THB #441: Godzilla Minus One

Godzilla movies are like a box of chocolate… you never know what you're going to get.

But with Godzilla Minus One, you are going to get the most emotionally complex Godzilla movie ever made. There is actually a card at the front of the film noting that this is the 70th Anniversary Godzilla film. All the previous versions pushed off of that first 1954 film, whether trying to gather that feeling or trying to top it with some kind of new feeling. This one really reconsiders the whole thing.

The film starts before the first arrival of Godzilla, at least for the people in the story. The local islanders already have named it Godzilla. The tale is really about Koichi Shikishima (played by Ryunosuke Kamiki), a pilot who was meant to fly a kamakaze mission in the last days of World War II and instead, lands on an isolated island for repairs to his plane… which may or may not be needed. Before he can leave the island, Godzilla, still just 25 feet high or so, arrives.

When Shikishima gets back to…