Godzilla vs Kong is absolutely ludicrous. That’s hardly surprising for a movie about titanic lizards and really giant apes battling it out in urban environments, but what is shocking is that the beastly brawls are probably the least ridiculous aspects of the whole enterprise.
For those of you that haven’t been paying attention, Godzilla vs Kong is the fourth entry in Warner Bros/Legendary Entertainment’s “Monsterverse”; a series big on spectacle and low on plot that nevertheless reckons that putting pretty well known actors in between the bouts of monster action, looking pensive and spouting nonsense is the secret to putting bums in seats.
The Story So Far
In 2014’s Godzilla, Gareth Edwards reimagined the “The Big G” as the Apex Titan. A vast creature of unimaginable strength and power that will stop at nothing to eliminate any threat to his primacy. Luckily the entirety of human civilization barely registers on his radar, so after taking out some “Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms,” or MUTOs, Godzilla, as defender of the status quo, becomes cast as humanity’s saviour, even if it’s more due to indifference than anything else. Oh, and Bryan Cranston and Juliette Binoche were there, if only for the briefest of moments. (Note: I refer to the various human characters by the actor’s names because nobody cares.)
2017’s 1970’s set Kong: Skull Island, from director Jordan Vogt-Roberts, performed the same image rehabilitation for King Kong. As the custodian of the isolated Skull Island, Kong keeps the nasty Skull Crawlers at bay, while a Monarch research team tries to escape the island. Oh, and Loki (Tom Hiddleston) and Captain Marvel (Brie Larson) were there too.
With Michael Dougherty’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters, the wheels finally seemed to come off the whole enterprise as rogue Monarch scientist Vera Farmiga sets loose far too many Titans, in a simply bat shit crazy attempt to balance humanity’s damage to Mother Earth. Unbeknownst to her, one titan, Monster Zero, was “Not Of This World,” and Ghidorah, as he came to be known, was hell bent on dominating the other Titans and terraforming the planet. Only Millie Bobby Brown (Stranger Things) and Kyle Chandler (Friday Night Lights) could prevent all out Armageddon, through the healing power of nuclear weapons, and getting out of Godzilla’s way and letting him do his thing. Oh and Mothra was there, along with Rodan, taking full advantage of Toho’s Monster back catalogue.
Godzilla vs Kong
With all these films, the filmmakers have tried, some might say too hard, to come up with something, anything, to fill the gaps between the clashes of these titans with varying degrees of success. This has mostly taken the form of the “crypto-zoological agency” Monarch, whose role is primarily to try and help Godzilla, although in action, they are about as helpful as a toddler in the kitchen.
Godzilla vs Kong seems to have learned from many of the mistakes of the series, although in some cases it has embraced them wholeheartedly.
In an act of “KONGservationism,” Rebecca Hall’s scientist shelters an older, more grizzled King Kong in a special base that protects him from a perma-storm that has engulfed Skull Island. This also helpfully keeps him off Godzilla’s murderous radar.
When Godzilla starts tearing up some Apex Industries research facilities, owned by the euro trash Tony Stark, Demián Bichir, Hollow Earth theorist Alexander Skarsgård convinces Hall to loan him Kong to enter the hollow earth for… reasons. Millie Bobby Brown also returns, along with her father Kyle Chandler, researching just how little impact she can have in a film while still getting paid, and why Godzilla has decided to rampage against humanity now.
None of this matters.
What matters is that we get to see the giant King Kong and Godzilla square off, first in a Neon Genesis Evangelion fan-baiting encounter at sea, and later in Hong Kong, as the plot happens around them with as little impact on them as it does on the audience. I really can’t believe that we have had four, FOUR!, entries in this series with a legendary organization that hunts and catalogues giant monsters, and have them be, by far, the most boring parts of the movies. The most anyone can remember about them reliably is Ken Watanabe’s “Let them fight!” line from Godzilla.
Monke v Lizard
When it comes to the real stars of the show, both beasts look magnificent, with astounding care and attention given to Kong shaking droplets of water from his fur. He does this a lot. Thankfully one particular lesson director Adam Wingard has taken from the less than thrilling action in King of the Monsters is to pull the camera back, just a little, so we can actually see all the expensive CGI that went into making these huge creatures recreate scenes from WWE Smackdown. Too often the action in King of the Monsters was obscured by bad weather or framed way too close, losing the flow of the fights. Godzilla vs Kong revels in letting us see Kong land a punch squarely on Gojira’s jaw in glorious mid shot, in amongst the skyscrapers of Hong Kong.
The human storyline is mostly garbage but it also misses the highly quotable lines of its predecessors. There’s no real, “Long live… the king,” or “Let them fight” here. Instead the film goes all in on its bonkers, mostly unexplained mythology. Characters babble about the aforementioned hollow earth theory, genetic memory, anti-gravity, and psionics as explanations for some really silly stuff. There’s a weird star gate thing at the Earth’s core that’s never explained along with the ruins of the civilization that’s found there.
Now This is Acting
The absolute ludicrousness of what is going on is matched only by the seriousness with which the actors treat it. Alexander Skarsgård delivers a master class in spouting gibberish with the utmost conviction. I have no idea why he seems to be decked out in Marty McFly cosplay for parts of the film, but it adds to the general wackiness of the proceedings. Rebecca Hall looks concerned for Kong at all the appropriate times as “The Kong Whisperer,” and acts as an incredibly bad guardian for Kaylee Hottle’s orphaned tribe girl, Jia. Who is of course present to provide the required link to Kong so we know when we’re supposed to feel sad for the big ape.
If I sound a little harsh on the film, I don’t mean to be. I had a blast watching it, even if it was for different reasons than the filmmakers may have wanted. (I’m looking at you Brian Tyree Henry’s unfunny podcaster Bernie Hayes.) I couldn’t help but erupt in shocked laughter at every escalation in the nonsense, and at every new, unexplained, possibly unknowable crazy thing that happened on screen. You have to admire the sheer sincerity of Alexander Skarsgård talking about gravity inversions and dead brothers in the same sentence.
I had no idea Julian Dennison (Deadpool 2, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, and contender for best IMDB profile picture ever) was in this, and after watching the film I couldn’t tell you why he’s in it. It doesn’t matter. None of this matters. What matters is that Godzilla vs Kong is a big, stupid, expensive, clever, beautiful thing. Perfect for a (safe, socially distanced) return to the cinema.
Avoid spoilers and get an extra kick at the end when another classic Toho Kaiju gets the update treatment.
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