GODZILLA FINAL WARS (2004)

What just happened? There we were, Mommy, Daddy and Roy entering the Dryden Theater to see the only showing of Godzilla Final Wars in Rochester, NY. Next thing I know I’m sustaining injuries from a full frontal assault on the senses by a movie that is equal parts Godzilla, the Matrix, X-Men and Independence Day.

There are evil aliens who initially “come in peace” but whose intentions are to raise humans as cattle because “we need your mitochondria!” There’s some talk about an alien gene known as M-Base that is shared by the Xilians (the aliens), the mutants as well as Gigan, the Robocop of kaiju. There’s a token American actor who speaks his lines in English while everyone else speaks Japanese. How is that possible, you ask? We have just entered the world of Toho Productions, my friends, where all the dreams that Disney can’t realize come true!

Godzilla makes short order of the Roland Emmerich Godzilla (from the lousy 1998 flick) in a brief battle staged in Sydney, Australia which ends with the real Godzilla tossing the CGI Godzilla into the famous multi-domed opera house. Mothra brews up a wind storm in a desperate battle against a chain-saw wielding Gigan and literally defeats him in a blaze of glory. The other kaiju include Hedora (the smog monster), King Seesar, Anguirus, King Ghidora, Rodan, Ebirah (the lobster), Manda and, as comic relief (!), Minilla (Gojira’s son), who gets to ride shotgun in a pickup truck with grampa and grandson. I'm not kidding.

I looked over at my four-year-old periodically who seemed to be genetically designed to absorb everything the screen was throwing at him. My wife, however, looked at me several times with a What-do-you-think-we-should-do look which made me feel nothing but guilty.

During the long drawn-out scenes between the humans, mutants and aliens, my son often asked “Where’s Godzilla?” at which point I knew for a fact he was biologically mine. Although there are stand-out performances by the chief bad guy and the sword wielding American good guy (who for all the world looks like a cross between Jesse “the Body” Ventura and Josef Stalin), their scenes couldn’t compare to watching the four-hundred-foot men-in-rubber-suit monsters trash yet another styrofoam Tokyo.

I still don’t know what happened but I promise you there is more entertainment per square inch in this movie than X-Men, X-Men 2, Spiderman 1 & 2 and Fantastic Four combined. When the credits began to roll, Roy applauded spontaneously. Watching him watch Godzilla Final Wars without prejudice, with sheer enthusiasm, reminded me that kaiju films aren't made for the critics, for the cynics, or the even the older jaded fans. They're made for Roy, pure and simple.

We were home by 10:30 whereupon my son downed a bag of M&Ms, listened to me warble "Blackbird", asked me to stop singing, rolled over and went to sleep.

Directed by hot young director Ryuhei Kitamura, I give Gojira: Fainaru Uôzu 3 out of 4 crushed buildings and one defeated alien scumbag race.