With Attack On Titan, its sequel and accompanying television miniseries releasing through this fall, Toho is now focused on brining Godzilla back to Japan.
Godzilla hasn’t had an impact in years, and didn’t become part of the general public’s conscious until Warner Bros. rebooted the film here in the States last summer.
Now, with the new Japanese Godzilla, the stakes are high. Not only do they need to make a movie better than the U.S. remake (that won’t be hard), but they need to reinvigorate the franchise that’s become nothing more than a cheap rubber costumed joke.
Shinji Higuchi, the director and special-effects whiz chosen by Toho Co. for the made-in-Japan comeback, is hoping to one-up last year’s Hollywood version, with not only the biggest Godzilla filmed ever, but one that takes up challenges previous ones haven’t attempted, reports ABC News.
“Godzilla had to deliver more and more, responding to calls from the audience, as well as creators,” said Higuchi of the series’ trappings.
“Godzilla went through these stages, resetting itself, developing and then succumbing to exhaustion, until it just got so big it had to stop.”
And so Higuchi plans to keep his Godzilla, in a sense, simple, stripped to the essentials.
With shooting to begin next month, Higuchi is under order to keep Godzilla details secret. But he is promising the most terrifying Godzilla that Japan’s cutting-edge special-effects movie-making can muster.
Higuchi’s special-effects techniques were amply demonstrated in Attack on Titan.
The work combines computer graphics with manipulating a towering doll of rippling red muscle that resembles a giant biological anatomy chart, as well as special-effects filmmaking, using actors moving through miniatures, to depict grotesquely enlarged humans.
Applying to Godzilla that kind of technology, which Higuchi calls “hybrid,” has never been attempted in Japan. Higuchi is promising just that.
But why is Higuchi the right man for the job?
“I’m confident I am among the top-50 lovers of Godzilla in the world. That’s how much I love Godzilla,” he explained. “Maybe I’m not in the top 10, but definitely in the top 50.”
I’ve never thought Godzilla was scary, and he’s never been a great anti-hero either. The idea that they’re going to try and make a terrifying movie out of Godzilla is more than exciting as most feel more action-oriented than anything else.
What would you like to see? First and foremost, I want there to be some character interaction with Godzilla, as opposed to watching from miles away like in the U.S. remake. Second, we need some fresh mythology, and for Godzilla to be a real threat to the entire planet…
