***1/2 The Classic, the Original.

This is the one that started it all. Every series of Godzilla is based on this one. It is the one that is never written off when they start a new series. It will remain the first one forever.

This movie was made way back in 1954, in glorious black and white. It started out as a Japanese movie protesting nuclear weapons. Later on, in 1956, new scenes were slipped in and it was shown in America. The movie is about a giant monster known as Gojira(or Godzilla, depending on version). It was a prehistoric animal woken up and mutated by hydrogen bomb testing. It attacked Tokyo a couple of times, and was unaffected by military weapons. It was later destroyed by a device called the Oxygen Destroyer.

This movie has one of the best plots of the Godzilla series. It has a point to make, and it does it very well. It is very dramatic and somewhat scary(for movies back then). The whole movie has a dark mood that adds to the plot. The Tokyo catching on fire thing is something that it not done in most other Godzilla movies, mainly because it creates such an earie effect of a horrible disaster. This one is a disaster movie, not a silly fight between two monsters. It tries to show how Godzilla is killing thousands of innocent lives, and it succeeds. It is a movie about a horrible disaster that might come to us, and it does well at showing it.

The problem with this movie, however, is it’s special effects. I know its an old movie, but the whole movie was very cheaply made. "King Kong" was made a whopping 19 years before this one, and it has ten times as realistic of effects then this one. The idea of a guy in a rubber suit might be good for a silly monster fighting movie, but not a serious dramatic movie. Instead of being scared or awed by mass destruction, people laugh at how silly he looks. Even worse is the dorky looking hand puppet the use in half the scenes. Its so goofy looking how can anybody believe Godzilla is real? Although it is cheap and pathetic looking, it is somewhat reasonable. It was made using a very low budget, and they did the best the could with what little they could afford. Another problem was the main concept. They tried to scare people into being against nuclear weapons by telling them it will create giant monster that will come and kill everybody. Stupid.

A couple of years later, this movie was sent to America. It was changed around to appeal to American audiences. Raymond Burr was slipped into the movie. It ruined a little bit of the movie, but added a faster, deeper, more dramatic, and more straight forward explanation through first person narration. It gave the movie more depth, and a longer plot that was actually faster. They basically took out the long and boring parts, and added a quicker explanation. Only problem was that they dubbed some parts that shouldn’t have been, and forgot to dub parts that should have. An example would be the part of the woman talking to here children before being squashed by Godzilla. For some reason they didn’t dub what she was saying, even though she was saying something important. Otherwise, they did a pretty good job of slipping that Raymond Burr guy into the movie.

Very good plot

American scenes improved movie(at least I think so)

Dramatic disaster movie

Uninterrupted city destroying

Godzilla in its pure form

"In Glorious black and White"

Everybody else thinks its the best movie ever made

Pathetic special effects

Pathetic looking hand puppet

Cheap rubber suit

Bad way to get people to join a cause

My mom hates suicide

That girl cries to dang much! (Oh no, your burning papers! Waaaaahhhhh!)

Credits