in big bucks for studios.

Still, the large amount of those gives me pause, simply because many of the May movies didn't seem to have a lot of stamina, despite good word of mouth and reviews. This can be mainly attributed to the fact that a new summer blockbuster emerged each and every week; who has time to see Godzilla when X-Men just popped up?? It's a real shame, as it's rendered a film like Godzilla (my favorite movie of the summer so far) into the Ang Lee's Hulk of the summer through its disastrous plummets from week to week (the mixed reception it's received from the fanboy community also adds to this perception).

June is a bit more level, but there's really only one guaranteed conventional blockbuster that month; Transformers: Age of Extinction. Then, two weeks later, a constant barrage of summer blockbusters arrive. For six weeks straight, one big movie after another opens up. This is gonna make it difficult for non-sequels like Jupiter Ascending who have to contend with proven franchises like the Ninja Turtles and Planet of The Apes. Even then, those sequels will have to make as much money as possible in their first week before new releases come and steal some of the spotlight (the good news for these six major releases is that they'll have summer weekdays where they can make some extra cash)

Frankly, the situation isn't terrible, especially since we've always had to contend with a jam packed schedule in the summertime. But with all these giant tentpoles fighting for space, I just wish studios could be more flexible with their scheduling, which would allow greater opportunities for all. Consider this; The Lego Movie, Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Gravity all opened outside of summer (February, April and October respectively) and are going to make more money than any movie released in May.