The awesome “Godzilla Minus Zero,” which had its world premiere Saturday night at the New York Film Festival
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which → have → Festival
embraces the principle that has guided this franchise for seven decades: The ‘zilla you know beats the Ghidora you don’t.
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you → embrace → Ghidora
In the latest thrilling addition to the “Minus” saga, as has long been the case, Godzilla goes from deadly destroyer to humanity’s last best hope to defeat an even worse foe — King Ghidora.
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Godzilla → go → foe
Yet “Zero” is not the typical “vs.” venture we’ve seen so many, many times before.
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we → see → ?
The Japanese film delves into places both familiar and previously unexplored in this series.
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film → delve → series
It’s been more than 20 years since Japan’s Toho pitted two giant beasts against each other onscreen.
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Toho → pit → other
American studio Legendary Entertainment, which licenses characters from Toho for their IQ-lowering “Monsterverse,” delivered one more recently in 2024 with the dumb-as-rocks “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire.”
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which → license → Godzilla
“Zero” has come to wipe that sorry schlock from your memory.
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Zero → come → memory
The truth is, Japan just does Godzilla better.
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Japan → do → Godzilla
His sequel picks up close to where the last one left off.
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one → pick → ?
In 1949, two years after Godzilla laid waste to Japan, kamikaze pilot Koichi (Ryunosuke Kamiki) and his wife Noriko (Minami Hamabe) are pretty, pretty sure he’s extinct.
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he → lay → Japan
But you know the old saying: When one door closes, a three-headed dragon awakens.
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dragon → know → saying
A frightening winged creature with a possible connection to outer space arrives, and scientists call the flapping menace Ghidora.
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scientists → arrive → menace
Back from the last flick, Disaster Response Bureau head Dr. Noda (Hidetaka Yoshioka) teams up with a meteorologist, Makoto (Masami Nagasawa), to quickly figure out why the terror goes where it goes and to strategize how to swat the freakin’ fly.
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it → team → fly
Koichi, the best pilot in the land, gets dragged kicking and screaming for that second bit.
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Koichi → drag → bit
And maybe a little too willing to help with the cause is the U.S. Military.
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Military → help → cause
Each person has an involved and fascinating backstory.
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person → have → backstory
Nerdy Noda is traumatized that he couldn’t prevent more carnage during the first go with Godzilla.
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he → traumatize → Godzilla
And Makoto, while driven to succeed, is still full of guilt over a botched weather report during a typhoon that claimed many lives.
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that → drive → lives
Noriko has been left with an eye injury (one that doesn’t meet the eye) from the events of the previous flick.
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that → leave → flick
And everybody, in one way or another, still suffers from the scars of World War II.
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everybody → suffer → II
The bombing of Hiroshima plays a meaningful role here.
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bombing → play → role
And the whole crew has a hardened exhaustion from conflict and loss.
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crew → have → conflict
For them, the fighting never really stopped.
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fighting → stop → them
It just became reptilian.
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It → become → ?
A fascinating new character is Kanji (Kin Tanaka), an eccentric old biologist hiding consequential secrets.
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character → hide → secrets
And little Akiko (Sae Nagatani), Koichi and Noriko’s adopted daughter, amps up the stakes with cuteness.
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Akiko → adopt → cuteness
I can’t remember ever watching a kid actor cry this hard in any other movie.
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actor → remember → movie
And this affecting film — which, yes, has some occasionally silly dialogue — is one of two “Godzilla” entires I know of in which the audience might shed a tear.
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audience → have → tear
Now, for those of you who don’t turn up to this franchise for emotional sensitivity, the battles are fantastic.
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battles → turn → sensitivity
The creatures are realistically textured and stomp with believable tonnage.
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creatures → texture → tonnage
As ‘zilla and ‘dora rip each others’ guts out, the viewer perceives the pain.
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viewer → rip → pain
That’s quite impressive for 3D animation.
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That → ’ → animation
The 1940s setting lifts everything visually, too.
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setting → lift → everything
The many buildings that unfortunately get crushed are ornate and easily distinguishable from the one next door.
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that → crush → one
That’s a nice shift from Monsterverse movies, in which the final clashes look like a glass and steel smoothie.
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clashes → ’ → smoothie
The post-war setting also forces the clever characters to use ingenuity to stop the cold-blooded killers.
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setting → force → killers
There aren’t any Instagram reels of Ghidora, or a whole scene where some guy with glasses furiously types on a laptop while not blinking.
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guy → be → laptop
The scientists also don’t over-explain what these creatures are while we zone out.
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we → explain → ?
It’s the exact opposite of “The New Empire,” which, lest we forget, made one of its main characters a podcaster.
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one → ’ → characters
…and 4 more, not listed.
The Aporia
