Director: Takao Okawara
Year: 1999
Country: Japan
Alternate Titles: Gojira Ni-sen Mireniamu; Godzilla 2000: Millennium
Genre: Kaiju
Plot:
After discovering a strange object in the sea, a task force by the military brings it to the surface where it is revealed to be a UFO that soon wakes and sets out into the Japanese sky. Eventually, it reappears when Godzilla appears in the country while battling the military, and when the two clash the ship manages to extract DNA from Godzilla before escaping which is soon revealed to contain a special property that will allow cells to organize into a stable structure the aliens inside the ship need to colonize Earth. As a team of scientists race to uncover a way to prevent this from happening, Godzilla races to stop the ship itself which soon reveals the giant creature Orgah to assist in their plans.
Review:
One of the few standout areas of the film is a wholly unique and intriguing storyline. The first half-hour of the film spends a large amount of time detailing the origins of Godzilla's power source, mostly centered around the discovery of the G-cells and their infinite source of power. While this function has long been part of the canon of public knowledge for the series, to finally get an in-universe rationale for what's going with Godzilla's powers and history gets brought into the film rather early on in the quest to discover the purpose behind the alien invaders. With the concurrent alien invasion taking place, the revelation that they're looking to regain their form after millions of years of sleep manages to fuel several plotlines. By going through the process of discovering the cells and their features through the investigation of the cells left behind after the first attack, gives the alien craft somewhat of a purpose for their appearance. As their own backstory is given here featuring the link to the prehistoric crash and remaining dormant until being revived in the modern day upon their exposure to light beams, this allows for some fine motivation on their part to be around and attack Godzilla. It’s all pretty new and original offering a different take on Godzilla and his powers while bringing together some intriguing aspects about the creature and humanity that give this a decent enough touch.
There’s also a lot to like here involving the secondary setups that are included here. The inclusion of a special watchdog group looking into the idea of protecting citizens from Godzilla tracking his movements and looking to use that information to study him makes immense sense as a real-world concept that helps to give the human drama a completely relatable entry point. It also gives the group a fun sense about them as they go through their trials and tribulations about looking for him which offers a strong set of bonds between everyone and the reporter who joins them along the way which offers a chance to enjoy this one even more. The involvement of the group in the second half towards the team collaborating with the military to look into their studies into Godzilla’s history brings them together in a fine way. Enhancing everything is a nice touch of comedy with some well-timed humor that helps to ground the characters the more we’re with them, from innocent come-backs and one-liners to the few hints of physical in a sneezing co-worker giving instructions to a guest but not realizing what he’s inadvertently doing to someone else.
As well, the monsters and special effects featured here are quite enjoyable leading to a lot to like about it. The new Godzilla suit is an enjoyable take on the creature, bringing about a unique design while still keeping Godzilla at a familiar enough image to be somewhat comparable to what’s unmistakably Godzilla. The fearsome face, longer jaws with spiked teeth, and fat neck offer the kind of unique image that creates a nice image as the imposing size and scale are created quite effectively. The most intriguing part of the costume is the spiky, angular back plates that are far more likely to be considered weapons than anything else in his history compared to the puffy overinflated pieces he’s had in the past that look immensely enjoyable with the charge-up action that accompanies his ray-blasts. The amount of time it takes to get everything fired up manages to let the impact have a greater destructive power as the few scenes where it’s fired create pretty impressive visuals. The idea of the other creature, Orgah, offers a unique departure from other monsters in Godzilla’s past and brings about a bizarre collection of shapes that leaves everything here as far more intriguing thang else with his constantly-changing cellular structure offering some interesting moments during battle.
That leaves the monster action here to be immensely fun and certainly a fun highlight factor. The initial appearance of Godzilla starts the film with the attack on the light tower by dragging a ship in its mouth through the fog and alerting the keepers to his presence due to the ships’ unnatural height at their eye-level and races to get away before he crashes through and starts attacking the section of the city nearby. That offers up a fine launching pad for the encounter with the team as there’s a solid enough chase with them and Godzilla when they try to evacuate from the area of attack. A military attack shortly afterward when he lands on a nearby beach features some strong ideas with the new super-rockets employed during the fight and some interesting tactics to try to catch him off-guard. The subsequent battle with the saucer has some really intriguing ideas here is a solid enough idea as it features a wholly unusual type of combat where Godzilla interacts with a flying object over his head that mainly fires beam blasts at him. This leaves the final confrontation in the middle of Tokyo to have plenty of great times with the big destruction-fueled rampage to charge at the ship and the ensuing battle with Orgah to be quite fun and generate some enjoyable elements throughout here.
There are some issues here that do eventually emerge here. The biggest issue with the film is the lack of context given to the invading aliens who are kept off-screen with no interaction from the investigative collection of human characters. Everything here is left to supposition as to what’s going on, and while the inference usually comes across with a degree of rationality and logic behind them, it offers up the kind of unconfirmed leaps of reason that come off as awkward how these elements come together without any kind of confirmation given from the aliens themselves. Even in the sequence where they observe the alien ships’ readouts from the monitor stations where the ship is parked over and taking information from, the whole thing reads as leaps of logic that only turn out to be true when the military plan to destroy the ship fails and the aliens retaliate by destroying the building, the whole thing would’ve had more impact with some kind of explanation for their appearance and plan to attack Earth instead of simply guessing at what’s going on.
The other issue is a series of rather underwhelming effects-work featured here that do feel rather obvious in their execution and clumsy in their execution. The use of so many odd matte shots throughout here shows Godzilla appearing to float or hover in the background as he tries to advance on a target or enter the city. It feels awkward based on how it looks compared to similar scenes in other films that look far more impressive. CGI rendering for other objects is oftentimes hit-or-miss depending on the severity or duration of the scene with no rhyme or reason for everything, and the whole thing keeps it from really employing the immersive quality some of the other films enjoyed. Also, Orgah himself is such an awkward design from the great backstory with the bizarre angles, unnatural patterns, and just no discernable shape that makes for a recognizable creature in any form with how he’s packaged and set up. It’s all enough to drag this one down overall.
Overview: ***/5
A fun enough if flawed genre effort, there’s a lot to like here in most regards but has some big detrimental flaws that manage to give this one some problematic factors. Give it a shot if you’re a fan of this style of genre or interested in giving the franchise a shot while most others out there turned off by these factors should heed caution.
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