Editorials
Putting the ‘God’ Back in ‘Godzilla’: Our Visit to the Set of ‘King of the Monsters’
A star-studded cast featuring the likes of Bradley Whitford, Kyle Chandler, Ken Watanabe, O’Shea Jackson, and Zhang Ziyi are all gathered around a large conference table of a high-security war room – The Monarch war room to be precise. The camera continuously circles around the group capturing their heated discussion. It appears the majority of the group is intent on capturing “The Titans” alive. The obstacle in their way? A group of anarchist militia who have run off with “The Orca” along with kidnapping Mark Russell’s (Chandler) wife and daughter, played by Vera Farmiga and Millie Bobby Brown respectively. Russell’s concern is not of the Titan’s safety or securing “The Orca” but rescuing his family in one piece. While the names may seem different, rest assured, the players are all the same.
These “Titans” are merely a blanket term for the Kaiju of so many Godzilla films before. “The Orca” is the codename given to a massive larva discovered in the jungles of China. Hmm? Larva? It’s no secret, but come the film’s release on May 31 we’ll be witnessing an all-star lineup of giant monster mayhem on the big screen. Director Michael Dougherty‘s Godzilla: King of the Monsters aims to be the ultimate rendition of an Americanized Big G. To accomplish this, the film seemingly pulls upon the vast legacy of films predating its production. Godzilla will be battling legendary foes Mothra, Rodan, and the biggest and baddest of them all, King Ghidorah.
“It doesn’t really get much better than these four. These are the crowned jewels of Toho,” gushes Dougherty.
Beyond the scientists of Monarch who seek to preserve the creatures, there’s even a special military unit formed to protect and defend against the giants, G-Team. Not to be confused with G-Force from the Heisei era of Godzilla films. A mistake even one of the film’s stars, O’Shea Jackson is quick to make.
“There’s certain divisions of military, and then there’s G-Force,” he quickly corrects himself to namedrop the modern incarnation, “There’s G-Team. There’s the cream of the crop, and then there’s the crazy cream of the crop that make it to G-Team. You know, you got to get up on a different side of the bed to hunt monsters willingly.” These updated concepts from classic Godzilla canon are refreshing, especially considering the previous US installments to toy with the Toho universe have attempted to distance themselves greatly from the source material.
In the words of Dougherty himself, “We’re putting the ‘God’ back in ‘Godzilla.”
In the Land of Gods and Monsters
In the wake of Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla, some fans were a bit miffed. On one hand, the grounded and realistic depiction of Godzilla was met with much praise, yet the lack of…well, screen-time for Godzilla and the absence of a creative foe (the MUTOs weren’t the most interesting from a design standpoint) left others cold. Love or hate the film, it was the start of a new shared universe of giant monster flicks; the MonsterVerse as it has since become known. Edwards went on to play in a much bigger cinematic sandbox with Rouge One: A Star Wars Story which left the director’s seat wide open. To fill the position, a filmmaker with a vision for how to pick up where Edwards left off and to start the world building needed to launch a successful shared universe was needed.
Michael Dougherty, certainly most famous to readers of BD due to his penchant for holiday horror by way of insta-classics Trick r’ Treat and Krampus, was to many, a surprising choice. Those naysayers might have felt a film of this scope was too large a leap for the director of “small” genre films. At the top of the interview, a fellow reporter innocently started with this line of questioning. Dougherty, however, wasted no time in shutting that ish down. “I don’t know if X2 and Superman count as small.” He’s right. Sure, his two directorial features are both modestly budgeted horror fare (still major studio productions), but he’s been in and around much larger sets from the beginnings of his career as a screenwriter and animator. To me, a Michael Dougherty directed Godzilla is nerd-gasm inducing. As a huge fan of the series himself, it seemed like a no-brainer. “When I got the job, I went back and looked at an old childhood Bible…I found an old Bible where I had drawn Godzilla into various Bible illustrations. I figured if you add Godzilla to anything, it makes it better.” That, my friends, is a factual statement.
Despite obvious Super X-loads of talent and passion for the material, Dougherty sealed the gig over a conversation with one of the film’s producers, Alex Garcia. Garcia recalls what excited him so much about Dougherty’s pitch:
“He really had a handle on how to [take] that grounded sensibility that we tried to bring in with Gareth – looking at our plans for expanding the mythology, he brought his own spin to it that was super exciting, but also very steeped in real-world thematics as the franchise has always been. It’s very much about how we deal with these threats that are bigger than ourselves, how we deal with our demons.”
Dougherty furthers the notion that his film is respectful of the groundwork laid by Edwards while managing to up the ante in terms of monster-y goodness.
“I hesitate to say it,” realizing the massive gauntlet he’s about to throw down, “but I would call it the Aliens to Gareth’s Alien.”
It appears that James Cameron’s pinnacle mashup of sci-fi and horror is quite a touchstone for the director in King of the Monsters. It’s mentioned a total count of five times during our brief interview.
“The first movie was really about Ford Brody’s character sort of weaving his way through that adventure, and Monarch was the backdrop for that. Here, Monarch is the focus. So I found that concept really fascinating – the idea there is a secret agency tracking giant monsters. [There was] an opportunity to craft Monarch as a group of heroes…What I appreciate about Gareth’s film is that it took things seriously. I think there’s a fine line between the two. This isn’t a knee-slapping comedy by any means. But, again, if you compare Alien which is a very straight science fiction film without a lot of yuks compared to Aliens which was sort of – had a bit more fun and tongue and cheek moments. [This is] somewhere in the middle there.”
A common sentiment repeated throughout the day, these creatures are more than mere monsters. They’re gods. They existed long before us, and as Dougherty put it, “We’re the invasive species.” It’s an element that has certainly been touched upon throughout the various reincarnations of Mothra within the Toho films, but not explored much with Kaiju on the whole. It’s this reverence for these deities coming from Dougherty that makes this lifelong G-fan confident in what he’s bringing to the table. This is a richer tale steeped inasmuch the history of these beings as it is the modern science used to understand them. The story will take audiences all across the globe as evidenced by concept drawings of Rodan rising from an erupting volcano, massive underwater laboratories, and ancient ruins with stone etchings resembling a potentially familiar pair of twins. Dougherty did promise we may see the Shobijin fairies, only to follow with “I don’t know how big they’ll be, but they might make an appearance.”
From a God’s Lips to Your Ears
One thing most people agreed upon with Godzilla 2014 is the look of the big man himself (except for those fat shamers out there). It certainly could have gone left with an attempt to differentiate the new series from the original. Never forget 1998. However, in regards to Kaiju purists, there was limited risk to pit Godzilla against a new creation, the MUTOs, as opposed to chancing a bastardization with an additional Toho headliner. For Godzilla 2019, the pressure is most certainly on. King of the Monsters will see Godzilla battling some of the biggest names from the Toho kingdom of monsters: Rodan, Mothra, and King Ghidorah. It’s a bold move that has fans excited. Even Jackson couldn’t believe it when he heard the news, “Anytime Ghidorah is mentioned, it’s just like ‘No way. No way!’ No way, that’s the second fight? It goes down. It’s not going up.”
To bring these iconic men-in-suit creations to life using modern technology and have them make sense within the more grounded reality of the MonsterVerse, it’s without question a tall order. Dougherty, however, remains un-shook.
“To me, it’s important that the silhouettes of the creatures honor the originals…you need to be able to look at the silhouette of your monster whether it’s the Alien or Godzilla, Rodan or whatever, and be able to identify it. You can’t have Ghidorah without the two tails and three heads and he’s got to have the right amount of horns. And then the wings are a very distinct shape. They’re not traditional western dragons. Those have been the marching orders from the beginning is to make sure Ghidorah looks like an Eastern dragon versus a Western. You know. we don’t want them to look like Game of Thrones dragons.”
From Sam in Trick r’ Treat to the multilayered concept of his Krampus design (layers of which we’ve apparently still yet to see), Dougherty speaks about the designs in such a thoughtful manner. What if these creatures were real? Yes, simply put, we’d likely be terrified, but his focus is on the deeper story – beyond simple plot mechanisms.
“The bigger challenge [has] been Mothra. How do you take a giant moth and make it look cool? It can’t just be a moth magnified big.
“The beauty of it is that I had to go down a rabbit hole and research moths…There are so many different species of moths that have very different shapes. Some of which almost look predatory. Some of them are much more sleek and a little scary looking than the typical Mothra design. That allowed some leeway. The approach with Mothra is to create an insectoid, huge creature that looks believable from every angle, and especially in motion. But, also looking at the different kinds of aspects you can draw from nature: bioluminescence, moth dust – and also going back to the idea that these creatures were once worshiped as gods. What would she look like flying in the sky at night? I wanted to jump off this idea that if you saw Mothra hovering in the sky at night you’d think you were looking at an angel.”
It’s easy to see just what he means when up close to a model of the creature, designed by ADI. The design is every bit as majestic as Dougherty intended. Mothra’s wings are absolutely massive, the wingspan easily doubling the size of her body. Yet, there’s still a fierceness to the creature with mandibles that resemble sharp claws – ready to tear into the flesh of an opposing Titan. Despite any changes, the model was instantly recognizable as Mothra. “Toho has very specific requirements. All of which I completely agree with,” Dougherty told us.
Even more important than the look of the monsters is their iconic roars, screeches, and shrieks. Since the original ’54 film’s use of leather gloves, pine resin, and a double bass to create the echoing wail for Gojira, that sound has become intrinsically linked to the series. “I think you should be able to close your eyes and listen to the creatures and be able to identify them without having any visual whatsoever,” Dougherty explains. His intent is keep the distinct essence of each creature. “What I did was, I gave a supercut of all the creature noises from the original films to the sound designers and said, ‘Start there,’ and then start layering and playing. But they have to be as distinct as the original films.” He even enlisted the production sound mixer, Whitt Norris, to create a monster sized set of speakers (nicknamed “Behemoth”) in order to pipe the sound effects on set during filming.
“Any scene that involves our cast running and screaming in terror – there’s a lot of them – I’ve been playing the creature noises. And it really ups their performance…In some ways, the creatures have been on set with us.”
For the Love of Godzilla
“The Hanna Barbera cartoon, that weird Ferris Bueller one, I love all Godzillas. I’m a huge fan,” states a beaming O’Shea Jackson Jr. He comes off as jovial and excited with that quintessential “kid in a candy store” vibe. Playing one of the key members of the G-Team, Jackson isn’t allowed to reveal many specifics about his role or the film itself. “I’m nerding out pretty hard. There’s something I can’t really speak on. We definitely give you – you get that burn in the movie. You’re going to go on the internet immediately after.” While much of the film beyond the basic setup was kept shrouded in mystery, there was a sense of commitment to the material from all those involved. O’Shea teases out the evolution of Godzilla even more, “We’re still learning about Godzilla – exactly what he is…More gets unraveled the further that this story goes. I’m glad people are getting to further understand what Godzilla represents.”
The people working to uncover the “what” are Monarch, a government organization first gleamed in the ’14 film. However, Dougherty’s film is going to bust the gates wide open. We were given a tour of the intricately built Monarch set. A cavernous tunnel leads you into their headquarters where lines of glass-enclosed offices open up to a large area filled with high tech gadgetry and flashing computer screens. A massive image on the wall lays out a map of various Titan sightings, their name, and any important information. Some names were familiar. Kong, for instance. Others, less so. We have Abaddon from Cambodia, Leviathan from beneath the Indian Ocean, and Sargon of Mexico.
Beyond the Monarch lab, there was an expansive, chilly-looking Arctic diorama representing a crashed military plane and a snow-filled wasteland, all leading to the entrance of the Antarctic Monarch facility, Outpost 32. To horror fans, this should be an obvious homage. Of course, Dougherty is pretty quick to cop to it. “Yes, Outpost 32 is a total nod to The Thing. It’s one of my all-time favorite movies. I like the idea that once Outpost 31 burnt down, they had to build another one. So who knows?” By no means does that mean we’ll be seeing a full-blown horror film like the John Carpenter classic, but as a fan of the genre, Dougherty doesn’t plan to shy away from varied genre elements.
“I wouldn’t call it a ‘horror’ movie. There’s definitely horror elements. I’m definitely trying to bring in some of that. Obviously, [I’m] going for a lot of suspense and fear and tension and, occasionally, some gross-out moments. The fact that you referenced The Thing was fitting. Because regeneration is one of the things also drawn from nature. Uh, I’ll leave it at that, but there’s definitely a little bit more horror to it than I think the previous film had.”
The suspense he refers to can be easily imagined from the ruins of Fenway Park erected in the middle of the giant warehouse where filming is taking place. Garcia describes the scene as we look on at a gorgeous conceptual drawing of young star Millie Bobby Brown staring out from the press box at Fenway Park into the eye of a giant monster. “There’s a sequence in the movie where Millie Bobby Brown’s character has run into the city, which is where her family’s from, trying to escape and ends up trapped alone in Fenway Park which had been used as an evacuation site…She comes face to face with [Ghidorah]…And then Ghidorah starts to lay waste to the stadium as she’s trying to run out.”
From all the promises of massive monster action and exciting set-pieces, it’s easy to lose sight of Godzilla’s origins as an allegory for nuclear weaponry. Kyle Chandler, admittedly not a fan prior to taking on the lead role, dove into the original films in preparation.
“In the ’54 version, two things that blew me away – There’s a scene on a cable car…where there’s two gentlemen and a lady on a train and she flippantly says, ‘First Nagasaki, and now this!’…The other one…Godzilla, you’ll notice, when he vaporizes people – they’re left as shadows. It shouldn’t be lost how important this was to the filmmakers, what it was doing and saying….Obviously, it’s not lost anymore. Today’s August 8th, inbetween the day[s] of those two droppings of the bombs. That’s something I find very interesting about this whole deal.”
Ultimately, I can safely say that I feel the film is in good hands. They’re not shying away from the not so jolly green giant or his origins. As Garcia puts it, “Godzilla is the star of the movie.” I believe Dougherty knows just how to handle the property and set the series up for success in the years to come with future films in the MonsterVerse. The director certainly put it best:
“Besides laying the groundwork for the organization and sort of, I hope, a visual bible for what Monarch is – which is still developed from Gareth’s film…I’m hoping it gets passed on to the next film. It’s kind of like an exquisite corpse. The artwork gets passed from one artist to another. Ideally, they’re adding new and interesting layers to it.”
Come May 31st, we’ll all find out together just how exquisite it is.
Soon after the New Hollywood generation took over the entertainment industry, they started having children. And more than any filmmakers that came before—they were terrified. Rosemary’s Baby (1968), The Exorcist (1973), The Omen (1976), Eraserhead (1977), The Brood (1979), The Shining (1980), Possession (1981), and many others all deal, at least in part, with the fears of becoming or being a parent. What if my child turns out to be a monster? is corrupted by some evil force? or turns out to be the fucking Antichrist? What if I screw them up somehow, or can’t help them, or even go insane and try to kill them? Horror has always been at its best when exploring relatable fears through extreme circumstances. A prime example of this is Larry Cohen’s 1974 monster-baby movie It’s Alive, which explores the not only the rollercoaster of emotions that any parent experiences when confronted with the difficulties of raising a child, but long-standing questions of who or what is at fault when something goes horribly wrong.
Cohen begins making his underlying points early in the film as Frank Davis (John P. Ryan) discusses the state of the world with a group of expectant fathers in a hospital waiting room. They discuss the “overabundance of lead” in foods and the environment, smog, and pesticides that only serve to produce roaches that are “bigger, stronger, and harder to kill.” Frank comments that this is “quite a world to bring a kid into.” This has long been a discussion point among people when trying to decide whether to have kids or not. I’ve had many conversations with friends who have said they feel it’s irresponsible to bring children into such a violent, broken, and dangerous world, and I certainly don’t begrudge them this. My wife and I did decide to have children but that doesn’t mean that it’s been easy.
Immediately following this scene comes It’s Alive’s most famous sequence in which Frank’s wife Lenore (Sharon Farrell) is the only person left alive in her delivery room, the doctors clawed and bitten to death by her mutant baby, which has escaped. “What does my baby look like!? What’s wrong with my baby!?” she screams as nurses wheel her frantically into a recovery room. The evening that had begun with such joy and excitement at the birth of their second child turned into a nightmare. This is tough for me to write, but on some level, I can relate to this whiplash of emotion. When my second child was born, they came about five weeks early. I’ll use the pronouns “they/them” for privacy reasons when referring to my kids. Our oldest was still very young and went to stay with my parents and we sped off to the hospital where my wife was taken into an operating room for an emergency c-section. I was able to carry our newborn into the NICU (natal intensive care unit) where I was assured that this was routine for all premature births. The nurses assured me there was nothing to worry about and the baby looked big and healthy. I headed to where my wife was taken to recover to grab a few winks assuming that everything was fine. Well, when I awoke, I headed back over to the NICU to find that my child was not where I left them. The nurse found me and told me that the baby’s lungs were underdeveloped, and they had to put them in a special room connected to oxygen tubes and wires to monitor their vitals.
It’s difficult to express the fear that overwhelmed me in those moments. Everything turned out okay, but it took a while and I’m convinced to this day that their anxiety struggles spring from these first weeks of life. As our children grew, we learned that two of the three were on the spectrum and that anxiety, depression, ADHD, and OCD were also playing a part in their lives. Parents, at least speaking for myself, can’t help but blame themselves for the struggles their children face. The “if only” questions creep in and easily overcome the voices that assure us that it really has nothing to do with us. In the film, Lenore says, “maybe it’s all the pills I’ve been taking that brought this on.” Frank muses aloud about how he used to think that Frankenstein was the monster, but when he got older realized he was the one that made the monster. The aptly named Frank is wondering if his baby’s mutation is his fault, if he created the monster that is terrorizing Los Angeles. I have made plenty of “if only” statements about myself over the years. “If only I hadn’t had to work so much, if only I had been around more when they were little.” Mothers may ask themselves, “did I have a drink, too much coffee, or a cigarette before I knew I was pregnant? Was I too stressed out during the pregnancy?” In other words, most parents can’t help but wonder if it’s all their fault.
At one point in the film, Frank goes to the elementary school where his baby has been sighted and is escorted through the halls by police. He overhears someone comment about “screwed up genes,” which brings about age-old questions of nature vs. nurture. Despite the voices around him from doctors and detectives that say, “we know this isn’t your fault,” Frank can’t help but think it is, and that the people who try to tell him it isn’t really think it’s his fault too. There is no doubt that there is a hereditary element to the kinds of mental illness struggles that my children and I deal with. But, and it’s a bit but, good parenting goes a long way in helping children deal with these struggles. Kids need to know they’re not alone, a good parent can provide that, perhaps especially parents that can relate to the same kinds of struggles. The question of nature vs. nurture will likely never be entirely answered but I think there’s more than a good chance that “both/and” is the case. Around the midpoint of the film, Frank agrees to disown the child and sign it over for medical experimentation if caught or killed. Lenore and the older son Chris (Daniel Holzman) seek to nurture and teach the baby, feeling that it is not a monster, but a member of the family.
It’s Alive takes these ideas to an even greater degree in the fact that the Davis Baby really is a monster, a mutant with claws and fangs that murders and eats people. The late ’60s and early ’70s also saw the rise in mass murderers and serial killers which heightened the nature vs. nurture debate. Obviously, these people were not literal monsters but human beings that came from human parents, but something had gone horribly wrong. Often the upbringing of these killers clearly led in part to their antisocial behavior, but this isn’t always the case. It’s Alive asks “what if a ‘monster’ comes from a good home?” In this case is it society, environmental factors, or is it the lead, smog, and pesticides? It is almost impossible to know, but the ending of the film underscores an uncomfortable truth—even monsters have parents.
As the film enters its third act, Frank joins the hunt for his child through the Los Angeles sewers and into the L.A. River. He is armed with a rifle and ready to kill on sight, having divorced himself from any relationship to the child. Then Frank finds his baby crying in the sewers and his fatherly instincts take over. With tears in his eyes, he speaks words of comfort and wraps his son in his coat. He holds him close, pats and rocks him, and whispers that everything is going to be okay. People often wonder how the parents of those who perform heinous acts can sit in court, shed tears, and defend them. I think it’s a complex issue. I’m sure that these parents know that their child has done something evil, but that doesn’t change the fact that they are still their baby. Your child is a piece of yourself formed into a whole new human being. Disowning them would be like cutting off a limb, no matter what they may have done. It doesn’t erase an evil act, far from it, but I can understand the pain of a parent in that situation. I think It’s Alive does an exceptional job placing its audience in that situation.
Despite the serious issues and ideas being examined in the film, It’s Alive is far from a dour affair. At heart, it is still a monster movie and filled with a sense of fun and a great deal of pitch-black humor. In one of its more memorable moments, a milkman is sucked into the rear compartment of his truck as red blood mingles with the white milk from smashed bottles leaking out the back of the truck and streaming down the street. Just after Frank agrees to join the hunt for his baby, the film cuts to the back of an ice cream truck with the words “STOP CHILDREN” emblazoned on it. It’s a movie filled with great kills, a mutant baby—created by make-up effects master Rick Baker early in his career, and plenty of action—and all in a PG rated movie! I’m telling you, the ’70s were wild. It just also happens to have some thoughtful ideas behind it as well.
Which was Larry Cohen’s specialty. Cohen made all kinds of movies, but his most enduring have been his horror films and all of them tackle the social issues and fears of the time they were made. God Told Me To (1976), Q: The Winged Serpent (1982), and The Stuff (1985) are all great examples of his socially aware, low-budget, exploitation filmmaking with a brain and It’s Alive certainly fits right in with that group. Cohen would go on to write and direct two sequels, It Lives Again (aka It’s Alive 2) in 1978 and It’s Alive III: Island of the Alive in 1987 and is credited as a co-writer on the 2008 remake. All these films explore the ideas of parental responsibility in light of the various concerns of the times they were made including abortion rights and AIDS.
Fifty years after It’s Alive was initially released, it has only become more relevant in the ensuing years. Fears surrounding parenthood have been with us since the beginning of time but as the years pass the reasons for these fears only seem to become more and more profound. In today’s world the conversation of the fathers in the waiting room could be expanded to hormones and genetic modifications in food, terrorism, climate change, school and other mass shootings, and other threats that were unknown or at least less of a concern fifty years ago. Perhaps the fearmongering conspiracy theories about chemtrails and vaccines would be mentioned as well, though in a more satirical fashion, as fears some expectant parents encounter while endlessly doomscrolling Facebook or Twitter. Speaking for myself, despite the struggles, the fears, and the sadness that sometimes comes with having children, it’s been worth it. The joys ultimately outweigh all of that, but I understand the terror too. Becoming a parent is no easy choice, nor should it be. But as I look back, I can say that I’m glad we made the choice we did.
I wonder if Frank and Lenore can say the same thing.
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