Godzilla vs. Kong - New Release Review

Finally, another clash of the monsters has arrived. Refusing to be compromised anymore by the pandemic, Godzilla vs. Kong has come to both theatres and HBO Max subscriptions (only available in the U.S., unfortunately). Some people have been waiting like sharks in anticipation, while others have been circling like vultures ready to peck on the same issues they did with the previous two Godzilla films. And…I must say that after seeing it, I’m with the sharks on this one.

So a bit of backstory, I didn’t see the 2014 Godzilla reboot because I really wasn’t that interested at the time. I saw Kong: Skull Island in 2017 and enjoyed it for the fact that it was a film with an uncompromised directorial vision and style, along with a great design and characterisation for Kong and the other creatures. 2019’s King of the Monsters was a horrible movie, dull and uninteresting with only one scene that I can even bother recalling. So I had no clear image for what this film would be like.

Thankfully, it managed to avoid the pitfalls of what made King of the Monsters a terrible experience while building on the strong stylistic intent of Skull Island to create an ultimately better experience. It’s still not great, but I like that the film has learned from its predecessor’s mistakes in some ways.

What everyone’s obviously coming to this movie for is the fight scenes, which are incredible to look at. It’s clear that director Adam Wingard took a lot of inspiration from Pacific Rim for the fight scenes – the final battle is set in a neon-drenched Hong Kong, the creatures keep using the environment as weapons rather than just hitting each other, and the human business barely interrupts any of the proceedings. They look phenomenal, and the sound design for every roar and building crash is awesome.

I know that a lot of people will point out that the film, and therefore the fight scenes, is predictable and stale. That’s undeniable, but what shouldn’t be stale are the actual methods and framing of the fight scenes – will Kong use a crane as a tomahawk? Will Godzilla trip him with his power breath? Will there be a Harry Potter homage (there actually was, it was awesome)? And I think that Wingard thought of enough creative ways to frame the fights to keep them interesting.

Additionally, the film in general is blazingly colourful and beautiful, fully embracing the lunacy of the premise in its presentation. Compared to the drab nature of many other action films I’ve seen; Godzilla vs. Kong feels like a bunch of people who really just want to make the coolest stuff possible. Cinematography, set design, sound design and even the musical score are all soaked in this colourful, 80’s-inspired cheese that’s great on a visceral level, and the visual effects are amazing to look at. This is certainly one of the more technically accomplished films you’re going to see this year.

Where this movie fails – as with the other MonsterVerse films – is the script. I firmly believe that just because a movie’s premise sounds crazy, it doesn’t mean that you have to repel that craziness with a self-serious nature in the script to come across as though you are well-written. Doom 2016, for instance, has really no deep plot beyond “kill demons”, but I feel that it’s an incredibly well-written game as it knows how to immerse the viewer/gamer and get them engaged with startling efficiency.

Godzilla vs. Kong is only 113 minutes long, 18 minutes less than King of the Monsters, and still feels like there could be a solid 10-ish minutes cut out. It’s a movie which is almost prideful of the fact that it explains none of its ludicrous science in favour of kinetic energy, yet devotes significant time to random subplots and unnecessary exposition that’s a chore after the mad punching party that is the rest of the film.

Character-wise, it also seems that Kong is the only one who gets any kind of character development whatsoever. He has this friendship with this deaf girl on his island, and it’s rather sweet, and is the only bit of human connection in the film. Additionally, Kong – thanks to a great mo-cap performance by Terry Notary – feels like a flawed, living, breathing creature way more than the humans do in this movie.

How I would describe the humans in this movie is to paraphrase a quote from RockStar Games talking about why they no longer hire celebrities to voice act in their games – audiences will only see the actor, never the character. Seeing incredibly prolific actors like Lance Reddick, Demain Bichir, Kyle Chandler and Millie Bobby Brown pop up in the film for 5 minutes and having nothing in their role differentiating them from their regular selves is rather distracting. You could literally replace every role in this movie (except Kong’s deaf girl) with rando actors and the film would feel more universal. It also doesn’t help that the movie’s sound mixing when it comes to conversation scenes (especially with Brian Tyree Henry’s character) obscures most of the dialogue to an even worse extent than Tenet, meaning that I couldn’t even hear most of the comic relief, let alone be cringed by it.

But the most disappointing character in this movie is Godzilla. Compared to the characterful and lively Kong, Godzilla just comes off like this random, mindless monster. This is partly because the story focuses more on Kong, but there’s still nothing for Godzilla’s character that doesn’t rely on remembering specific details of the previous films (which weren’t that memorable to begin with).

Even so, I acknowledge that this is just meant to be a dumb monster film, and the filmmakers threw every effort at what they wanted to make – the fight scenes. It may be written awfully and half of the title may be missing in a character sense, but it’s still an enjoyable piece of pop culture that will be squawked at by the artistically spoiled people of 50 years from now.

I’m giving Godzilla vs. Kong a B-.

I should also note, I saw this in an empty theatre. Admittedly, it was 11:00 on Easter Sunday, but there were already two people booked when I bought my ticket, and they chose not to show up. I wonder if that means anything…

Have you seen this movie? If so, what did you think of it? Leave your answers in the comments below.