Godzilla vs. Kong

Oh, my was I disappointed with this one. I'm not sure what I want from a 'giant monster' movie, but this wasn't it - for the most part. I have a chequered past with the franchise. I hated the original 'Godzilla' as there wasn't enough of the monster (or Bryan Cranston) then the 'King of Monsters' sequel was little more than colours and noise before me, yet the - much maligned 'Kong: Skull Island' was quite an enjoyable romp.

Here we have a film about humans. A lot of humans. Occasionally a giant ape or lizard show up and punch each other. That's about it. It's like 2007's 'Transformers' film all over again. I know that focusing a story on either giant monster would be difficult, so humans would have to be a major part of it - I don't know - it's just it felt too centred around pointless stuff. If the main cast of humans wasn't enough, they feel the need to include a totally redundant sub-plot about Millie Bobby Brown leading a pair of other wise-cracking, yet still bland, sidekicks around a secret facility. This whole aspect could have been left on the cutting room floor and the movie would be all the better for not seeing this - supposedly - secret base. Yes, this is the most secure facility that just allows any old Tom, Dick or Harry to simply wander in and nose around.

And that's just one of the plot holes. I swear if a modern movie exists that has more leaps of faith in it than 'Godzilla vs Kong' then I haven't seen it yet. To even hope of enjoying this film you really can't afford to allow yourself to actually think too deeply about what you're watching, because nothing really holds up when put under any form of scrutiny.

The humans are annoying, but the monsters are - reasonably - cool. Yeah, even for a big budget film like this they're still kind of CGI-looking, but they at least do more than their human counterparts. Naturally, our titular beasties have to team up to fight some 'greater evil' - if you've seen 'Batman vs Superman' it's almost a play for play re-enactment and I kept expecting it to be Doomsday. Don't worry - it's not just the - obviously evil - human baddie in this film who wears a coat over his shoulder just to prove what a cad he really is.

It's a film. It's way too long. It's not terrible, but I got through it by not watching it at the cinema and therefore in the comfort of my living room I was able to fast-forward every time I saw Millie Bobby Brown come on.

I liked the action but once again, The story and characters were unbelievably bland.

We all know why we're here, don't we?

Of course - we want mindless destruction with awesome monsters and great visuals, and if it was only about that, this film deserves some praise, indeed. I very much liked the wrestling component of the fights, with some of the highlight moves being some of the most satisfying examples that ever graced the screen.

However, with all the monster madness there is something that most of these movies seem to get wrong almost every time: the overall plot and characters.

Now, I certainly don't expect grand drama and acting excellence from a flick like this, but GODZILLA VS. KONG is a remarkably bad example for both of these aspects. All characters were pretty bad, and the plot... oh boy.

Let me put it this way: when the movie is trying to be smart, it's pretty stupid. But when the movie is stupid, it's absolutely brainmeltingly stupid. The techno babble is annoyingly idiotic, down to a point where it completely took me out of the film, laughing hard at the audacity the writers had when typing these lines. The acting is at best alright, but Rebecca Hall's overacting and the astonishingly unlikeable attitude of Millie Bobby Brown's character ruined a lot of the already unbearably inept plot. Alexander Skarsgård's talent was pretty much wasted here, while all the others seem to come directly from that direct-to-video sequel to Roland Emmerich's Godzilla that never happened - for good reason.

All in all, I can only recommend this film if you're able to leave your brain far, far behind and to focus only on the action itself. This is basically a script from 1997, made with today's technical possibilities - a script that probably even Roland Emmerich might have thought was too stupid.

Also noteworthy: when the Tom Holkenborg score isn't the worst part of a movie, you know that something's off. Although, to be fair, this was actually a pretty decent score for our less talented Hans Zimmer clone.

Don't believe the hype though. Instead, get drunk before starting to watch this, and you might have a good time.

"Godzilla vs. Kong" is the fourth film in Legendary Pictures' "MonsterVerse" and the fourth Godzilla film produced in the west. Starring Millie Bobby Brown, Julian Dennison, and Alexander Skarsgård, it delivers exactly what it says on the poster - a pair of iconic monsters duking it out in the most epic way possible ...and very little else.

Sometime after the events of "Godzilla: King of the Monsters", the giant ape Kong is being kept under surveillance inside a large simulated habitat, forming a bond with a deaf girl who communicates with him through sign language. One day, Godzilla attacks a city in Florida for seemingly no reason and this sparks an international debate over whether or not these huge monsters are a threat to humanity's future. A team of experts soon deduce that Godzilla was actually tracking Kong's energy signal and decide to transport him somewhere secret in an effort to prevent the two of them from fighting each other and causing even more collateral damage.

When it comes to giant monster movies, you can't go too wrong with the ones featuring the undisputed king of the monsters himself - Godzilla. Since 1954, this giant reptilian has been stomping his way through cities battling various monsters of similar size with his brute strength and trademark atomic breath. Every time I hear Godzilla's signature roar, it gives me chills like the first time hearing a lightsaber turning on in "Star Wars" or the DeLorean from "Back to the Future" reaching 88 miles per hour. Likewise, the enormous gorilla Kong has also had his fair share of time in the spotlight, debuting all the way back in 1933 in the classic film "King Kong". With this in mind, it seems fitting that these two iconic titans of east and west should face off against each other at some point, having previously done so in 1962's "King Kong vs. Godzilla". Now in 2021, we have a brand new reimagining of such a rivalry, complete with better special effects and destruction galore. There's something so mindlessly satisfying in seeing giant monsters beating the hell out of each other while leaving heavy destruction in their wake. I guess it's all just part of the entertainment value we can take away knowing it's all in good fun and that we can be thankful such colossal creatures don't exist in real life. However, if you are expecting to be treated to anything else beyond this, you will be greatly disappointed. Regardless, if fighting monsters and gratuitous demolition of skyscrapers is what you crave, then this movie certainly delivers.

In addition to this, the film also touches on the mythology of these strange beasts (known as "Kaiju" in Japanese), with particular focus placed on Kong and his origins. I'm no expert on Kaiju lore or anything like that but I did enjoy that we got to see how these towering figures aren't evil beings with a lust for destroying everything, but rather neutral parties trying to establish their place at the top of the monster food chain. Of course, the level of neutrality varies for each of the two, with Kong perhaps being "True Neutral" and Godzilla being "Chaotic Neutral". For example, Kong is seen attempting to live peacefully on Skull Island under the pretense that he is in charge and nothing else can take that away from him. Later on, when Godzilla arrives to challenge this notion, an all out brawl ensues, much like how predator animals like big cats would fight one another to establish dominance. We are informed it has been like this for thousands of years and that human civilisation has only popped up recently, just being on the brink of learning how to co-exist among all this ongoing conflict.

There's not much to say about the film's human characters, as they are only there to help move the small remnants of the plot along. Most of them were either generic military personnel marked for death or scientific minds trying to make sense of all this madness. I suppose Millie Bobby Brown was the only actor in the film with some dimension to her, as anyone who saw 2019's "Godzilla: King of the Monsters" will recall her character and her importance in that story. I did also like the film's scenes with the deaf girl talking to Kong via sign language, as this reminded me of the famous gorilla Koko who was taught how to communicate with her trainers through similar means. In spite of all this, by the end of the movie, I couldn't recall a single name of anybody other than the titular monsters, remembering them by the actor's real names instead of their characters. At the same time though, it didn't really matter because at the end of the day we don't pay to see a giant monster movie for the human characters for the same reason we don't go to McDonald's to order a filet mignon. Godzilla and Kong's names are in the film's title and it should be obvious by now that they are the real stars here, not the humans.

As far as giant monster movies go, "Godzilla vs. Kong" does a serviceable job at entertaining us with frequent action and great special effects. It's mind numbingly simplistic but I wouldn't expect anything less. At this stage, it is unknown if there will be any more films in this "MonsterVerse" but I do see potential in the franchise continuing for as long as the demand is there. Since there are still plenty of threatening monsters out there to be dealt with, I remain hopeful.

I rate it 6.5/10

Rating basically for the epic battles in this movie, great special effects that blend perfectly with the environment accompanied by immersive sounds to rumble your speakers. Kudos to all those responsible for that. On the other hand, this movie does a poor job of character personalization and story plot. Had a lot of fake smiles and poor dialogues, did a poor job of making you feel for any character's situation and wanting more from them, it's like the movie pauses when scenes switch from the Kaijus to humans. Characters were introduced for no particular purpose or reason. Story was dull and uninspiring. Wouldn't recommend this movie for the plot or character performances but will recommend it for the epic Kaiju battles and CGI.