Film Review: American Godzilla (1998)

Godzilla – The American Monstrosity

And now it's retro time on lamp-ARR-ski Reviews.

Do you remember the 90s? All the new, cutting-edge CGI technology advanced to sack half of the model builders and stop-motion animators and those people who made special effects possible, in favour of the new nerds and geeks, also known as the CGI artists. Those where the happy days when effects didn't have to be too realistic to be great. So, remember when Stargate came out? I don't – because I was born shortly after. But I watched it on a DVD recently, and boy, did it suck. I mean, I liked the film as a whole, but this pyramids built by aliens concept was just crazy and fucked up. No Egyptian geniuses, no architectural wonders, no calculations – just aliens.

Then, Independence Day came out. And boy, did it suck. This time, the only upside to this film was the visual effects, which were very neat for their times, so I won't write too much about it.

Then, few years after I was born, Godzilla came out, from the producers of Stargate and Independence Day, or should I say, people held responsible for those films. The only reason people actually went to see this film was the advertising strategy. We never see the whole monster in the trailers, so we go to the theatres, just for the sake of our curiosity. And yeah, you guessed it – it sucked balls. So, let's dig into American Godzilla of 1998, shall we?



The film starts proper, with Godzilla attacking the Japanese… trawler. They didn't subtitled it, which might've sounded scary at the first time, but as I browsed the Internet for a translation, I came upon this line: "Shitty movie on starboard bow!" OK, that is not what they said. But it's a close match. We see Godzilla sink the trawler – big one – with three claws and a tail. I'd say it's a pushover.


We then cut to the Matthew Broderick as the Worm Guy (BTW, good cast choice), A.K.A. Nick Tatopoulos, who's studying earthworms in Chernobyl. After few shots of him and the earthworms, some governmental douche bag lands in a helicopter and reassigns him to Panama – because the crew was already kicked out of Ukraine.

The film then cuts to Tahiti, where that French guy who advertises Renault by his mere surname is interrogating the single Japanese who survived the attack on the trawler. And guess how he does that: A) via a translator, B) speaking to him in Japanese, or C) Waving a lighted lighter in front of his face. If you picked C – no congratulations here. Notice that the Japanese says "Gojira", not "Godzilla". He could've been saying anything.

We then cut to Panama, where the Worm Guy – by the way, did you notice that he's a white guy with the glasses and socially awkward, just like the characters in two previous Emmreich films? – meets the obnoxious comedy relief – of course – and his boss who's kind of interested in his personal life. Anyway, in Panama, they have to investigate the footprints of a… giant chicken? Anyway, nothing interesting happens.



Few scenes later, the film shows Worm Guy's ex-girlfriend and her boss, anchor for the news channel. The conversation goes like this: "I want to be a reporter." "Then eat dinner with me." "But you're married." "So? Want to go up, you do it through my bed, sweetie." Seriously, this guy's a douche.

We cut back to Panama, where they discover the ship wrecked by Godzilla – apparently, it drifted there rather than sunk on the spot. That's also where Tatopoulos & Friends run into the French guy & friends. Again, Wormy picks up some Godzilla flesh and scene dissolves…

…Into more trawlers, now American. They get pulled down underwater by what else – Godzilla. As in Godzilla can do that.

Then, Worm Guy finished DNA analysis and announces that this is not a lost dinosaur, but rather mutated aberration – just like this film. We see him staring at the approximate monster destination, which ends up in New York. Give the city a break, it was just attacked by aliens! And what's up with the thunders?
We then see Godzilla attacking the port, while the mayor – wait, why did they put Siskel and Ebert clones in this film? Did they want to make fun of them because they criticised all of Emmreich's films? Then why the fuck won't have the monster eat them or kill them in other nasty way! Even Siskel himself said that they didn't take the advantage.

See, that's how sucky the film is. So anyway, the mayor is giving a speech, and then oh my GOD, IT'S CLOVERFIELD! No, it's just Godzilla. Then, when Godzilla passes by the news channel building, that douchebag anchor didn't even noticed it! I mean, we was on a phone and whatnot, but it's a fucking monster passing twenty meters to the right, how the fuck can you ignore that? Was he so thick or retarded? And then... the monster disappears. HOW THE FUCK WAS THAT POSSIBLE? He's fucking Godzilla, how the fuck did he just disappear? While the military is wondering over the same questions, Wormy says that Manhattan is the perfect place for Godzilla to hide. And that's the part where I like to stop and play the game: Where's The Logic? It's a simple game where you take an illogical part of a film and try to find the logic that stood behind it. Let's see… We have a huge monster, a huge, multi-million city on an island on a river, and suddenly, the monster disappears. Did he go to the river? No, Wormy says no, which strips all the logic left. I'd risk with "There Is No Logic At All". And guess what – it's a correct answer!

Few scenes later, we cut to the French intelligence hidden in an UPS van. Then, the scene dissolves into a scene where Siskel and Ebert – the cloned ones – argue with the military about whether or not the evacuation was necessary. So yeah, Manhattan is now evacuated and taken over by the military who try to find the monster – but they find some fish in a collapsed subway tunnel. So now the military hits the fish jackpot, with twelve lorries full of fish. They try to lure Godzilla with fish – but it just spawns one of the most awful lines in the history of Godzilla franchise. Are you ready for it?


Tatopoulos then stands face to face with Godzilla – too bad the monster didn't eat him! – and then Godzilla eats the fish, because all lizards eat fish. Well, I'll tell you the truth: most lizards DON'T eat FISH, they eat fucking BUGS! And the species Godzilla was spawned from certainly didn't eat fucking FISH!!! The best part is when they start to shoot at Godzilla. It goes on a rampage, and the military blows up the Fuller Building.

And yeah, that's the scene where we see Godzilla breathing fire. FINALLY!

They then chase Godzilla through the city with the helicopters – causing more damage than Godzilla himself (e.g. This Chrysler building they've blew up). Then, they run into that hilarious scene where Godzilla appears to be gone, just to pop out at their backs, slapping one chopper down and trying to eat another one. Charming. Delicious. Then, Godzilla chases the third helicopter – hang on, where's the fourth one? – and it ends with Godzilla eating the machine – hang on again, I think I saw this shot already, I just don't remember where…
 
Then, Ebert – the cloned one – gets angry, Godzilla humps a building, and Tatopoulos collects its crap – and the monster disappears AGAIN.

Then the story goes in the most fucked up way ever: Godzilla is p r e g n a n t. Or, more precisely, has somehow managed to have eggs and fertilize them in one go. Yes, it's "Where's The Logic?" moment! Military tries to lure it with fish again, and fails to take him down again. Meanwhile, Tatopoulos gets sacked from the military and joins the French Foreign Legion, which means the Jean Renault – pardon – Reno character. They go follow Godzilla in the subway again, and trace him down to American football stadium, where they find monster's eggs. Then, Wormy's ex-girlfriend haves that speech over TV where she says that the stadium must be destroyed. Fighters are dispatched from nearest air force base, but then the film suddenly turns Jurassic Park for some reason. (Un)luckily, Wormy, the chick and some of the Reno's crew escape before the stadium blows up. We finish the film when Godzilla is taken down by the fighters, and in most cliché moment in all films, dies, and slowly closes his eyes. Now, out of nowhere, everyone feels sorry for him, but in the end, people of New York live happily ever after – or do they?

Of course not, because they just had to make this stupid cliffhanger showing that there's still one egg left in the tunnels… Here's a note to everybody who thinks cliffhanger endings are cool – if you don't plan a direct sequel, DON'T DO THEM! It just pisses people off! Seriously, DON'T – DO – THEM! They're ass, unnecessary, and really disappointing. You know what else had that kind of ending? Super Mario Brothers The Movie…(!) Oh no. No. NOOOOOOO!!!!!

Conclusion

Wrapping up, the film sucked like two previous ones did – of course, hehe. Emmreich was banished from USA and kicked out back to wherever he came from. They didn't want him there, either – so now, Emmreich is wandering through the world in hope that he'll some day settle down and make his last film – and boy, will it suck. CGI Godzilla looked great, although I wasn't sure if I'm watching a mutated lizard, a dinosaur, or a mutated lizard with dinosaur mouth. Special effects were acceptable. Not too good in today's standards, but acceptable. The story just jumps around like crazy, trying to include a romance between Tatopoulos and that Siskel and Ebert rip-off – which BTW they failed. It has too many "Where's The Logic?" moments, and too many fillers just to make this god awful film two hours long. Broderick sucked, and I don't know what money they gave Reno to be in this film. Overall, it was bad. I'll give it 2 out of 5 – hey, it still might've been Super Mario Brothers The Mo…vie… Damn you, Holywood!


I'm lamp-ARR-ski, sending bad films back to hell!

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