Review Roundup: Takashi Yamazaki’s Godzilla Minus Zero

The earnestness of Godzilla Minus Zero is strained compared to its predecessor, and heavily reliant on story contrivances. It still has power, since the cast is committed 1,000% and Yamazaki is an incredibly skilled director, but one can see the film wobble under the uneven weight of its dramatic ambitions and increasingly absurd storyline. The emotional depths reached in Godzilla Minus Zero have more to do with our residual investment in the characters returning from Godzilla Minus One, rather than what actually transpires in the sequel.

While the future is still uncertain by the end of this latest Godzilla movie (which feels very much like the middle chapter of a trilogy), Minus Zero makes rewarding sense of why the series’ numbers are starting to add up.

[A] grand monster extravaganza first and foremost, with a long, awe-inspiring climactic set piece, while also assuring us we truly care about the humans scurrying around underfoot. Like Minus One, it fulfills all the requirements of its genre and then some, and then goes further to elevate the form to true art.

[W]hile not as thematically resonant as Minus One, Minus Zero is a phenomenal kaiju movie. The third act contains some of the most insane giant monster action I’ve ever seen, all realized through astonishing CGI that smartly emphasizes the monsters’ scale, weight, and impact on the environment. Throughout the final tussle. my jaw was left flapping uselessly on the floor as I soaked up the carnage.

It’s big, thrilling, gorgeous, and makes an excellent companion to its Oscar-winning predecessor. The story pays off everything left open by that previous film while also amping up the action, adding new characters, digging deeper into the originals, and ultimately leaving its world with more places to go, if it so chooses. The 2023 original is probably slightly superior, but this is pretty damn close.

Publicity for the film has implied this would be the last installment of the Minus continuity, and if that is the case, then it couldn’t have picked a better finale. While undoubtedly larger in scale than the previous film, the same amount of care has been put into every aspect of the storytelling, making for a movie that will thrill franchise devotees as well as leave newcomers in awe.

Godzilla’s greatest foe is an appropriate antagonist for Minus Zero, which aims to be bigger, better, and (especially) louder than its predecessor. The unprecedented success of Godzilla Minus One put a lot of pressure on Yamazaki — who, along with writing and directing, supervised the film’s VFX — and his team to outdo their own Oscar-winning VFX work. And they have succeeded, as Godzilla Minus Zero is a triumph of special effects.

Even though this is the second time around with Yamazaki’s spin on the series, the luster has not worn off. In an age of CGI slop, where graphics work gets sloppily split among various effects houses vying to do the work cheaper and faster, the care in Godzilla Minus Zero towers head and shoulders above the competition, like the titular monster over a city skyline. There’s a genuine tactility to the scaly exteriors, and even the sinewy interior tissues, of these creatures.

[S]uffice it to say that Minus Zero taps into Toho history to add new dimensions to Yamazaki’s wartime melodrama. And, of course, the titular titan does show up (eventually), though his presence exists as a force of nature to be steered more than stopped, controlled more than conquered.