MAKING A MONSTER
The cast and production team of ‘Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire’ give us a glimpse into the creation of such an epic movie
The new adventure film, out this weekend, pits the almighty Kong and the fearsome Godzilla against a colossal undiscovered threat hidden within our world. Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire delves into the histories of these Titans and their origins, as well as the mysteries of Skull Island, while uncovering the mythic battle that helped forge these extraordinary beings and tied them to humankind forever.
The film is directed by Adam Wingard and stars Rebecca Hall (Godzilla vs Kong, The Night House), Brian Tyree Henry (Godzilla vs Kong, Bullet Train), Dan Stevens (Gaslit, Legion), Kaylee Hottle (Godzilla vs Kong), Alex Ferns (The Batman, Wrath of Man, Chernobyl) and Fala Chen (Irma Vep, Shang Chi and the legend of the Ten Rings).
We spoke to the production team, cast and crew:
What audiences can expect
ADAM WINGARD (director): I want people to have fun watching this movie. This film is a total thrill ride with tons of action. It’s pretty nonstop. This is actually a monster character study, I want the audience to get into the psyche and point of view of the monsters in a way they’ve never done before. I didn’t want to make a monster movie that stands on its own merits and is doing something new and unique. You’re seeing a story that’s mostly visual, taking you places you’ve never been.
What was it like working in these remote locations, particularly Daintree Forest, the oldest tropical lowland rainforest in the world?
REBECCA HALL (Dr Ilene Andrews) : Oh yeah. And there was this thing called... The gympie! It looks like a leaf, but it has just hundreds of tiny little claws. If you brush past it, they’ll hook into you and then you won’t stop itching for, who knows, the rest of your life, potentially. So all these things, horrors, and cassowaries (the world’s most dangerous bird)!
We were shooting during the season when they have their babies — the mum is fiercely protective. It was truly one of the most bizarre animals I’ve ever been in proximity with ... You suddenly understand dinosaurs, especially since I have a six-yearold and she is teaching me all kinds of things. There were amazing creatures. Crocodiles, snakes — everything.
What are the driving forces in this film?
DAN STEVENS (Trapper): Obviously, the big draw and the main event is Godzilla and Kong. We get to deepen our exploration of Kong’s story and his backstory. The technology available now affords a rich texture to that storyline that we might not have got years before. The human storyline is rich and heartfelt, especially between Rebecca Hall’s character, Ilene Andrews, and her adopted daughter, Jia. There’s also a huge amount of fun and action-adventure. There’s action beats, there’s heartfelt beats, there’s humour. It’s got it all.
What’s Jia’s relationship with Kong? What do they have in common?
KAYLEE HOTTLE (Jia): They’re connected because they have similar traits. They communicate with each other through sign language, she can tell what he is feeling and vice versa. They listen to each other, and connect through their struggles. They’re both wondering what their purpose is, and they do that together.
We get to know more about both Kong and Godzilla in this. What is Kong looking for at the start of the film?
ADAM WINGARD: Kong is in a better place, in terms of his environment, than he was in the last movie. Hollow Earth is more in line with the world he grew up in on Skull Island. It’s got that prehistoric feel. Physically, that’s where he thrives. But emotionally, Kong is still lonely, and like any person who has it all, there’s something missing. Kong is a lonely ape in Hollow Earth — thriving on one level, but lonely on another.
There were some incredible stunts. We see you dropping into Kong’s mouth. How was that?
DAN STEVENS: It was a very long drop. We were up on the roof of this massive studio, dropping down — about 65 feet. It felt a long way when they hoist you up there ... but also, a great way to introduce that character to this world. I love doing stuff like that, so it was in equal measures thrilling and terrifying.
How is Godzilla evolving?
ADAM WINGARD: I wanted to give him an updated appearance for this film. That’s part of the fun of Godzilla as a character — to see him evolve into different iterations in different films. It’s exciting to see the new approach to the spines on his back and all the details, but it was important that it was motivated from a story perspective. The concept of Godzilla’s evolution became the impetus for the story.
Differentiating “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire”
TOM HAMMOCK (production designer): We wanted to make this film different, and we tried to approach that with colour. Adam was fascinated with the original art from 1980s toy boxes ... for, say, He-Man or ThunderCats. We tried to bring that colourful language to this MonsterVerse. A lot of the previous films had been on the surface of the Earth. There are storms going on, so, immediately, that brings you into a darker colour palette. But the ability to enter Hollow Earth and start from scratch allowed us to jump into a really colourful palette.
Globetrotting destruction
ALEX GARCIA (producer): Audiences have come to expect a big brawl in a global city, and we wanted to have a major brawl at the end of this film. We chose Rio de Janeiro, which has this incredibly beautiful backdrop — a tropical and urban vibe. We’re seeing these characters come together, which was challenging from a choreography perspective, but it allowed us to spotlight the agility of the Scar King and Kong.
Kong’s new power is in his mechanical glove, together with this newly evolved version of Godzilla, and during this insane battle, people run to save themselves. We were fortunate to be able to shoot this film all over the world. We shot primarily in the Gold Coast in Australia, and there’s a little bit of that for the beach sequence at the beginning of the Rio sequence. But, we had a unit in Rio shooting a lot of the plates and action pieces you see in the film. We also shot in Rome, Morocco, Iceland, Hawaii and Gibraltar. —