We Need a New Godzilla!

Growing up, some of my favorite movies were, or are, the original Godzilla movies by Toho.  I am not talking about the miserable, misbegotten film with Matthew Broderick.  Nor am I talking about any of the most recent (3rd gen maybe?) films by Toho.  I am talking about those awesome movies where you know the cities are made of balsa wood and the monsters are just people in rubber suits.

There is a near wholesomeness of destruction and lack of contrivance when you watch the campy action (remember the flying Godzilla kick in the movie with Megalon?) and watch the disparity between the original script and the badly dubbed English.  It makes each film worth seeing just to marvel at how Toho threw these together but still managed to make a great film. 

So, why do the new monster movies (Super 8, Cloverfield, atc.) fail to measure up when they have an infinitely bigger budget and access to CGI?  One word, focus.

Now, I am not ranting over camera focus, but over the movie itself.  In newer monster movies, even some of the later Toho features, the script becomes more about the humans involved than the monsters themselves.  For instance, compare Godzilla vs. Mothra to Cloverfield.  In the classic Godzilla, you see and hear more of the monsters than you do the people running around trying to stop them.  You don't get to care if these two firends make it out alive, or if the boy gets the girl.  You are watching the movie to see Tokyo, yet again, trashed.  You are watching to see monsters fighting monsters or crushing buildings.  The human aspect is ancillary.

My kids can watch early Godzilla movies becuase they are fairly clean, and when they do, they don't ask me about the school teacher or the scientist who is running around.  They ask me why Godzilla is using his fist instead of his breath, or why the one baby Mothra moves differently.  The monsters become the actors.  They gain personality and, in some sense, a cause for the viewer to rally behind.

Bring me more peple in rubber suits, less CGI, and kill the humanity in the script.  What audiences want are monsters who act.  And, I am not talking about Cruise or Sheen folks.  Can the FX and bring on the Latex.  Wow, that sounded almost as obscene as the script for the last Superman movie.  That, however, is another rant altogether.