Godzilla (1998 film)

Godzilla is a 1998 film about the titular character himself, a giant reptilian monster, who surfaces, leaving destruction in his wake as he strides into New York City. Dr. Niko "Nick" Tatopoulos, an earthworm scientist, Audrey Timmonds, Philippe Roaché, Victor "Animal" Palotti, and other unlikely heroes team up to stop him and save the city.

Directed by Roland Emmerich. Written by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich.

Size Does Matter.taglines

Nick

• [Every time somebody mispronounces his last name] It's "Tatopoulos!"
• That's a lot of fish.
• [after Godzilla discovers one of his dead offspring] He looks angry.

Mayor Ebert

• [After the first fight between Godzilla and the military] What the hell's the matter with you people? You caused more damage than that goddamn thing did!

Phillippe

• Running would be a good idea.

Dialogue

Nick: This animal is much too big to be some kind of lost dinosaur.

Hicks: Well, don't tell me what it isn't. Tell me what the hell it is.

Nick: Well, what do we know? It was first sighted off of the French Polynesian Pacific, right? That area has been exposed to dozens of nuclear tests over the past 30 years.

Elsie: Uh-huh. Hence the radiation.

Nick: No. More than that, I believe that this is a mutated apparition - a hybrid, caused by the fallout on these islands.

Elsie: Uh-huh. Like your earthworms?

Nick: Yes, yes. We're looking at a completely incipient creature. The dawn of a new species. The first of its kind.

---

Philippe: [to traumatized survivor of shipwreck] What did you see, old man?

Survivor: Gojira. Gojira. Gojira!

---

Hicks: O'Neal, what's going on?

O'Neal: He's back, sir. He's back. Godzilla is still alive.

Quotes about Godzilla

They tried to ruin the monster completely. They took away the only thing that worked in decades of sequels, the look of the monster itself. Then they took away everything that made Godzilla appealing to Kaiju fans, then they tied it down and shot it. Such disrespect. - Aron Ra

• Probably the most difficult aspect for Westerners to understand is that at heart Godzilla is considered a force of nature by Japanese and not just an oversized radioactive lizard. Lizards can be killed; but nature can only be dealt with. It was one of the reasons the Roland Emmerich-directed Godzilla [1998] was such a failure with the fans. Like a lot of Westerners, he just didn’t get it.
  • Norman England, as quoted in "Godzilla:Why Japan loves monster movies", BBC Culture (May 16, 2014)
• [Americans] seem unable to accept a creature that cannot be put down by their arms.
  • Shusuke Kaneko, as quoted in "The US version", Expressindia.indianexpress.com, (July 11, 1998)
• Amusingly in 1954, Toho made a giant lizard and called it a dinosaur. In 1998, Tristar re-designed Godzilla as a dinosaur, but called it a lizard. Of course that wasn’t the only thing Tristar did wrong. They tried to ruin the monster completely. They took away the only thing that worked in decades of sequels, the look of the monster itself. Then they took away everything that made Godzilla appealing to Kaiju fans, then they tied it down and shot it. Such disrespect. If you’re going to make a movie that already has a fan-base, and they are the ones who will decide whether your film will pay off, respect those fans and the story they’re paying to see.
  • Aron Ra, "Weighing in on Godzilla", Patheos (June 8, 2014)
• Throughout Godzilla, it feels as though Emmerich is embarrassed of his subject matter; the dumb jokes and one-liners ("We need bigger guns," "That's a lot of fish," and so on) are like cynical, condescending winks to the audience. It's also obvious he wants to avoid reminders of the old Japanese films - not only is the creature itself almost totally different, but scenes that the audience expects to see in a picture called Godzilla are missing. Where is Godzilla smashing buildings and incinerating entire city blocks? The fierce battles between Godzilla and the army? The monster rearing back and bellowing his high-pitched roar? The are a few Godzilla-like moments in the affair - for instance, when Godzilla hugs a skyscraper and wails into the night; why doesn't he push the edifice to the ground? Wasn't the point of making a mega-budget Godzilla the chance to relive these classical thrills with super-enhanced visual effects? Sure, a gigantic reptile jogging down Fifth Avenue is impressive, but the new Godzilla was just a way for Sony to make its own upsized, dumbed-down Jurassic Park without getting sued by Steven Spielberg. The experience leaves one wondering why they bothered, for the awe of seeing CGI dinosaurs for the first time is gone, and there's little else that's new.
  Emmerich tries vainly to create an atmosphere of dread by dowsing the movie with rain, but gloomy skies alone do not equal subtext. The original Godzilla was a harbinger of doom, but this one is a gutless wonder whose only desire is to eat fish and give New York the ultimate pest problem: a clutch of Baby Godzilla eggs.
  • Steve Ryfle (1998), Japan's Favourite Mon-star: The Unauthorized Biography of "The Big G", ECW Press, p. 342, ISBN 1550223488
• ...it's not Godzilla, it doesn't have his spirit.
  • Kenpachiro Satsuma, as quoted by Steve Ryfle (1998), Japan's Favorite Mon-star: The Unauthorized Biography of "The Big G”, ECW Press, p. 344
• When I heard that an American motion picture studio was going to produce a Godzilla film, I said, "Of course!"
  • Yukiko Takayama, as quoted by David Milner, "Yukiko Takayama Interview", Kaiju Conversations (July 1994)

Taglines

• Size Does Matter
• 1998. The year of GODZILLA!
• Something Big Is Happening
• The city that never sleeps just got a wake-up call.

Cast

• Matthew Broderick — Nick
• Jean Reno — Philippe
• Maria Pitillo — Audrey
• Hank Azaria — Animal
• Kevin Dunn — Colonel Hicks
• Michael Lerner — Mayor Ebert
• Harry Shearer — Mr. Caiman
• Arabella Field — Lucy
• Vicki Lewis — Elsie
• Doug Savant — Sergeant O'Neal
• Malcolm Danare — Dr. Craven
• Nancy Cartwright — Caiman's Secretary
• Kurt Carley — Godzilla Mo-Cap Service
• Frank Welker — Voice of Godzilla

External links

• Godzilla quotes at the Internet Movie Database