Godzilla, King of the Monsters

Rating:
Summary: Godzilla is the BEST!
Review: This is the first move appearance of the greatest monster of all time, and what an amazing thing to behold it is! The suit is amazingly fearsome and the black and white adds to the movie's somber feel. The king is all death and destruction as he destroys Japan in this classic, and the miniature cities are amazingly realistic. With such great acting, special effects, and an amazing script, who cares if the dubbing is bad? Probably the most underated film of all time, this not only is a must-see, but a must-own for Godzilla fans and non-Godzilla fans alike!

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Summary: Oh No! There goes Tokyo!
Review: One of the best monster films ever made. Godzilla, King of the Monsters is the very first Godzilla film. The radioactive, mutated dinosaur starts out his destructive rampage by sinking ships. Then, he rips apart villages on islands. Finally, he destroys Tokyo. The movie is totally awesome. It has the best Special FX and Music of the 1950's. Go buy and watch this movie. You won't regret it! ;)

Rating:
Summary: Godzilla, King of the Monsters (1956)
Review: This is the very first Godzilla movie ever made. Its also one of the best ones, too. The basic plot is a surviving dinosaur is exposed to radiation and turns into a monster that breathes nuclear fire. Then, Godzilla attacks Tokyo and kills thousands. Godzilla is defeated by... Nah, I won't tell you. It will spoil the surprise. Godzilla, King of the Monsters is an awesome movie. Unlike King Kong (1933), Godzilla is a man in a suit. The special FX, acting, and music are AWESOME! Its just that there is some bad dubbing, but thats it. Go check out this movie. You will absolutely LOVE IT!!

Rating:
Summary: GO GO Godzilla
Review: Okay, everyone knows that this is a commentary on the dangers of atomic power and that Godzilla is a symbol for America that won't be satisfied until it destroys the earth.
It still rocks!! No other monster has such staying power (or a hit rock song). Burr is good in his running dialogue interjecting the human element of the love-triangle into the flick.
The wholesale destruction is enough to satisfy the most barbaric of us while the plot is smart enough to entertain the rest.

Rating:
Summary: King of the monsters
Review: Godzilla truly is the perfect monster. Other creatures go down in movie cinema history as some of the best to. But this monster gave the world the perfect metaphor the perfect monster the perfect everything to associate with the monster parts of scifi. This is one of the best of its genre. Despite poor special effects poor knowledge of what dinosaurs( which the Godzilla suit was based on. this was made in the 1950's during a time when many of dinosaur knowlege is considered inaccurate now.) this film was one of the best. Unlike Independence day, Jurassic Park or even The Mummy(1999) this film relies on a sense of awe somber metaphorical note. We don't see Godzilla that much. Even by today's standards when we see Godzilla it is thoroughly satisfying enough not to make it look human. It looks almost convincng despite outdated technology now. The suit which was used by Haruo Nakajima a pro stunt actor performed wonderfully. The suit weighed about over 210 punds i think. So it was heavy but Nakajima performed beautifully. Godzilla is and always will be king of the monsters.

Rating:
Summary: Long live the king
Review: The title pretty much says it all. Indeed, Godzilla is king of the monsters. This is in many ways the greatest of the Godzilla movies, particularly those of the original series. This first film was unique; indeed, some may not realize just how serious-minded a movie this was. The theme of this movie can clearly be seen as an indictment of the use of nuclear weapons; the images of a devastated Tokyo bespeak themselves closely of the real-life scenes in Hiroshima and Nagasaki following the atomic bombs dropped on those cities. Coming just over a decade after the end of World War II, the message condemning nuclear proliferation is understandable and easily understood. Nuclear tests gave birth to Godzilla, unleashing a havoc that proved all but impossible to contain. Only a scientific miracle of sorts and a good bit of luck saved Tokyo (and presumably the rest of the world) from the unspeakable horror unleashed by man's experiments with a weapon of mass destruction.

We tend to see Godzilla now in comical terms, due largely to later films starring the big lizard, but the debut of Godzilla must truly have seemed horrific to film audiences in the 1950s. The monster's first appearance, as his head rises up over the crest of a hill, is very well conceived and impressively presented. For the most part, the special effects in this film are excellent. The fact that this movie is in black and white helps a great deal in this regard, I believe. In no way does Godzilla appear as a man wearing a rubber suit; the face and mouth seemed particularly well done and realistic to me, and I was most impressed by the way the creature's eyes seemed to bug out at times. There was one scene involving a helicopter being blown over that bespoke the word "model," but everything else, especially Godzilla's destructive march through Tokyo, seemed very well done and quite realistic enough for me. Not until the new Godzilla series of the 1990s would the monster look so monstrous. The music is very well done and adds much to the atmosphere of horror evoked by the destruction and menace of the monster.

I have not seen the original Japanese version of the movie, but I imagine it would be even better than the Americanized version featuring Raymond Burr. For the most part, Burr's insertions into the film were well done and presented no continuity problems. It does seem strange that an American, and a reporter at that, should so easily be taken into the confidence of Japan's military and scientific leaders, but this feeling is quite assuaged by the knowledge that young boys, no matter how annoying they might be, are commonly given the same privilege in a spate of later Japanese monster movies. Burr's acting is a little overdramatic after he is injured, and he tends to look like a prop smoking a pipe in many of the scenes leading up to the climax, but I cannot bring myself to give this movie less than five stars. I am sure, however, that the original Japanese version is much better and much more powerful, especially in the anti-nuclear message it evokes. It is unfortunate that American distributors apparently chose to remove a number of images they viewed as too uncomfortable for Cold War audiences.

Rating:
Summary: Often imitated, never equalled, the original Godzilla/Gojira
Review: Listen to the opening narration of this 1956 film, the original Godzilla film, and it the film's sub-text of Japan having been the target of two atomic bombs at the end of World War II is patently obvious. Yes, there are a few unintentional laughs every time one of the insert scenes with Raymond Burr pops up, but his reporter character is just a spectator while the big green fellow takes apart Tokyo. Inoshiro Honda's original "Gojira" was released in 1954; two years later Terry Morse shot additional footage for this US version, which was not only re-edited but dubbed into English. Too bad we cannot get the original uncut version of "Gojira" on DVD, which actually ran 20 minutes longer. I would not mind having both versions, because this is still the best of the bunch when it comes to Godzilla flicks. At least in this one you can take the monster seriously.

Rating:
Summary: Inexcuseable
Review: Inexcuseable. Being a short movie there would have been ample room on the DVD to include the original Japaneese version of the film. The Raymond Burr version presents broken shards of the original film interspersed with an american narrator spliced in to soothe the minds of racist 1950's america. "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" viewers can choose between english subtitling or english dubbing. Godzilla fans get neither. DVD extras are a nice, but what's the point when they don't include the movie in the first place?

Rating:
Summary: The Best Godzilla Movie of em all!!
Review: Godzilla King of the Monsters was by far the best in the series by Toho. My brother is a diehard G-fan, and he was introduced to Godzilla when Disney showed the second b/w one(i cant remember its name!) Son of Godzilla, and Godzilla vs the Sea Monster. Then, TNT had King of Monsters on during a New Years Monsterfest. We taped it, and I've loved KOTM ever since. Godzilla vs Mothra, was good, but those agrivatin Barbie doll lookalikes spoiled it for me. Son of Godzilla was a funny movie, but Godzilla aint sposed to be funny. Its sposed to be horrifyin. The 2 scary ones were the black and white ones, and the b/w ones were the BEST!!!!!!!!

Rating:
Summary: A spectacular classic
Review: The original Godzilla is one of the greatest monster movies ever made, few movies can compare to it, it's better than Gorgo, King Kong, and Rodan. The film is very dark, it features excellent special effects ( for the time), good music, and a lot of action. It is kind of scary, seeing all the injured people who felt the wrath of Godzilla. This movie is far better than any other "monster on the loose" movie, If you only see one Godzilla movie see this one.