# Godzilla (1998)

### reviewed by
Choo Eng Aun, Jack

    GODZILLA (1998)

    Directed by Roland Emmerich
    Starring :        Matthew Broderick        (Nick Tatopoulos)
                    Jean Reno                (Phillippe Roche)
                    Maria Pitillo                (Audrey Timmonds)
                    Hank Azaria                (Animal)
    Written by Dean Devlin=20
    Running Time : 2hrs 15mins
    A Tristar/Centropolis Release

    Rating : *** out of *****        =09

    JURASSIC CENTRAL PARK!

Back from the immensely successful INDEPENDENCE DAY, director ROLAND = EMMERICH and producer DEAN DEVLIN (both collaborated in earlier moderate = hits, UNIVERSAL SOLDIER and STARGATE) are back with yet another = eye-popping, effect-laced excuse of a movie. GODZILLA has nothing going = for it other than its CGI effects, which forms nearly 90% of the film! = And what effects! As yet again, EMMERICH and DEVLIN has opted to go for = lesser hit-movie actors as in their films pre-dating GODZILLA. The = teasers for GODZILLA started hitting screens and TV more than a year ago = and rumours has it that the budget is close to a whopping US$200 = million.=20

The story brings us to the pacific where the French have been conducting = nuclear tests, inevitably harming the wild life and setting them off = from their predestined path of evolution. GODZILLA was thus born, = standing as tall as the Empire State Building, GODZILLA is no more than = a gargantuan mix between a Komodo Dragon and a T-Rex. It sets off from = the pacific, walked across Mexico (without being detected!) and swam its = way to Manhattan, New York to make it into a nesting place. Sounds more = like an excuse than a story right? Well, I don't blame you. After all, = this is Hollywood!

Broderick is the ever-zealous Nick, who leads his field of study in the = effects of radiation on the evolution of animals. Trailing the creature = to New York, he bumps into ex-girlfriend, Audrey (Maria Pitillo), an = aspiring reporter who find herself lacking in the nasty skills required = in achieving her dream. When the military falsely dismisses Nick from = their research team with the accusation that he has been leaking = information to the public, he is picked-up by French secret agent = Phillippe Roche (Jean Reno). Incidentally, the French has sent a team of = secret operatives to destroy the creature, an effort to undo what they = have indirectly done through the nuclear tests. Jean Reno once again = reprises his role as `The Cleaner' (as in his roles in Luc Besson's LA = FEMME NIKITA and THE PROFESSIONAL aka LEON), apparent to his words in = the film, `we are here to clean the mess we have made'. Hank Azaria = plays Animal, the crazy cameraman who would do anything for a good = camera shot.

In GODZILLA, the creature takes centrestage. True to the original = Japanese GODZILLA movies, we get to see gratuitous lack of respect for = public property as it tramples through landmarks of New York. The CGI = effects are impressive, imagine JURASSIC PARK with a few thousand = percent more worth of CG creatures. One cannot help but notice the = resemblance of this creature to the previous two dinosaur movies and = though it may not deliver the landmark quality to outshine the realism = of JURASSIC PARK and THE LOST WORLD, it sure has the magnitude and = destruction to significantly numb audiences, forcing them to immerse = into the fast paced action and loud sound effects.=20

EMMERICH's direction flows with unoriginal ideas, regurgitated from = landmark action sci-fi movies of our time. Each scene an excuse to flex = yet another muscle of his CGI team. Definitely the special effects movie = of the year. Not quite memorable stuff, but it was highly entertaining = while it lasted.=20

The review above was posted to the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due to ASCII to HTML conversion.

Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews