GODZILLA, KING OF THE MONSTERS (2019)

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *cosmological, sociological*

While KING OF THE MONSTERS isn't quite bold enough to qualify as one of the best iterations of the Big G, it's a huge improvement over the preceding film in the series, the 2014 GODZILLA.

One of the best changes is the selection of Michael Dougherty as the director, in contrast to previous helmsman Gareth Edwards, who tended to stage the 2014 film in scenes dominated by darkness. In contrast, Dougherty-- who, among others, collaborated with one of the writers of the 2014 film-- makes sure that all of the scenes of big monster-combat are easy to follow. Whereas the 2014 film was trying too hard to keep things realistic, Dougherty's film is a valentine to the best of the Toho Studios monster-mythology. I'm not crediting Dougherty alone with this idea, for clearly the producers had to pay Toho for the use of other kaiju, principally King Ghidorah (Godzilla's principal foe), Mothra and Rodan. The final film in the series, projected for 2020, is also based on the Toho mythology crossbred with that of Universal's only giant creature, in a rethinking of 1962's KING KONG VS. GODZILLA.  (KING includes a brief glimpse at Kong on his Skull Island stomping-grounds, no doubt to build fan-support for the 2020 film.)

The roles of the human characters are marginally better in that they go from being "not interesting at all" in 2014 to "slightly interesting" in 2019. The principal characters-- Mark Russell, ex-wife Emma, and their teen daughter Madison-- are introduced as if the audience ought to already know them, though this is their first appearance. We soon learn that Emma possesses an almost religious devotion to "the Titans," as the various prehistoric beings have been named, while Mark despises the monsters because he and Emma lost one of their children during a monster-rampage.

Most of the prehistoric behemoths are, unlike Godzilla, still hibernating beneath the earth, and Emma becomes worried that the American military will use her monster-research to find and destroy these sleeping Titans. Thus she collaborates with a British terrorist (whose motives are inconsistent at best) to make sure that all 17 of the monsters are revived, so that they can become the new dominant creatures on Planet Earth, and in some way reverse humankind's tendency to reduce the planet to ruin.

Emma Russell's extreme eco-terrorist agenda is rattled off a little too quickly to have any dramatic impact, and to be sure she reverses her course to protect her own kid, though she was apparently OK with the kids of other mothers falling into monster-peril. Yet she's such a blah character that I neither liked nor disliked her: she obviously was just there to serve a function in the plot, as much as were Mark and Madison. Indeed, some of the supporting side-characters, such as Rick Stanton (modeled after the "Rick" character in RICK AND MORTY) and Doctor Serizawa (modeled after the heroic scientist from the 1954 GOJIRA), are far more compelling than the dysfunctional family of the Russells.

If one can make the decision to ignore the human characters and their dubious pontifications, then GODZILLA KING OF THE MONSTERS delivers what the Toho series did best: portraying the impossible vision of a world where giants not only walk the earth, but spend most of their time fighting for supremacy. I was particularly taken with a Mothra/Rodan battle, given that the two kaiju never have an extended fight in the Toho films. That said, the three major battles between the two "apex predators," Godzilla and Ghidorah, are the film's best effects, and the only downside is that I don't know how a Godzilla/Kong matchup can possibly improve on these mammoth dust-ups.