For someone who spent his childhood engrossed by Toho's classic Godzilla films (to six-year-old eyes, the rubber suit is completely believable as a kaiju-butt-kicking boss), this will possibly be the biggest movie of 2014. Pun intended. (Watch the trailer here.)
Director Gareth Edwards' take on Godzilla portrays the 350-foot-tall, radioactive lizard as less of a monster-battling hero and more of an apocalyptic disaster, in a new twist designed to be more realistic and emotional. That realism is anchored by performances from a star-studded cast that includes Breaking Bad's Bryan Cranston and Ken Watanabe.
Yes, Godzilla can be realistic. In fact, I don't think it's any exaggeration to say that this movie touches on one of the most fundamental questions of mankind's existence.
I can see the doubt in your eyes, so hear me out. Most religions in the world can be divided into one of two categories: spiritualism or naturalism. The difference is in whether they consider the spiritual or physical worlds to be more important; in other words, what is man's relationship to nature? And that's precisely the question the newest Godzilla flick explores.
The Godzilla franchise has its roots in the nuclear atrocities of World War II and a long history of tangling with the morality of nature and progress. “Is a giant monster ever going to come out of the ocean, flatten a city, and leave lots of radiation behind? No,” Edwards said in a recent interview with Wales Online. “But have cities ever been destroyed and radiation traces left everywhere? Yes.”
Edwards went on to explain the connection the franchise has to the Hiroshima bombing: “At the time, Japan wasn’t able to make movies about how they suffered through events like that,” he said. “Yet they could make a giant monster movie which touched on all those things – it was like therapy for them, I guess.”
“The arrogance of man is thinking that nature is in our control and not the other way around,” Ken Watanabe's character warns in the newest trailer.
So before you dismiss this as a next-gen, high-budget, rubber-suit monster flick, take a minute to consider how it can introduce fundamental questions of religion and the purpose of science into discussions in your home. Take every thought captive—even thoughts of Godzilla—and let art's ability to ask good questions lead you and your family deeper into life.
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