Monster mayhem, with a nod to his noble past C

REATED by Japan’s Toho studios in 1954, Godzilla, starring a shuffling chunky bipedal saurian the height of the Hillbrow tower, played to a nation’s fresh horrific memory of the atomic bomb.

A mutation of nuclear radiation, Godzilla, a costumed actor plodding about a scale model set, devastated Tokyo in cinematic black and white.

Over time, as the cult of the king of Kaiju — Japanese for monsters — grew, Godzilla graduated from nemesis to inadvertent deliverer, battling other Kaiju and threats to the nation’s cities. The monster hero was soon mined by popular media to feed a growing global fandom.

Hollywood’s latest adaptation, rather than Roland Emmerich’s 1998 lithe T-Rex version, is a better tribute to the heritage of this monster darling. Director Gareth Edwards, creator of the obscure but tonally brilliant 2010 Monsters , lends his understanding of scale translation, where colossal structures of geography, atmosphere and monster mock humanity’s diminutive fragility. This is no senses-bludgeoning escapade à la Michael Bay. Mostly, Edwards maintains a faithful iconographic reproduction of the original beast. The heavy-set A-frame, snub nose and palisade spine are all there, among other original features that will have true Godzilla fans squealing.

The origins differ with Edwards’s monster, however. His Kaiju existed when Earth’s surface-radiation levels were higher. Radiation being their ultimate food source, they were forced into subterranean hibernation due to climactic changes. Now awoken because of our nuclear activity, the Kaiju need to feed and breed.

The science wobbles but the greater flaw is the dreaded requirement for the Hollywood blockbuster to squeeze out as many action sequences and as much fast-cued dialogue as possible. Tragedy is expeditiously edged off as our co-leads Ford Brody (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), a dutiful family man and soldier on leave, and Dr Ishiro Serizawa (Ken Watanabe), the scientific specialist needed to reason out the plot, find themselves tasked with stopping these rampaging beasts.

The few moments of solemnity are stretched thin in the continuous relay of mayhem.

If the aim was for a blockbuster, then it is laden with an all-too-stern script, perhaps telling of Edwards’s unfamiliarity with big-budget territory and fear of falling into schmaltz. But, for a romp about a lardy lizard with atomic breath, some comic relief would have been good, elevating a film that’s entertaining, but takes itself too seriously, to a real monster ride. LS — Keith Tamkei