EPISODE 838: THE KING OF THE MONSTERS IS BACK
You can cancel all your parties.
POP CULTURE SPIRIT WOW
Hi and welcome back to Pop Culture Spirit Wow, the newsletter that asks, But what if Godzilla was a Virgo? (He’s so clearly a Leo.) I’m your host, Jim McDermott (who is so clearly a Virgo, but thinks he can pass as a Gemini). And I’m really excited about the Wow today, not only because I get to write about the new Godzilla movie, but because I get to share with you an interview with the director!
Let’s get into it!
THE WOWND UP
The Great British Bake-Off finished a tremendous season Friday night. If you haven’t seen it yet I won’t spoil it. But I have to say it was a wonderful finale, one that in different ways allowed each of the finalists to shine. For the last few years I’ve wondered if the Bake-Off was kind of past its use-by date. I’m very happy to be so wrong. (A perfect season to binge over the holidays, and pairs well with Julia.)
This week in Bob Iger Did What Now? news, Disney CEO Bob Iger, who returned from retirement apparently having asked someone to hold his beer, made another in an ongoing series of just plain bad-for-business statements this week, saying the problem with The Marvels was that having been shot in part during the pandemic, it was “not well-supervised.” Literally no one who has ever seen a Marvel movie will believe they are not scrutinized to within an inch of their lives. Most people are reading the comments as a slam on director Nia DaCosta, the first black woman to helm a Marvel film, and it’s all pretty awful.
If you haven’t seen the film, and probably you haven’t because no one has, let me just say, after a somewhat shaky start it’s a lot of fun. Its resolution also involves what I would say is one of Marvel’s funniest ideas. (It involves kittens.) My own feeling about why the film bombed is basically that Marvel Studios spent the last 5 years running the character of Captain Marvel into the ground. The sad irony of The Marvels is that the film that fixed all the mistakes that had been made, leaving Carol finally in a place where she could actually become a real star of the Marvel Universe. Again, it’s all pretty awful.
Finally, Eddie Murphy has a fun new Christmas movie out as of Friday on Prime, Candy Cane Lane, and it’s written by my friend Kelly Younger! It’s a great concept—Murphy stars as a guy who is obsessed with winning the Christmas house decorating contest on Candy Cane Lane where he lives (which is a real place in Los Angeles). Kelly, in addition to being a great writer (he was also behind the most recent Muppets Now TV show and Muppets Haunted Mansion), and a professor at Loyola Marymount University, is just a wonderful human being. Hurray for you, Kelly!
THAT’S MR. KING OF THE MONSTERS TO YOU
2024 is the 70th Anniversary of the original Godzilla film from Toho Studios. And as part of their celebration of that event, Toho Studios has just put out a new Godzilla film, Godzilla Minus One. I had the chance to see the film about 2 weeks ago at the Japan Society, which is an absolutely gorgeous setting on the East Side where they do Japanese film festivals, language classes and other things. (Honestly, it was such a wonderful set up I was excited to be there even before they let us into the theater.)
I’ve seen my share of Godzilla films, as I’m sure probably have you. (There have actually been over 30.) I can remember Saturday afternoons my dad, who is not a scifi guy, occasionally letting me watch bits of one, usually involving him fighting King Kong or Mothra, either between episodes of The Cisco Kid or at halftime of some game. And I think that cemented for me the idea of Godzilla as a monster precursor to TV wrestling, the babyface (aka hero) dealing with a world of skyscraper-sized heels and marks trying to bring him down. In other words, somewhere between a comic book character and a comical one. And that’s what he is most Hollywood movies today, too.
But the original Godzilla is not entirely like that. He’s more like a combination Jaws and King Kong. Having been disturbed by nuclear tests in the Pacific, he comes to the surface and starts killing people. But while some want to kill him, others want to trap him for study, which of course is a terrible plan, and leads to him rampaging through Tokyo. (Rule One of Godzilla movies: Do Not Fuck with Godzilla.)
The movie ends up as a condemnation of nuclear weapons, as this scientist is asked to unload on Godzilla a new weapon he’s created called the Oxygen Destroyer, which causes anything in the area of its detonation to asphyxiate (terrifying). Afraid that using it will cause other countries to make their own Oxygen Destroyers, he destroys his notes and dies himself after using it on Godzilla.
Godzilla Minus One very much takes it cues from the seriousness of the original, but I would say it goes much farther, producing a haunting tale about Japanese war veterans haunted by their survival. Here Godzilla is like a manifestation of their shame, rising from the ocean to come for them. There’s nothing adorable or pitiable about this creature. He is just fucking scary. I know that may sound hard to believe, but truly, Godzilla in this movie is absolutely terrifying.
The movie also tells this deeply emotional story about the Japanese war veterans, what they’ve been through and then what the confrontation with Godzilla does to them.
I know subtitles are not everyone’s favorite thing, but I’m telling you, this movie is fantastic. Less a monster movie than a small, poignant story about war that just happens to have a monster in it. One of the best films of the year.
If you want to read more about it, I wrote about it for Religion News Service this week. My friend Tiffany Babb (who does a monthly newsletter that I really recommend) also has a great piece about the film at Popverse.
A CONVERSATION WITH GODZILLA MINUS ONE DIRECTOR TAKASHI YAMAZAKI
I actually had the chance to interview the director of Godzilla Minus One this week via Zoom. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
One of the things that most surprised me about the film is how genuinely scary it is. Godzilla movies are often exciting, but it’s hard to generate real fear watching a 100-foot lizard stomp around a city. And yet there are moments in Godzilla Minus One which are truly frightening.
How did you go about making the character so scary?
With Godzilla I think the key to making him scary is how close he can be to the camera. I really feel that was where the fear of Godzilla could take effect.
I actually had a hand in creating Godzilla the Ride at Seibuen Park in Japan. And I and the crew went to it, and there’s a part where Godzilla is really in your face, and we all actually experienced that fear.
Sneak peak from Godzilla the Ride
Is your Godzilla entirely CGI, with no practical effects used to create him? Because he looked so much more real than he does in most Hollywood films.
It’s all done digitally. There’s no mo-cap. The old school practical methods were very, very minimal. Everything was digital by hand.
It’s really impressive how real he looks.
I think that the scenes that happened in the afternoon, in that afternoon light, maybe come off as very real and raw.
One other thing I realized watching the film is that in most Western Godzilla movies, even though he’s often not the main character, Godzilla still ends up at the center of everything. You’re constantly waiting for him.
But in Godzilla Minus One the film is always very clearly centered on the human characters and their dilemma.
I was very intentional about keeping the balance between the human story and Godzilla, much like the original 1954 Godzilla. That movie really had a great balance between what was going on with the humans and Godzilla.
I don’t want to have a movie where [the audience thinks], “Oh, the humans are doing something boring, let’s wait until Godzilla arrives.” I definitely wanted to avoid that.
Creating characters that the audience cares about, that’s how the audience is taken on the journey. We as audience experience Godzilla through the characters’ eyes.
In your interview with the Associated Press you talked about Godzilla as partially a “tataragami,” a spirit of vengeance that must be exorcised or put back to sleep. For you is Godzilla Minus One ultimately a spiritual tale?
That spiritual aspect was actually not something I was conscious of during production. Generally while I was making the movie, I was asking myself, Why is Godzilla attacking Japan? It could have gone anywhere else. Why is it in Japan? We were creating the story without an actual answer to that question.
But I started realizing as I tried to finish the movie that if he is an entity that is expressing all the anger and the negativity in the world, it kind of makes sense. And that’s why it’s in Japan, because of that [Japanese spiritual idea] of calming all the evils of the world.
Having worked on this film and thought so deeply about the character, do you have any insight why Godzilla continues to endure as a character in our imaginations? What is it about that creature that continues to draw us?
First of all, I think that Godzilla is a powerful creature. He represents an all-powerful creature who can wipe out the world, but I think humans are just drawn to power, to that kind of almost godlike power.
The other thing is that Godzilla is an IP. We’ve had more fun Godzillas, we’ve had serious Godzillas. There’s been just a wide range of different Godzillas. So people have a lot to choose from, whatever Godzilla you like. I think that’s why they come back to Godzilla.
Well I didn’t think there was room for any more variety in the IP, but yours is by far the scariest Godzilla I’ve ever seen.
Thank you.
Many thanks to Takashi Yamazaki, his translator and his press team for agreeing to answer a couple questions about the film. It was such a please to get to talk to him.
I’ve got some more really cool interviews lined up for subscribers. If you’re on the fence about subscribing, I hope the King of the Monsters can help!
BUT I’M SURE IT’S GOOD THO
Speaking of the King of the Monsters, for Thanksgiving the New York Times interviewed the person who makes the cookies that Cookie Monster eats. Genius idea.
Also, I had the chance to write about one of my all-time favorite human beings, Bob Mortimer, and one of my all-time favorite topics, silliness, for NCR.
MOMENT OF WOW
I don’t know why, but this song has been running through my head this weekend.
It’s a great song, right? That swell of hope, I love it. (Yes, it’s also true that Platt’s character Leo Bloom dies like, 5 minutes later. But he’s happy now.)
If you need a little boost this week, highly recommend this on repeat.
I’ll be back later this week with some more fun stuff. Happy Advent and Hanukkah Sameach to those who celebrate!