Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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Mechagigan
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by Mechagigan »

Jatahaxe wrote: I guess what I meant was it barely does anything new with Godzilla. He doesn't do much new except dance like a lunatic (admittedly a priceless scene). No new monsters, just a new arena and a purdy cool alien invasion, a plot device that Toho would go on to try all kinds of new and exciting things with later in the series.
The plot is really what made it for me; true, Godzilla pretty much did the same old stuff - fought Ghidorah with Rodan, messed around with Aliens, whatever. But the story and the characters were so enjoyable, that didn't matter.

To me, the actual story of the movie (including stuff like characters) is most important. The monster stuff needs to be good, too, but it needs to be surrounded by something worth watching to make with worth getting to.

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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by kamilleblu »

Mechagigan wrote:
Jatahaxe wrote: I guess what I meant was it barely does anything new with Godzilla. He doesn't do much new except dance like a lunatic (admittedly a priceless scene). No new monsters, just a new arena and a purdy cool alien invasion, a plot device that Toho would go on to try all kinds of new and exciting things with later in the series.
The plot is really what made it for me; true, Godzilla pretty much did the same old stuff - fought Ghidorah with Rodan, messed around with Aliens, whatever. But the story and the characters were so enjoyable, that didn't matter.

To me, the actual story of the movie (including stuff like characters) is most important. The monster stuff needs to be good, too, but it needs to be surrounded by something worth watching to make with worth getting to.
Aaron Taylor Johnson's Ford can't hold a candle to Nick Adams and Akira Takarada's performances in Monster Zero. Subbed or dubbed. If there is going to be long stretches of nothing, I'd rather spend it watching them.

Doing something innovative isn't too important as long as you do an exceptional job with what you do. But if you're going to nitpick Monster Zero, G14 didn't really offer much "new" either besides the novelty of seeing Godzilla in CGI. Which technically isn't new either. We've seen him swim, tail swipe, fight, and shoot plasma down an opponent's mouth before.

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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by Jatahaxe »

kamilleblu wrote:
Mechagigan wrote:
Jatahaxe wrote: I guess what I meant was it barely does anything new with Godzilla. He doesn't do much new except dance like a lunatic (admittedly a priceless scene). No new monsters, just a new arena and a purdy cool alien invasion, a plot device that Toho would go on to try all kinds of new and exciting things with later in the series.
The plot is really what made it for me; true, Godzilla pretty much did the same old stuff - fought Ghidorah with Rodan, messed around with Aliens, whatever. But the story and the characters were so enjoyable, that didn't matter.

To me, the actual story of the movie (including stuff like characters) is most important. The monster stuff needs to be good, too, but it needs to be surrounded by something worth watching to make with worth getting to.
Aaron Taylor Johnson's Ford can't hold a candle to Nick Adams and Akira Takarada's performances in Monster Zero. Subbed or dubbed. If there is going to be long stretches of nothing, I'd rather spend it watching them.

Doing something innovative isn't too important as long as you do an exceptional job with what you do. But if you're going to nitpick Monster Zero, G14 didn't really offer much "new" either besides the novelty of seeing Godzilla in CGI. Which technically isn't new either. We've seen him swim, tail swipe, fight, and shoot plasma down an opponent's mouth before.
This is where it comes down to a matter of personal taste. Personally, I felt like the characters in G'14 (human and monster) were more believable, unlike Nick Adams and his space girlfriend (as entertaining a relationship that is), and some of Godzilla's more wacky antics in the movie.
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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The romantic relationship in G'14 is certainly more immediately relatable/accessible for most of the audience, in terms of mirroring common experiences. What's going on between Glenn and Namikawa involves a type of emotional conflict that most viewers will never come close to experiencing, and it's presented in broader, more melodramatic, and more innately cinematic terms. It's no less emotionally or narratively valid, but it is fundamentally different. As you say, it's very much a matter of personal taste (although I do feel that Monster Zero does more with the romantic relationship, and that it provides a stronger example of melodrama than G'14's relationship does of naturalism).
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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Nice work on the list, and very interesting. It sure does highlight the lack of Godzilla in last year's film and GFW (relative to some others). But more importantly it also shows the importance of story and characters, as G54 itself has one of the lowest minute counts of Godzilla. However, it's focused (and focused on Godzilla) with excellent explorations of characters. So the "lack" of Godzilla isn't as much an issue. Another favorite of mine personally is Mechagodzilla (1974), which also has a low percentage of Godzilla screentime. But that script and those characters are so enjoyable with excellent battles. Monster Zero and Ghidorah similarly characterize the monsters and have more enjoyable characters. On the other end of the spectrum, Spacegodzilla has tons of Godzilla in it, and BFE has plenty of Godzilla too. But Spacegodzilla remains full of flaws (JMO) that drag the film like poor pacing, and BFE is focused more on the Mothra-Battra subplot than anything involving Godzilla. I'm guessing more people would accept LPG as it was had Cranston been in the lead role and his motivations became more central to the story.
Starsteam wrote: It's a pretty long movie (is it the longest?) but there are some pretty lengthy human scenes between the monster's, so I'm pretty curious how the percentage holds up compared to the rest (don't count Baby Godzilla scenes though).
Yes, G98 is by far the longest of the Godzilla films.
Last edited by Tohosaurus on Thu Oct 13, 2016 4:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by Lioconvoy »

This is awesome to see, I wish I could of shown this to a few certain people who were griping about his screen time in 2014.

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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by kamilleblu »

Lioconvoy wrote:This is awesome to see, I wish I could of shown this to a few certain people who were griping about his screen time in 2014.
It's still towards the bottom and half of that screen time is teasing. With only dorsal plates or tail visible. If you only count the moments he's fully visible or doing something, it would be at the bottom.

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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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eabaker wrote:The romantic relationship in G'14 is certainly more immediately relatable/accessible for most of the audience, in terms of mirroring common experiences. What's going on between Glenn and Namikawa involves a type of emotional conflict that most viewers will never come close to experiencing, and it's presented in broader, more melodramatic, and more innately cinematic terms. It's no less emotionally or narratively valid, but it is fundamentally different. As you say, it's very much a matter of personal taste (although I do feel that Monster Zero does more with the romantic relationship, and that it provides a stronger example of melodrama than G'14's relationship does of naturalism).
Dude. You don't know what kind of fucked up things Invasion of the Astro Monster did to my psyche and psychosexual complexes when I was four years old. I understand them perfectly and have the hardest feels.

And relatable/more accessible doesn't equal better.
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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LSD Jellyfish wrote:And relatable/more accessible doesn't equal better.
Yup. That was exactly my point.
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by Tyrant_Lizard_King »

Hate to dredge up an old topic but according to a brand new interview from Kotaku Shin Godzilla has an estimate G screen time of 18 minutes and 8 seconds. Calculated out to roughly 15% of the film's runtime.
Kotaku: How much of the film is CG? I know lots of the military hardware was CG, which surprised me.

Sato: I don’t know the exact percentage, but Godzilla appears for 18 minutes and 8 seconds in this version. That’s 15% of the entire movie.
That puts it about right in middle ground for Godzilla screen time. Surprised people complain about his lack of screen time if that's the case.
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by szmigiel »

I went and saw it, but I wasn't going to try and break down the screen time in the theater. I will need to do that when it comes out on blu ray.
I will pencil in 18:08 for now and see if I get close later. I will also break down the time between each version of Godzilla, and mark at what time each version makes its appearance.

18:08 would put it at number 8 for total time, between "Return of Godzilla" and "Godzilla Vs Biollante.
With 15% of total time it is tide for 11th place with "Ebirah, Horror of the Deep" and "Godzilla Vs Mothra"

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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by Tyrant_Lizard_King »

Funny for as much as people are complaining about the lack of Godzilla in the film he actually has one of the more prominant appearances in the franchise. It actually has quite a bit more screen time than G14 and yet critics are acting like Shin has barely any more or around the same as G14. Then again Godzilla appears in G14 in only the latter half of the film while Shin's scenes are sprinkled throughout a bit more evenly.
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by szmigiel »

http://jokercluster.blogspot.com/2017/0 ... rst_7.html
The charts are all updated to included all 31 films released so far.

Screen Time Most to Lease
1 Godzilla Vs MechaGodzilla II 0:26:56
2 Godzilla 2000 0:22:28
3 Godzilla Vs Hedorah 0:20:33
4 Godzilla Vs Destroyah 0:20:09
5 Godzilla X Megaguirus 0:20:08
6 Godzilla Vs SpaceGodzilla 0:19:38
7 Return of Godzilla 0:18:54
8 Shin Godzilla 0:17:23
9 Godzilla Vs Biollante 0:16:49
10 GMK: Giant Monsters All Out Attack 0:16:40
11 Godzilla Vs Gigan 0:16:12
12 Godzilla Vs Mothra 0:15:16
13 Godzilla Final Wars 0:14:55
14 Godzilla Vs King Ghidorah 0:14:46
15 Ebirah, Horror of the Deep 0:13:01
16 Godzilla (1998) 0:12:58
17 Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S. 0:12:52
18 Son of Godzilla 0:11:56
19 Godzilla X MechaGodzilla 0:11:48
20 Godzilla Vs Megalon 0:10:24
21 Mothra Vs Godzilla 0:10:24
22 Godzilla (2014) 0:09:56
23 Terror of MechaGodzilla 0:09:34
24 Godzilla Raids Again 0:09:32
25 King Kong Vs Godzilla 0:09:13
26 Gojira 0:08:44
27 Destroy All Monsters 0:08:29
28 All Monsters Attack 0:08:19
29 Ghidorah, the Three Headed Monster 0:07:55
30 Godzilla Vs MechaGodzilla 0:07:55
31 Invasion of the Astro Monster 0:05:43

Percent of Screen Time Most to Least
1 Godzilla Vs MechaGodzilla II 25%
2 Godzilla Vs Hedorah 24%
3 Godzilla 2000 23%
4 Godzilla Vs Destroyah 20%
5 Godzilla X Megaguirus 19%
6 Godzilla Vs Gigan 18%
7 Return of Godzilla 18%
8 Godzilla Vs SpaceGodzilla 18%
9 Godzilla Vs Biollante 16%
10 GMK: Giant Monsters All Out Attack 16%
11 Ebirah, Horror of the Deep 15%
12 Godzilla Vs Mothra 15%
13 Shin Godzilla 15%
14 Son of Godzilla 14%
15 Godzilla Vs King Ghidorah 14%
16 Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S. 14%
17 Godzilla Vs Megalon 13%
18 Godzilla X MechaGodzilla 13%
19 Godzilla Raids Again 12%
20 Mothra Vs Godzilla 12%
21 All Monsters Attack 12%
22 Terror of MechaGodzilla 12%
23 Godzilla Final Wars 12%
24 King Kong Vs Godzilla 10%
25 Destroy All Monsters 10%
26 Gojira 9%
27 Ghidorah, the Three Headed Monster 9%
28 Godzilla Vs MechaGodzilla 9%
29 Godzilla (1998) 9%
30 Godzilla (2014) 8%
31 Invasion of the Astro Monster 6%

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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by Tyrant_Lizard_King »

See in both actual screen time and percentage G14 is towards the lower ends of the spectrum. Man Godzilla seems like he's in Ghidrah a lot more than just 9% of the film!
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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Tyrant_Lizard_King wrote:See in both actual screen time and percentage G14 is towards the lower ends of the spectrum. Man Godzilla seems like he's in Ghidrah a lot more than just 9% of the film!
Too start he is only 1 of 4 kaiju in the film, so the screen time is spread between all of them. Also Honda and Tsuburaya did a good job of spreading out the fight between Godzilla and Rodan during the second act. The battle between the two is only shown in short segments, less then a minute, spread out across the act ending with the talk between Godzilla, Rodan, and Mothra. So once Godzilla shows up the film keep checking in on him and it doesn't feel like he is missing, even though overall time is short.

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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by LSD Jellyfish »

I watched GTTHM the other night and Godzilla isn't really the star of the film, the film treats all four monsters pretty evenly.

I think screentime is also irrelevant when you consider tension and build up. Even though Godzilla isn't physically on screen a majority of the film he's continually in the back of the mind of the viewers given destruction seen post facto as well as reports of his destruction. The entire film is also about him and people studying him.

Contrast to G14 where Godzilla is just there. Other than the scene with serizawa discussing his history he's not really significant.

Also I think a more accurate view would be seeing how much total time monsters, not just Godzilla take up in the film. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla has tons of monster action but Godzilla only shows up briefly.
Last edited by LSD Jellyfish on Fri Sep 08, 2017 8:11 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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LSD Jellyfish wrote:I think screentime is also irrelevant when you consider tension and build up. Even though Godzilla isn't physically on screen a majority of the film he's continually in the back of the mind of the viewers given destruction seen post facto as well as reports of his destruction. The entire film is also about him and people studying him.

Contrast to G14 where Godzilla is just there. Other than the scene with serizawa discussing his history he's not really significant.
I would actually completely disagree; ' tension and build up. Even though Godzilla isn't physically on screen a majority of the film he's continually in the back of the mind of the viewers given destruction seen post facto as well as reports of his destruction.' is exactly how I'd describe G14, and exactly the point of how his screen-time is utilized; even his big reveal in Hawaii is a tease, building anticipation for the big ending showdown. While (similar to the distribution in GTTHM), a lot of that buildup is also distributed tot he MUTOs (setting them up as a greater threat to emphasize the role of a more heroic protector Godzilla in saving mankind from them), the exact same tactic being favorably described in GTTHM is equally (and I'd suggest even more effectively) applied in G14.

It really isn't about the screentime, it's about the usage and the purpose behind the screentime- a factor recognized in the entire fourth of all Godzilla films that rank below the 2014 film in terms of total screentime but are still defended and beloved. G14 deserves the same recognition; and hey, I'd say it deserves to be equally beloved, but if it's not someone else's cup of tea, that's fine. It's okay to say 'I just don't like it.' But the screentime thing is not a good reason why; at least, not one that shouldn't also disparage a number of other well-liked G-films in the process.
Last edited by Zarm on Fri Sep 08, 2017 8:49 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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LSD Jellyfish wrote:Also I think a more accurate view would be seeing how much total time monsters, not just Godzilla take up in the film. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla has tons of monster action but Godzilla only shows up briefly.
I do have that information on each films breakdown, but hard to put it all in one list. But I would like to do that as my next big project. The notes I took are pretty detailed so I want to create a timeline for each film that plots the scenes all the kaiju are in as blocks of time on the timeline. Then try to create a master chart with all the films, or maybe try it by era if that chart is to big.

Also toying with the idea of going back over the films and counting the number of times kaiju beam attacks are used and how long they last.
Last edited by szmigiel on Fri Sep 08, 2017 9:07 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

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szmigiel wrote:Also toying with the idea of going back over the films and counting the number of times kaiju beam attacks are used and how long they last.
Good luck with Heisei. :) They seem to enjoy animating stutter-beams and quick cuts that make the counts practically need to be frame-by-frame to determine what's going on... (at least, based on my experience trying to count in vs. Mothra and vs. Spacegodzilla.)
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Re: Godzilla Franchise Screentime Rundown

Post by Tyrant_Lizard_King »

The only films comparable to G14 are Final Wars, G98, and Shin Godzilla. They're the only films that break the 2 hour mark. The percentage is more important than the actual number of minutes in the film. If Godzilla is only in an hour and a half movie for 10 minutes and in a 2 hour+ movie for 10 minutes I'd rather watch the shorter film.

Added in 5 minutes 44 seconds:
Sorry I'm getting dragged into some bull against my will. So that post was a little half assed.
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