Rent Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)

Epic, but empty in equal measures - Godzilla: King of the Monsters review by JD

Id give this 3.5 if i could, but rounded it up as at the end of the day this is Godzilla AND entertaining.

There are much worse films out there certainly as far as monster films go this is pretty good.

This uses lots of monster on monster action to get around what feels a pretty empty film plot wise and the action scenes are by the numbers.

But the action is a plenty, it has good effects and lots of noise.

It also does well to avoid the cheese that ruins so many films like this. The 'annoying' kid is Millie Bobby Brown and she isnt in the slightest bit annoying. Head military guy is a woman, but she carries the position well - rather than simply being better than all men she carries herself like a leader and is utterly believable.

We dont get half a film taken up with soap opera character building (im looking at you independence day). The broken family is a broken family and the film doesnt dwell on it.

As for the monster action it was predictable and it felt a bit like a rocky film, even if it was good. It certainly wasnt clever, just entertaining.

I liked it and i think its got its head firmly above the water. But a classic it isnt. Which is a pity as Godzilla is one of the greatest screen names of all time.

Run as fast as you can - Godzilla: King of the Monsters review by DT

Don't waste your time watching this...… load of noise and special effects but that's it. The story around all is so far fetched it's ludicrous. 10 year olds might be ok with it...lol

Where are people? - Godzilla: King of the Monsters review by CP Customer

Shockingly bad. Action sequences that you can't see, apparently no daylight ever, cities containing no people, central characters that you are supposed to root for but are simply self absorbed horrible people, good actors left just to look at screens and state the obvious...

A big budget mess which is s shame as the director has done good work previously

Kids stuff - Godzilla: King of the Monsters review by HM

Well it kicks off with a monster rampage and doesn't let up. A daft threadbare plot with the usual Godzilla is out for the count; nope he is up and running again stuff. It hardly troubles the brain cells so it needs a home cinema sound system to do the action justice; bang crash, roar and squeal.

As with most blockbuster special effects based franchises, the charm wears off and the plots get dafter, so you are left with a visual spectacle serving up more of the same. Poor movie.

Good fun - Godzilla: King of the Monsters review by AL

Film was good fun. Nothing special, nothing bad, it was ok.

Not giving anything away, as this is seen in virtually every film. But there did seem to be a lot more key characters constantly just last second escaping, over and over again. I know all action films are like this, if they weren't then these films would be a lot shortly, if the hero died in the first 5 minutes. But noticed this more in this film. Perhaps it's because of the film's running time, which did seem to drag a little.

But it is good fun still. Couldn't remember what happened in the first one. I'll probably forget what happened in this one. But would be happy to see another, which I'm sure will happen.

Godzilla Stomps Things to Bits and Punches other Monsters - this is what it should be. - Godzilla: King of the Monsters review by Strovey

Godzilla: King of the Monsters is about great big monsters stomping the crap out of cities and people and then having no-holds-barred fights with each other. It is that simple. The original Japanese versions were as bonkers fun but had an underlying message about the nuclear proliferation and horror of having atomic bombs dropped on your country. Perhaps it may not have seemed that obvious, but it was there amongst Tokyo being stamped into matchwood.

The message for this 2019 version is the planet’s health and how if we do choose the correct path then we will not need Godzilla or his wacky enemies to destroy the planet will do it ourselves. Really though this is about massive monsters stomping cities into rumble and roundhouse pounding each other with much fire and roaring.

In this respect Godzilla: King of the Monsters works perfectly. It knows what it is, director Michael Dougherty apparently loved these films and the little kid in him shows in every frame on the screen. The cast Vera Farmiga, Millie Bobby Brown, in particular, are great, play this all with a straight bat which is the only way to do this. It is camp and silly but if you wink to the audience you ruin it. Kyle Chandler, having taken on King Kong a few years ago and got away, now takes on Godzilla, his mates and enemies and his own estranged family this time around. Charles Dance pops up, in cold bad mode but at least not two-dimensional although ruthlessly evillike only Charles Dance can be.

For all the acting talent up there on the screen, Godzilla: King of the Monsters lives or dies by its monsters. The fighting, roaring, jumping up and down a bit and general mayhem by a roster of rather silly monsters is perfect. It took me back to the days of stamping around the fields near my house being a monster whilst my brother and his mates laughed at me. For me this was the purpose of the film.

So, what if the storyline involvies separated parents, mistaken motivations, two conflicting ideas, one of which is obviously ‘bad’ this is not the purpose of the film, but it pads it out, so something is there. It is perfunctory and perhaps it could have been better but in all honesty I did not care. How can you care when you can watch a giant moth curing and giant ‘lizard-king-thing’ but cuddling him?

Godzilla: King of the Monsters is a giant monster film with some human bits as filler before the WWE of creature fighting gets going. The human bits are not the best, but the actors are good and besides the aforementioned thespians we also get Sally Hawkins, Bradley Whitfield in best Bradley Whitfield-mode, Thomas Middleditch so much better here as the ‘nerd’ that he was in Zombieland 2, shoring up the human roster.

To me this was all good. It made me feel the exhilaration of being a little boy watching monsters knocking the stars out of each other. Perhaps I was in the right mood to watch that type of action, who knows?

Godzilla: King of the Monsters is camp, silly, trashy, daft but above all it was fun, really fun.

Pointless Sequel - Godzilla: King of the Monsters review by GI

A clunky, very noisy and unsubtle sequel to the 2014 reboot. You can see that a lot of money went into this and to be sure it's occasionally visually very impressive. But it's all rather pointless and confusing and by about half way through you just want it to end, but boy does it drag. Following on from the earlier film we have estranged scientist couple Kyle Chandler and Vera Farmiga getting mixed up in a secret organisation called Monarch that is studying and searching for the newly discovered 'Titans'. They've found seventeen of them around the globe and guess what? Yes they all more or less get woken up and fight one another. This cues loads of massive destruction, lots of roaring and even some vague attempt at religious allegory to try and make it all seem serious and worthwhile. An empty film that makes 2014s Godzilla look much better.