The world has been recently thrust into a period of uncertainty, with the war in Ukraine and the coronavirus pandemic. It was a mood that fit his supernatural “very Japanese” Godzilla, Yamazaki said at the Tokyo International Film Festival, where Godzilla Minus One is the closing film. It opens in Japanese theatres on Friday (Nov 3).
“You have to quiet it down,” he told The Associated Press of Godzilla, as if only a prayer can calm or stop the monster – as opposed to trying to kill it.
Set right after Japan’s surrender in World War II, Yamazaki’s rendition predates the original and portrays a nation so devastated by war it’s left with nothing, let alone any weapons to fight off Godzilla.
And so its arrival puts everything back into negative, or minus, territory.
Ryunosuke Kamiki portrays the hero, a soldier who survives the war and loses his family, only to end up confronting Godzilla.
The monster’s finely detailed depiction is the work of the Tokyo-based Shirogumi digital special-effects team, which includes Yamazaki. A frightfully realistic-appearing Godzilla crashes into fleeing screaming crowds, its giant tail sweeping buildings in a flash, its bumpy skin glowing like irradiated embers, its growl getting right up into your face.
Some Godzilla aficionados feel Hollywood has at times incorrectly portrayed “Gojira”, as it is known in Japan, like an inevitably fatalistic natural disaster, when the nuclear angle is key.
Source: CNA
