Godzilla: King of the Monsters (Blu-ray)

Michael Dougherty’s “Godzilla: King of the Monsters” is a sequel to Legendary Pictures’ 2014 “Godzilla” and the third entry in their MonsterVerse after “Kong: Skull Island.” The story begins five years after the events of the previous “Godzilla” film when Dr. Emma Russell (Vera Farmiga) and her daughter, Madison (Millie Bobby Brown), are apparently kidnapped while studying Mothra. Dr. Ishirō Serizawa (Ken Watanabe) and Dr. Vivienne Graham (Sally Hawkins) bring in Dr. Mark Russell (Kyle Chandler), Emma’s ex-husband, to help find them. Mark hates Godzilla since his son died in San Francisco during the previous film, but he reluctantly agrees to help. They find Emma and Madison in Antarctica with Alan Jonah (Charles Dance), a mercenary who believes the Titans offer the possibility to restore balance to the world. Despite Monarch’s efforts, Jonah and Emma release Monster Zero from his icy tomb. The monster, King Ghidorah, begins awakening other Titans including Rodan. Monarch must find a way to assist Godzilla in fighting King Ghidorah, who threatens to tip the balance in such a way that humanity will not survive. Along the way, Mothra joins and provides crucial help. As a sequel to “Godzilla,” this successfully builds upon what came before while also playing its part in developing Legendary’s MonsterVerse series. Visually, the film is simply gorgeous. The use of color and lighting makes something uniquely beautiful. Cinematographer Lawrence Sher may have made one of the most visually appealing Godzilla films in the franchise’s 35-film history. Bradkey Whitford, Zhang Ziyi, Aisha Hinds, O’Shea Jackson Jr., David Strathairn, and Joe Morton give the story their all, but it can be difficult keeping track of so many new characters. Morton portrays an older version of Dr. Houston Brooks, who previously appeared in “Kong: Skull Island” portrayed by Corey Hawkins, but most viewers might miss that without knowing to expect that character’s cameo beforehand and because he’s played by a different actor. The story itself has a lot of great moments, but tends to go from battle to battle. Fans of the previous films in the MonsterVerse will enjoy this as will those looking for some fun kaiju battles. Interestingly, this film shares a title with Ishirō Honda and Terry Morse’s 1956 heavily-edited American dub of the original Gojira, “Godzilla, King of the Monsters!” Bonus features include profiles of the monsters Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidora, and Rodan; the evolution of the monsters for Legendary Films’ MonsterVerse; a study of Monarch’s various facilities and another of Monarch’s tech; a profile of Millie Bobby Brown as an actress; a segment called “Monsters Are Real;” a welcome to the MonsterVerse; and deleted scenes.

Good product

One of my favorite films!

Oh man it pains me to write this. I so wish I could write this up as a 5 star Best Movie Ever. But I can't in good faith. If you are a pre-existing Godzilla Fan. If you know Godzilla, and have watched some if not all of the classic movies, this will be a 5 star extravaganza. If you are coming to the franchise new, you will be confused and overwelmed. This is a great movie, but it is not a point of entry to the franchise. Its greatest strength and most crippling weakness as a movie is that it is a glorious love letter to Godzilla and Godzilla Fans, made by Godzilla Fans. The movie is one giant Easter Egg to half a century plus of movie history. There are subtle references and callouts to practically every era and version of Godzilla. But that is the problem. If you know what all these things reference you will be having great fun. if you don't, the movie never bothers to stop and give you any needed information. If you don't know who/what and how of Mothra some events near the end will make no sense to you for example. On top of that the human plots are just confusing and contrived. (To put this in perspective it almost feels like the entire movie is one big Godzilla;Final Wars Easter Egg.) If you know and love Godzilla, this is great. You will see Rodan, Mothra and Ghidorah look better than they ever have. With real menace and movement. If you don't know Godzilla and don't know the monsters, it's just another CGI destruction porn movie. 5 stars if you know Godzilla, 3 stars if the only thing you have ever seen is Godzilla 2014.

Godzilla: King of the Monsters is not the best Godzilla film. It is not as sharp as Shin Godzilla, and it is nowhere near as moving or as satisfying as Godzilla Minus One. Those are better films by a significant margin. But Godzilla: King of the Monsters is a lot of fun. More importantly, it is an answer to almost every complaint I had about the 2014 film. You wanted more Godzilla? Here he is. You wanted actual classic monsters instead of weird bat MUTOs doing Wonder Twins powers activate? Here are Mothra, Rodan, and Ghidorah. You wanted the camera to stop cutting away from the good stuff? Here are monsters fighting in full view with good lighting (Well dark rainy good lighting mostly but still entire monster in focus). You wanted city destruction? Please select from our international buffet. The human material is messy, the comic relief is overdone, and several characters needed to be eaten. But the movie understands the assignment in a way its predecessor did not. It gives us giant monsters, apocalyptic stakes, beautiful destruction, and Charles Dance acting as if the end of the world is merely a disappointing board meeting. Recommended for Godzilla fans, action fans, people who enjoy buildings exploding, and Yankee fans who have always wanted to see Boston receive a proper cinematic adjustment.

"Godzilla: King of the Monsters" is a May 13, 2019 American science fiction monster film produced by Legendary Pictures, based on the screenplay cowritten by Michael Dougherty and Zach Shields from an original story cowritten by Max Borenstein, Michael Dougherty, and Zach Shields, with visual effects by Guillaume Rocheron; the third film in the 'MonsterVerse' franchise; occasioning the May 31, 2019 contemporaneous publication of the 'Official Movie Novelization', "Godzilla: King of the Monsters", written by Gregory Keyes; featuring the Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra, and King Ghidorah monsters created and owned by Tōhō Co., Ltd. Filmed in locations as diverse as Atlanta, Georgia at Blackhall Studios; Mexico City, Mexico at the Zócalo and its surrounding streets; Boston, Massachusetts on multiple sets recreating Antarctica and a back lot baseball field representing Fenway Park, as well as sound stages for the stadium's broadcasting booth and corridor sets; Tunnel Hill, Georgia; and was partially filmed at Wàndá Group's "Oriental Movie Metropolis" in Qīngdǎo, China, the largest and most advanced media production complex in the world, spanning 408 acres, the facilities include 40 world-class studio stages, 25 workshops and two permanent underwater stages, including the largest exterior tank and blue screen in Asia. The 'MonsterVerse' is an American multimedia franchise, created in 2014 and owned by Legendary Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures, presenting an original and unique 'shared universe,' incorporating various exclusive canons, across continuities, into a singular storyworld within the same continuities' universe; having correlated characters, settings, and plot points. This franchise is in my opinion a brilliantly conceived literary device and framework, initiating an original cinematic universe, to introduce entirely unique mythopoeia (mythmaking) narratives to both old and new creatures and characters that present reinvented myths in an overarching metanarrative to establish prototypical canon, chronology, and continuum, expanding beyond the realm of film into publishing, television, gaming, toys, apparel, parklands, and more. Thus, the MonsterVerse published original 'novelizations' in connection with each of its films. A novelization is greater than an original novel. Where an adaptation from novel to screen compresses the narrative, the reverse is true in novelization, which elaborates the narrative and introduces more details, backstory, creative elements, prequels, interquels, and sequels. This extends the universe beyond the cinematic to include original tie-in novels and graphic novels "presented in comic-strip format and published as a book," which typically present new stories for existing characters already developed within the franchise but can create entirely new characters and complex mythologies, part of the "official" storyline continuity, considered canonical, and typically released in tandem with the film or soon thereafter as a promotion or resource. This sequel to the 2014 "Godzilla" film begins five years later with those who favor exterminating "Godzilla" and all the other Titans. However, Monarch’s scientists believe "Godzilla" and other Titans are benevolent and stand against killing them. Intervening is a group of eco-terrorist paramilitary, led by former British Army Colonel Alan Jonah, who attack the Monarch base and steal an ORCA, a bioacoustics sonic replication device designed to communicate with Titans, invented by the Monarch paleobiologists Drs. Mark and Emma Russell. In response, the Monarch military agents pursue the terrorists to Outpost 32 in Antarctica, the place where the colossal, 521 ft tall, 141,056 ton, three-headed extraterrestrial terror, "King Ghidorah," codenamed "Monster Zero," is held in a state of suspended animation. But Monarch’s agents arrive too late to stop the terrorist group from awakening and releasing "Monster Zero." Starring: Kyle Chandler as Dr. Mark Russell, Emma's ex-husband, Madison's father, an animal behavior and communication specialist who formerly worked for Monarch, and co-inventor of the "ORCA"; Vera Farmiga as Dr. Emma Russell, Mark's ex-wife, Madison's mother, a renegade Monarch paleobiologist with a history of environmental activism in league with eco-terrorist Alan Jonah, coinventor of the ORCA, who believes that humans and Titans can coexist, does not see Godzilla as evil, but as a potential savior in an age of catastrophic climate change; Millie Bobby Brown as Madison Russell, Emma and Mark's 12-year-old daughter; Bradley Whitford as Dr. Rick Stanton, a crypto sonographer working for Monarch; Sally Hawkins as Dr. Vivienne Graham, a paleozoologist working for Monarch as the right hand to Dr. Serizawa; Charles Dance as Alan Jonah, former British Army SAS Colonel and MI-6 agent who defected after becoming disillusioned by humanity during his time in the service, obsessed with "leveling the global playing field" and restoring the natural order, the mercenary leader of an anarchist eco-terrorist group funded through the trafficking of Titan DNA; Thomas Middleditch as Sam Coleman, Monarch's Director of Technology, leader on the development of the Monarch Sciences network, and communications liaison with the U.S. government; Aisha Hinds as Colonel Diane Foster, a decorated Green Beret and the leader of the G-Team, the special military branch established by Monarch specializing in battles involving Titans; O'Shea Jackson Jr. as Jackson Barnes, a Green Beret chief warrant officer who is a member of the G-Team; David Strathairn as Admiral William Stenz, Admiral in the 7th Fleet of the United States Navy, commander of the U.S. Navy task force, previously in charge of tracking down the MUTOs; Ken Watanabe as Dr. Ishirō Serizawa, the agency's de facto leader, son of Eiji Serizawa, Monarch's founding father; and, Zhang Ziyi as Dr. Ilene Chen and twin sister Dr. Ling Chen, a mythologist working for Monarch. The actors characterizations are engaging and present an interesting and enlivening story that is overwhelmed by the raging monster battle sequences. The monsters and their aggressions are so spectacular and memorable that the human performances are lost in the spectacle.

They did the same thing that they did with Pacific Rim 2; they took all the awe, majesty, and mystery out of the giant creatures. They no longer move slowly like lumbering giants moving literal tons of air out of the way just to swat a fly, the physics looks like just human-sized monster fighting and the scaling just throws it all off. They had a couple cases like this in the first movie but almost every motion that the giant's take in this one just feels like a transformer and not a behemoth. The plot was also non-nonsensical, riddled with inconsistencies, cliches, and plot holes (for example, a child making it from the top of a baseball stadium to the bottom in an 8 second sprint) that let me KNOW I'm watching a summer blockbuster film instead of trying to engage me. The first film waited, what, an hour before even showing Godzilla's face? This one has monster brawling throughout and it's pretty clear that the CGI was the only thing they put real thought into (and even then, not much thought so much as work). One of my favorite parts of the first film was the soundtrack and cinematography that would send chills down your spine. That happened almost zero times in this film because, by the time anyone was fighting, I was too drained from yelling at silly plot holes and watching the previous 5 improperly-scaled fight scenes (because King Ghidora is going to chase after individual humans, right?) that, by the time the finale fight hit, I didn't even care. I knew how it was going to end. So did anyone paying attention. Overall, it was worth watching but I would wait to rent and definitely not buy this movie. If you want a good Godzilla movie, rewatch the 2014 version because that's what a good movie looks like. This is just Godzilla brought to you by Michael Bay. Oh, and their portrayal of "radiation" is downright dangerous considering all the kids that will be watching this film. To all those kids: high-energy radiation does NOT promote life, it KILLS it. Again, plot holes. SLIGHTSPOILER: And the absolutely shameless "Join us next time for King Kong vs Godzilla!" plug for their next sequel at the end felt just as cheap as the rest of the movie.

Good Godzilla movie

Me gusto

The delivery was excellent and the 3D effects in the movie is awesome

Excelente película. Los efector visuales y de sonido son muy buenos.

Una excelente producción. Godzilla ha sido el personaje del cual inició mi infancia, y ahora, es mostrado como Rey en esta adaptación. Excelente película... Y diseño de la caja del disco me gustó bastante.

La película está excelente dos discos nuevos Llegó en la fecha estimada. Solo el estuche ,es frágil y blando . Por lo demás .cumplió mis expectativas. Y vaya que soy exigente.