Godzilla - Mothra - King Ghidorah: All Out Monster Attack (2001)
Produced and Released by: Toho Co. Ltd.
Director: Shusuke Kaneko
By Dr Kain

Introduction

Godzilla has been around since 1954 and is the most widely known as the most popular monster to have ever been created. Godzilla-Mothra-King Ghidorah (GMK) is his 25th movie and as such it is one of the best in the series. Godzilla returns to being a monster of mass destruction; can Baragon, King Ghidorah, or Mothra defeat him?

The Story

We are first introduced to SDF Admiral Taizô Tachibana (Ryudo Uzaki) who is giving a speech to his soldiers about Godzilla being killed in 1954. He also mentions other monsters attacking various cities, which include one in New York City at the end of the Twentieth Century. During this time a Russian sub disappears and some of the SDF’s members go out in search for it, but one of their two mini-subs is destroyed, one of the soldiers in the other sub sees big fins.

Next, we meet Taizô’s daughter Yuri Tachibana (Chiharu Nîyama), who works for a TV company called BS Digital Q, which specializes in low budget programs. She is doing a report about Godzilla when a tremor occurs. Yuri sees an old man, but when she looks back, he is gone. That night, bikers are driving around destroying things and start having fun with a truck driver. When they go into a tunnel, another tremor erupts and the tunnel collapses on them. The driver gets out of the truck and sees a monster’s eye, which he thinks belongs to Godzilla.

Yuri is at a bar with some co-workers, where her friend and science fiction writer Teruaki Takeda (Masahiro Kobayashi) meets her, and shows her this mythological book about the three guardians of Japan, a moth, a dog-like creature, and a dragon. She gets drunk, so Takeda takes her home, where he meets her father and leaves. During the night a group of kids are robbing a store and are going to drown a dog when they are suddenly pulled into the water by a giant caterpillar, which is now in a cocoon.

The next day Yuri, Takeda, and a co-worker ae at a police station because an old man was arrested and he was saying Godzilla is coming. He tells them Godzilla is immortal because part of him is made up of the souls of those that died during WWII, and they want revenge. He tells them the only way to stop Godzilla is to wake up King Ghidorah.

Later on that day Godzilla appears out of the bay area, which confirms all the reports of Godzilla being alive as true. Baragon appears, and later both Mothra and King Ghidorah show up, but I have spoiled enough of the movie for you.

Review

GMK is my favorite of the Godzilla movies because there is nothing to hate, at least for me. Godzilla’s costume is the best I have ever seen because it is so terrifying, especially his face. I love the negative effect (putting white over black) they used in the eyes, and the teeth just look gorgeous. Mothra is a lot different in this movie than in previous incarnations. She/He has a stinger, her/his wings actually flap all the time like a real moth’s would, and this is the first movie where there are no little girls (although there is a tribute to do it in the streets when Mothra flies by). King Ghidorah also looks like a dragon, which is why I also love this look the best. This is Baragon’s second movie where he actually plays a significant role, and he looks great as well.

The music is just excellent as well and really fits the mood of the movie. Kou Otani is an excellent composer, especially for the Heisei Gamera trilogy and here he outdid himself. The theme for Godzilla is just so dark it fits perfectly well for this incarnation of him.

Kaneko, who also directed the Heisei Gamera trilogy, outdoes himself with this movie. I love his mystical side of Godzilla, which a lot of people thought was bad because they think Godzilla is only made up of the dead soldiers, which is not true, he is still an atomic monster, but it is the dead souls that make him immortal. Everything in the movie was so realistic like Mothra’s wings, the way the buildings blew up, Godzilla’s tail destroying buildings rather than just passing by them, etc.

I love this movie so much that I really hope Toho decides to ask Kaneko back to do a sequel. There are so many things he can do it would give some more originality to the Godzilla movies. For example, one person on Club Tokyo’s message board said they could make Titanosaurus the Loch Ness Monster. I also think Gigan could be a Cyclops from the Greek period.

Conclusion

If you have not seen this movie, you are in luck, sort of. In Jan 2004 (well, as of typing this, it is this month) Sony is releasing this movie on DVD with its original Japanese track. Unfortunately, as of right now, it has been confirmed the subtitles are dubtitles, so they follow the English dubbed’s dialog. No matter what though, you have to see this movie, at least one million times.

Dr Kain